Brawl Over Starbucks Lingo Gets Customer Booted

'All I did was ask for a bagel,' professor insists
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 16, 2010 9:27 AM CDT
Brawl Over Starbucks Lingo Gets Customer Booted
In this Nov. 2, 2009 file photo, customers enter a Starbucks coffee shop in Arlington, Mass.   (AP Photo/Elise Amendola, file)

It was only a matter of time before Starbucks' bizarre lingo (tall? whatever happened to small?) drove someone batty. Fittingly, it was a college English professor who finally had enough, and subsequently got removed from the store by three police officers. "I just wanted a multigrain bagel," Lynne Rosenthal tells the New York Post. "I refused to say 'without butter or cheese.' When you go to Burger King, you don't have to list the six things you don't want. Linguistically, it's stupid."

The self-proclaimed "stickler for correct English" refused to answer the barista's "butter or cheese" question, instead yelling, "I want my multigrain bagel!" she says. But the barista responded, "You're not going to get anything unless you say butter or cheese!" As the verbal altercation heated up (one employee claims Rosenthal called the barista "an asshole"), the manager called the cops, who asked Rosenthal to leave. "If you don't use their language, they refuse to serve you," says Rosenthal. "They don't understand what a plain multigrain bagel is."
(More Starbucks stories.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X