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Although the recent upswing in solidarity surrounding the marriage equality debate in the Supreme Court has been mostly positive, a woman in Harlem is strongly against it. A coffee shop owner lost a customer after the owner drew a pink Human Rights Campaign logo on an erasable board. The customer later aired her disdain on social media. 

DNAInfo.com reports that the Chipped Cup coffee shop in the Hamilton Heights section of Harlem met the ire of Leesa Dahl, who felt that the shop’s support of marriage equality was a slap in the face. Arts Journal blogger Norman Lebrecht wrote that Dahl is a piano teacher at the Aspen Festival School and Juilliard. Taking her frustrations to Facebook, Dahl made clear which side of the aisle she stood on.

“You just lost two local customers with your political sandwich board,” wrote Dahl wrote on the shop’s Facebook page. “We were so happy when you joined the neighborhood and were faithful, but alienating the majority of the population is a really irritating and dumb move. We will encourage others not to patronize your business.”

Dahl just didn’t stop there and took to Twitter to continue her spiel. “It’s too bad @ChippedCupNY discriminates against 98% of their customer base by being H8ful!”

Dahll got a Facebook response from 33-year-old shop owner Andrew Ding, who is also gay. Using profanity to hammer home her point, Dahl angrily dismissed Ding’s return jabs on the comments page. Dahl said in private messages to DNAInfo that she’s being painted as a “bigot” and is being judged “wrongly and unfairly.”

It appears that Dahl has a history of online confrontations. Twitter user Michael Walsh found a link of 2009 discussion where the pianist was accused of making hateful edits to a classical singer’s Wikipedia page.

Much to Dahl’s displeasure we’re sure, Chipped Cup decided to put the sign back out today.

Check out the next page to see the exchange between Dahl and Chipped Cup on Facebook and shots of the sign in the gallery.

Update: It was reported that Dahl was a staff member of Juilliard and the Aspen Festival School. It appears that it no longer the case. Also, last year she was removed from duties at the New York Lyric Opera House and a representative confirmed she is no longer associated with the company.

Photo: Jeff Mays/DNAInfo.com/

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