David Brooks: 2020 taught us how to fix this Implicit bias is absolutely real. Courses to reduce its effects don’t seem to work. (Paul Sancya | AP photo) A sign announcing the store is closed is shown on the door of a Starbucks in Detroit, May 29, 2018. Starbucks closed more than 8,000 stores nationwide to conduct anti-bias training, the next of many steps the company is taking to try to restore its tarnished diversity-friendly image. By David Brooks | The New York Times | Dec. 31, 2020, 9:10 p.m. This is the year that broke the truth. This is the year when millions of Americans — and not just your political opponents — seemed impervious to evidence, willing to believe the most outlandish things if it suited their biases, and eager to develop fervid animosities based on crude stereotypes.