Racist staffing hierarchies can coexist with impeccably nonracist customer service.

Evidence

Comparison for inconsistency with other (nonracist) situations is also a useful tool. This heuristic poses the question: how should service have been in a nonracialized situation? Or, do you know of similar situations (staying in a hotel) where racism had not been a problem, what happened in that case? Preceding our visit to the President Hotel, we stayed at the one of the Movenpick hotels. The staff ranking followed traditional color lines: management white, reception and services black, Colored, Asian, kitchen black. But the service was impeccable. From waitress to manager, customer friendliness was the code. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1509

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces the ‘comparison for inconsistency’ heuristic — a methodical way to test whether a discrimination experience is racism or something else.