Joey, can we talk?
That would be the best approach for Philadelphia's Commission on Human Relations. In fact, making a low-key effort to settle grievances is its usual way.
Now that the agency has waded into the Geno's Steaks sideshow by filing an official bias complaint, city officials need to take a breath.
They'd be wise to remember something about Geno's owner Joseph Vento's business: It's all too easy to burn your fingers on a hot grill.
There's no need for anyone in City Hall to crank up the heat - no more than Vento himself has done by enjoying the 15 minutes of fame he's won by posting a silly counter sign that reads "This is America. When ordering, speak English."
Judging from the national avalanche of comments, and the lines outside the South Philadelphia landmark, Vento touched a nerve in the debate over immigration. The question posed by the complaint is whether Vento also crossed a line.
If he's found to have denied service to customers due to their national origin, or turned them away just by virtue of posting the sign, then Vento may have run afoul of the law.
It's one thing to mount a soapbox and gripe about people who speak little or no English. It's another thing to push that viewpoint while running an establishment supposedly open to all customers.
Opposing bias isn't hyper-sensitive political correctness. Sure, Vento has free-speech rights. But sometimes one person's right bumps against another person's, and something has to give. Vento is running a public accommodation, just like those lunch counters in the segregated South where African Americans couldn't get a seat. Some of the arguments that some of Vento's defenders are offering sound awfully familiar from those days.
To be fair, the analogy ends there. It's hard to link any actual harm to Vento's English-only grandstanding. He's not accused of actually refusing service to any customer.
The Human Relations Commission has power to levy fines, but that's not the desired outcome here. The commission's charter is to offer "mediation, conciliation [and] counseling," when such conflicts arise, as they will in a diverse city.
Vento's sign is a protest against the anxieties caused by rapid changes in his neighborhood. The commission knows how to help people work through such scary changes, while at the same time supporting immigrants' right to learn English at their pace.
So, Joey . . . The cameras will leave soon enough. Your newfound customers rushing down to Ninth and Pash-ee-yunk to support you will get on with their lives. But your neighbors will still be your neighbors.
There must be elders in your community who remember similar slights. Ask them about their parents being told that no Italians need apply.
It's time for brotherly love.
