Alleged 'fat, ugly' policy a bad piece of business

My dad worked nearly his whole life for a modest, family-centered chain of department stores, starting out selling shoes and working his way up to management.

Along the way, he got to know people better than just about anyone I've met.

And while I wouldn't go so far as to call him a retail therapist, he developed this knack for treating people right, no matter who they were or where they came from.

He had purely practical reasons, of course. If you're rude, people will remember it. They'll tell their friends. After that, you won't have to deal with annoying customers anymore - you won't have to deal with many customers at all.

But to my dad, treating people with respect was more than good business. It was the right thing to do.

So I've been wondering this week what he'd say about a West Liberty woman's complaint that staff at an Iowa City bar wouldn't let her dance on a raised platform with her friends. (That is, what he'd say after he got done shaking his head about the idea of young women dancing on bars.)

University of Iowa student Jordan Ramos was out at The Union Bar when her friends decided to climb onto a platform and dance. But when she went to join them, she says, a bar employee stopped her because she was “not pretty enough” and “obviously pregnant.”

Ramos, who isn't pregnant, told reporters she tried to file a human rights complaint with Iowa City, but there are no civil protections for size discrimination.

That's little help to The Union as the story has spread - to ABC News, Huffington Post, and everywhere in between. Staff may not have broken any laws, but the allegations sure make them look like jerks.

Now, to no one's surprise, a former Union bouncer is confirming that staff were told to let good-looking females dance in high-profile areas but to keep the “fat and ugly girls” away.

Union owner George Wittgraf has publicly apologized for any disparaging comments his staff may have made to Ramos. The bar owner nailed it when he told a reporter: “We can't be mean to people. It's bad business.”

To some, the whole thing seems pretty silly. None of us has a constitutional right to shake our booties on the bar. People, especially women, are judged by their looks roughly a billion times a day.

But as my dad would tell you, there's a difference between making judgments and treating people unfairly.

The latter is more than bad for business, it's a bad business altogether.

Comments: (319) 339-3154; jennifer.hemmingsen@sourcemedia.net