Relief for fired Starbucks partner Benjamin South

My name is Benjamin South and on August 3rd, 2022 Starbucks fired me over Microsoft Teams.

A few weeks prior a bad faith troll on Twitter photoshopped three of my tweets together that all expressed anger over transphobia to make it appear as if I was threatening violence against our manager who was hired in from out of state after we went public. That same manager once called in materials (protest signs) as a suspicious package after they were left during one of our protests, resulting in the police contacting me.

My tweets were NOT threats but I maintain my frustration-- it is dangerous to be trans in this world, and I will NEVER stop advocating for intersectional human rights, even as Starbucks fires me.

The official reason given for my firing was that I made "threats of violence on Twitter." In the months leading up to this I was written up several times in store for the most erroneous of things, including missing an inventory count. I got my last warning on my birthday, weeks before they closed our store and made us bargain for our jobs.

This week our bargaining committee finally came to an agreement with Starbucks, our jobs are being offered back at the stores that are still open. I will not get to go back into the store and continue our fight with my union.

And here I am with no health insurance, $50 in my bank account, and an inability to get unemployment because of the bargaining effort Starbucks forced us into by closing our store. I had to fill out an extensive questionnaire by paper about it all and my unemployment status is still under review.

Please help me as I look for a new job and continue to stand up for the rights of all workers. This fight is not over, and my time with the Starbucks Workers United union is not over. But I have no backup plan. I have no family to borrow money from. And right now I'm less than a paycheck away from losing most things.

I know that soon we will be able to celebrate every Starbucks as a unionized store. And there is power in our union. Money is so finite for everybody. Any form of solidarity goes 10,000 miles for me. I'm just glad to have you all in my life.