In West Asheville, coffee brewed with outrage

Update: Store to be temporarily closed starting Monday, give proceeds to rape crisis group.

WEST ASHEVILLE — Misogynistic Internet postings have drawn protests of a West Asheville coffee shop after its co-owners chronicled their graphic sexual conquests of women in forums they believed were anonymous.

Jared Rutledge and Jacob Owens, owners of Waking Life Espresso, have issued apologies for a podcast and website that critics say is an affront to women in the community.

In response to the blog posts and anonymous social media accounts, local businesses began removing Waking Life products from their stores and West Asheville residents staged protests outside of the business.

Rutledge has taken responsibility for a now-removed but archived Twitter account and blog that described detailed, often degrading, sexual encounters with dozens of women, many of whom he said he met in his Haywood Road business.

The posts detail the intimate encounters and body types of women, but they also mention the “red pill,” a slang term related to an online philosophy that champions sexual conquest as “game,” with “winning” strategy relying on dominance by an alpha male.

“Men’s problem is finding attractive, valuable women who will submit,” one blog post reads. “It could be an issue of the small town in which I live, but the pickings are slim. Women don’t seem to have that problem — their problem is finding dominant, valuable men who will commit.”

At Waking Life on Sunday, Rutledge told the Citizen-Times that the posts were his, but declined further comment.

But in West Asheville, a community that prides itself for supporting local business, the revelations were viewed as an affront, made clear with boisterous — and quieter — protests against Waking Life.

The West Village Market & Deli pulled iced coffee bottled by Waking Life from its shelves Sunday morning, said manager Nicki Lizotte, saying the posts, while not illegal, were immoral and hurtful to women and the larger community. Lizotte said her decision came after hearing Greenlife Grocery had removed the coffee shop’s beverages from its cooler. Greenlife did not immediately confirm that decision.

Rather than throw out the bottles, Lizotte said she gave them to nearby Orbit DVD, where workers said they cleared their own stock of the product by channeling the community’s outrage into a positive outlet.

For each $4 bottle the store sells, it will donate $50 to Our Voice, a rape crisis organization, Orbit manager Kayla Bott said. The store plans to dip into its profits for the difference.

“These are literally the women of the community that we live with,” she said. “These are our friends. These are our loved ones. These are our neighbors. There are mothers. We are taking this situation personally, and we are supportive of the women of the community.”

While the postings aren’t criminal, Orbit owner Marc McCloud decided to support Our Voice because the nonprofit advocates against abusive behavior, Bott said.

“The problem is not sleeping with people or talking about it,” she added. “The problem is using women as things to boost your own ego. This is an act of dehumanizing women for self-aggrandizement and that is not a good reason or way to improve your own self esteem.”

The postings by Rutledge and Owens appear to have been first made public by an anonymous blog poster about a month ago, but gained widespread criticism in recent days as the information was posted on Facebook.

An example of one of the blog’s typical entries reads, “Early twenties friend of one of my employees, (the dating site) Tinder provided the introduction. Radical feminist on the outside, radical submissive in the bedroom. Loved being abused and dominated.”

Groups protested outside Waking Life on Sunday. Another protest is scheduled to begin at 7 a.m. Monday, organized under a Facebook group with a name that revises the punchline to an old joke: “We like our coffee like we like our women. Not at Waking Life.”

Some people want to see the business closed, others who are angry are unsure of the solution, said Shawn Johnson, who has a popular West Asheville handyman business and is helping with the rally.

He said he also is uncertain about ousting Waking Life, but patrons should know about podcasts and posts that not only condone manipulative behavior toward women, but also seek to teach other men those methods.

“If I found out a subcontractor did that, I would disassociate with that person immediately,” he said. “That’s the accountability you have as a business owner. I feel like any other person in a job would be fired over this.”

In his online apology for posts made under accounts titled “Holistic Game,” Rutledge asked for forgiveness for violating the trust of women involved in intimate encounters, saying he sometimes vented in a hateful and foolish way under the cloak of anonymity.

“I grew up in West Asheville and have disappointed and brought shame to the community that raised me, and there’s not really anything I can do to make it right,” he wrote. “There are no excuses to be made. The way I’ve phrased and framed my private conduct in a sad and tawdry public way is humiliating.”

Owens also offered an online mea culpa, stressing that he was not responsible for blog or twitter posts, but was aware of their existence and general content. He and Rutledge together produced the podcast.

“Under a disguise that I thought would be anonymous, without the accountability that good friends hold you too, this persona that I am fully responsible for developed into a chauvinist and a misogynist,” Owens wrote. “I love women. I value them. In my experiences with them they have taught me of kindness, grace, and compassion. Many of my words in the podcast do not reflect that.”