[ Five myths about gentrification ]It was one coffee shop among many, and the latest expansion for a large Colorado chain. Countless people asked basically the same question, and it took all of an afternoon for the Larimer Street coffee shop with cortados and Brazilian Conquista beans to become seen as a symbol of racial privilege and arrogance. Coffee had apparently drunk too much coffee and therefore accidentally celebrated gentrification. This time the chain’s founder, Keith Herbert, published a thick mea culpa on Facebook, writing that he had thought a proudly gentrifying coffee shop would be seen as a good thing, but now understood his error. “I am embarrassed to say that I did not fully appreciate the very real and troubling issue of gentrification,” Herbert wrote.

Source: Washington Post November 25, 2017 22:02 UTC