Is This Man Playing The Race Card Perhaps Could This Be An Occasion Where He Is Justified In Complaining?

[sp1814]

...or should he simply not get’ so uppity’?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7701629/Black-man-24-victim-racist-abuse-Wetherspoons.html

[TheDevil]

Weatherspoon's could have acted more appropriately if they accepted the complaint for what it was, rather than the staff (which can't reflect Weatherspoon as a whole) dismissing any kind of issue.

[ToraToraTora]

The table service app in the spoons is great, just get a table and beer arrives and yes it's very simple to order for another table and the staff do not know who has ordered it they just bring it to the table. You can actually by a drink for any table in any spoons pub. Just waiting for my student son to realise that!

[retrocop]

//It was definitely not funny but racist.
He should have got the staff to identify who ordered it and then stuffed the banana into their gob. //

I am not sure that's possible Theland. From what I have seen of this app,which I have never used, a customer taps their order on their phone with a table no. It can be food or drink. The order is paid with a debit card. In my spoon there is a TV monitor behind the bar which flashes up a table no which has been activated by the app. A member of staff notes the order and brings it to the table.
I cannot see how Weatherspoon's staff can legally ascertain who's phone the order came from and who's debit card paid for it.

[pixie374]

Is that what happened, thedevil? It doesn't really say whether there was an apology or not- there was certainly an explanation given for it. I think the wrong people are being blamed here.

[Theland]

Put yourself in the shoes of the black victim.
It is quite sick and hurtful and not a bit funny.

[pixie374]

It says of the staff...// They thought they had brought an incorrect order. We had to explain what was wrong with that.//
Do we need to start associating bananas with black people now? What is he actually trying to achieve here?
It does appear some stranger was making some racist gesture- and hopefully can be identified. But I would be worried about staff refusing to serve something they believed was genuinely ordered, because the customers were black.
Isn't this the opposite of what we really want?

[pixie374]

Yes, theland. I'm not saying it is, just that the person who ordered it, is the person who is responsible.

[Theland]

Why didn't the so called prankster have the guts to buy the banana and take it over to the table himself, instead of acting so cowardly and hiding behind the handy anonymity?
A gutless coward.

[pixie374]

You've answered it yourself x

[woofgang]

pixie, they didn't have to refuse to serve it, firstly if they had concerns over the order, they could have gone to the table and said words to the effect of this was ordered for your table but not sure that you ordered it? and secondly when the problem had been identified to them, then they could have taken it seriously. I think as is often the case with complaints, all the bloke wanted was to be heard and understood and not dismissed. I also think that now this has happened, the app might need to be tweaked to require some kind of identification of who is ordering.

[naomi24]

//A gutless coward. //

Which is precisely why the victim shouldn't react in a way that pleases the perpetrator, ie showing that he's angry or hurt. That's exactly what the idiot wants.

[pixie374]

I think the app definitely needs some improvement. I have never (stupidly, maybe) related bananas with black people. I think it would be a shame to start now. Do I really need to?

[retrocop]

If the customer/complainant genuinely ordered a banana I can see him getting equally annoyed if a member of staff approached him first and said,"Did you really order a banana ?"The staff are just completing an anonymous order.Why should they have to question who orders what?

[TheDevil]

Pixie374 - "Is that what happened, thedevil?"

Yes. The man made a complaint on more than one occasion and the staff said that they "didn't see an issue" on the first, and had the same sentiment on the second time the man complained.

[dannyk13]

Pixie,banana eater has for ages been a racist remark aimed at people form Africa.

[pixie374]

That does seem equally bad to me, retro. I have spent so many years working with so many different people, it seems really unnatural to start thinking of them differently. Clearly, racism happens, as proven here... but I really don't want to start consciously registering the colour of the person I'm talking to... is that what I should be doing now?

[pixie374]

I think the gesture by the stranger was clearly racist and offensive. I just am not sure that the staff are to blame, for treating a black customer in the same way that they would a white customer. Is that really racist?

[dannyk13]

Pixie, the racist is the person who ordered the banana, but I do think that the staff could have been more sympathetic.

[TheDevil]

No. How they served the man was not racist. How they dealt with the complaint was racist.

[retrocop]

//but I really don't want to start consciously registering the colour of the person I'm talking to... is that what I should be doing now? //

Unfortunately in this day and age. Yes. The title of the OP says, 'Is this man playing the race card?' May be , May be not. You have to be very careful what you say or do lest offence is taken whether intended or not..