Sanctions at the Genius Bar

[JustAnotherGen]

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/12/opinion/why-is-apple-discriminating-against-iranian-americans.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&emc=eta1&adxnnlx=1342188062-u6YnMTak9aCQsJXE5RkASQ
Did my best to keep it under four paragraphs but get the relevant information in there. I know we had some posts about this last week in GD - but I think it's better to put this article in Race and Ethnicity. . . Since it appears the company in question has given their employees just enough information on the Sanctions Programs for them to feel comfortable making decisions to sell based on race/color of skin/foreign language spoken.

Last month, Sahar Sabet, a 19-year-old Iranian-American woman, was improperly prevented from buying an iPad at an Apple store in Alpharetta, Ga. After she had gone over the various options with two Apple sales clerks, a third clerk, who had overheard Ms. Sabet speaking Persian to her uncle, intervened. He asked what language they were speaking and, when he found out it was the language of Iran, he said she could not buy anything because “our countries do not have good relations” — never mind that she intended to give it to her sister in North Carolina. A local news account had Ms. Sabet describing a cousin in Iran as the intended recipient, an inaccuracy that was propagated last week in a Wall Street Journal opinion article defending Apple’s discriminatory behavior.

An isolated episode could be dismissed as the work of one bigoted, or misguided, employee. But there have been other recent reports of Apple employees refusing to sell to customers of Iranian descent.

In Santa Monica, Calif., two friends looking to buy an iPhone were asked whether they were speaking Persian and promptly informed, “I am sorry, we don’t sell to Persians.” In Sacramento, an Iranian-American man looking to buy Apple products for personal use mentioned that he was also thinking about buying an iPod for his nephew in Iran and was told he could not buy anything, even for himself. An Iranian student in Atlanta, and his Iranian-American friend, were not permitted to buy an iPhone after the friend, under questioning, mentioned that the student planned to return to Iran for the summer.

Apple has not been taken over by xenophobes. The discrimination is one result of trying to enforce flawed and haphazard United States export controls against countries, like Iran, that are under sanctions. Retail employees are left to interpret and implement federal policy, and racial profiling results.

I'm employed in Import/Export/Freight Control liason to Homeland Security and Secretary of State for a major wireless carrier.

Do we have posted limitations for our employees? Yep. Basically - don't ship phones/devices to Sanctions program countries. We also have a short list of countries where there are no sanctions - but if we ship to the customer a replacement device there are additional rules that have to be followed and/or it's at the customer's own risk. Two examples:

Italy - you have to include a copy of the customer's passport in the Airway bill. Not our issue as a company - but Italy - their government requires it.

Greece - a few years back we had several reports of our customers having to 'grease palms' at customs in Greece. Ditto Turkey and Belarus and Jamaica and a few others. But again - those are issues that are the domain of those countries - not ours. And certainly not those of a US company.

What is in our power to control? It's in our power to just decide to NOT sell a tablet, ipad or cell phone to someone because they may be of Iranian descent. Or Somali descent. Or maybe they speak Farsi? Or - hell - maybe they speak Italian. Or maybe they are just a black American and an employee has a bee in their bonnet because they are a bigot.

By the way - this is a hot issue for me because my inbox is being blown up with questions from the field on what our approach should be . . . I've canned a quick response that references the internal resource base - but also am making clear - you CANNOT discriminate against people for this. Your job is to sell regardless of race, religion, gender, creed and once the customer leaves the store it is their responsibility.

Can I say anything OTHER than that? Truthfully - as an 'industry' - we have some many reasons to be ashamed of ourselves. But decisions like this at the street level? This just makes us look like shit.