That’s the Way the Cookie Cancels

May 12, 2021

The year I turned 21, I’d finally worked my way from crappy coffee shop gigs to a serving position in one of the finest restaurants in town.

However, because of my inherent klutziness and tendency to burst into tears every time the chef yelled at me for standing too close to the walk-in, I was fired after a few weeks. This did not end my restaurant career, but a few more gigs of broken plates, ass-grabbing patrons, psychotic managers, and a glass of 17-year old Scotch spilled into Tom Selleck’s lap nudged me in other directions. (Mr. Selleck was very gracious about me pawing at his pants with a bar towel and definitely not an ass-grabber.)

Around the same time, I found myself dating a philandering law student with ethics issues and ended up at Planned Parenthood. The affordable, non-judgmental care I received was a balm to a lonely girl living in a lonely world, and it empowered me to become more proactive in protecting myself not only from unwanted pregnancy but also STDs, cervical cancer, and men who lie.

That challenging year of personal growth left me with a zeal for reproductive healthcare access advocacy and a lifelong pledge to knuck anyone who bucks with an undeserving restaurant employee just trying to make it through a double shift while wearing a bow tie.

So last week, when I got wind that some of the restaurants participating in Planned Parenthood Southeast’s annual Mother’s Day fundraiser were the target of a coordinated cancel campaign by local anti-abortion fanatics, my hackles reared.

Organized by local pastry chef supreme and my favorite genius Natasha Gaskill, “Plan C: Cookies for Choice” offered a massive box of gorgeous confections crafted by 29 local bakers and chefs in exchange for a $60 donation to PPSE. Supporters definitely got the winning end of this super sweet deal, and its stunning success in 2019 had people salivating for its post-COVID return. That the event sold out surprised no one.

Full disclosure: I sit on the advisory board of PPSE, which oversees clinics and provides reproductive healthcare policy support in Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. “Y’know, the easy states,” PPSE President & CEO Staci “Stone Cold” Fox likes to say with a wink. In fact, Georgia currently bears the highest mother mortality rate in the U.S., and the next Supreme Court challenge to Roe vs. Wade will revolve around Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban.

While extremists fixate on Planned Parenthood’s commitment to keeping abortion safe, accessible, and legal, informed people know its mission and practices are far more comprehensive. Its clinics in all 50 states serve more than four and half million people a year—women, men and non-binary—regardless of race, income level, immigration status, sexual practices or gender identity. And healthcare means birth control, HIV testing, cancer screenings, mental health counseling and basic primary care. Insurance is accepted but not necessary, as services are offered on a sliding scale.

“I think the people who demonize Planned Parenthood don’t realize how essential their services are, especially to people who can’t afford health insurance,” says Natasha. “For many people who work in restaurants, that’s the only doctor they see.”

How important does the restaurant industry consider Planned Parenthood? Much has been written about the restaurant revolution rumbling in this country, so let’s just break this down as simply as possible: In the midst of labor shortages, supply chain snafus and unprecedented incivility from customers, more than two dozen local restaurants volunteered unpaid time and raw ingredients to bake 250 cookies a piece for Plan C. Do you have any idea what 250 cookies looks like piled on a counter? Even the Keebler elves would struggle with such a hustle.

And yet, they responded to the call. For some restaurant owners, taking part wasn’t so much a political stance as it is a way to stand with their employees.

“Yes, we’re short-staffed, and everyone’s exhausted,” said Collins Quarter owner Anthony Debreceny. “But I support my people, and they wanted to help this cause.”

Ardsley Station’s Tyler Kopka echoed that his enthusiasm for the fundraiser came from a commitment to his crew. “I would never want to push extra work on my staff, but they were so excited to do it. This is really important to them.”

In addition to sugar and stirring, it took added fortitude to field the nasty emails, rude phone calls and veiled threats that proliferated over several days, many which landed upon shift managers and servers. The content clearly came from a standardized script, we’ll never set foot in your business again, we’re praying that you go bankrupt and also for your holy salvation, we never liked your French fries anyway yadda yadda, though some proffered more hostility, and in at least one case, a creepy, unsigned handwritten note. Another vitriolically and erroneously conflated the problematic viewpoints of Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger a century ago—an issue Planned Parenthood leadership has faced head on—with Nazi eugenics.

Don’t get it twisted: The issue here isn’t that these haters oppose Planned Parenthood, or even that they eat conspiracy theories for breakfast. And I don’t assume all of you share my passion for Planned Parenthood, either. Though I do wonder why anyone who still believes that subjugating personal reproductive choices on a planet of more than seven and half billion people—most of whom live in abject poverty—is going to work out so well for our species.

We all have our opinions, and often, deeply personal reasons for them. And while some are better informed than others, we all still have the right to declare them. Letting a business know that we choose to patronize them (or not) for whatever reason is late-stage capitalism’s only recourse for actual humans in a society that’s been hijacked by algorithms.

Where we spend—and don’t spend—our dollars is arguably the greatest power we have. It certainly has a far more immediate effect than voting. You bet your biscuit that I keep a list of local businesses from which I will never, ever buy coffee, pizza, a gun, furniture, inflammatory jingoistic t-shirts, or anything from a place that allows this fake “women’s health” bus to sit in their parking lot.

But if you think it’s OK to express moral outrage by harassing restaurant folk right now—even if the owner is a Fentanyl-pushing litterbug who clubs baby seals while wearing a MAGA hat—then you are an unequivocal asshole. I think Tom Selleck would agree.

Canceling isn’t really my style, anyway. I’d rather fill the negative void with support for the small businesses doing right by our community, especially the chefs, bakers and restaurant workers who put in oven overtime last week.

Staci Fox, who took time from battling anti-abortion legislation in three states to come to Savannah and pick up her cookies, put it best: “In a time when their industry is scraping to come back, they gave to others. They showed up for autonomy and freedom.”

By the way, Plan C 2021 raised over $20,000, which will go directly towards providing high-quality healthcare right here in Savannah to many of the same folks who baked the cookies.

Could you ask for more just desserts?

Unapologetically yours ~ JLL

Big gratitude and praise to all the Plan C Bakers: