A Texas Roadhouse server has sparked discussion on TikTok after claiming that a group wearing Confederate flag attire verbally harassed the staff at the restaurant.
In a video with over 189,000 views, TikTok user Lona (@love.lona) says that the large group entered her Texas Roadhouse wearing Confederate flag gear.
When they were eventually seated, one of the servers, who is Black, went to assist them. According to Lona, the group proceeded to use the N-word numerous times and refused to interact with the server.
@love.lona It was such an intense night tonight. I was getting so mad not only because of the table but the fact i had to watch and hear them treating one of the nicest caring souls I’ve ever met that way and they were still able to stay in the restaurant. How dare you take it as far as telling your kid to shutup and not talk to your own server because he is black. The minute they started dropping the N word while the server was present at the table is the minute they shouldve been kicked out. #fyp #blm✊🏻✊🏼✊🏽✊🏾✊🏿 ♬ original sound – Nani
“This server is a server that’s always happy, loud, outgoing, making sure everybody’s good,” Lona says. “He ended up going outside crying, and this is a grown-ass man.”
When the meal concluded, the server did not receive a tip on a bill of around $540. Lona and other servers pooled some of their tips together to make up for the server’s lost income.
“He still served them. He didn’t throw a fit, didn’t do nothing,” Lona explains. “Which, props to him.”
“It’s one thing to come in [wearing] what you believe in…You want to wear that? Okay. I don’t know why. But the fact that you’re N-word dropping, all this, all that—they made their kids stop talking to the server, too,” Lona details.
“I was getting so mad not only because of the table but the fact I had to watch and hear them treating one of the nicest, caring souls I’ve ever met that way and they were still able to stay in the restaurant,” she wrote in the caption. “How dare you take it as far as telling your kid to shutup and not talk to your own server because he is black?”
“The minute they started dropping the N-word while the server was present at the table is the minute they should’ve been kicked out,” she concluded.
In the comments section, users were largely in agreement with Lona’s assessment of the incident.
“Texas Roadhouse needs to do better and stand up for their employees,” wrote one user. “Wow.”
“Managers and company needs to held accountable [because] he very well could’ve been in harm’s way,” added another.
“As a customer I would have went full Karen with your manager,” shared a third. “They failed your staff.”
The Daily Dot reached out to Texas Roadhouse via email and Lona via TikTok direct message.
Update 8:27am CT, May 5, 2023: In a TikTok direct message conversation with the Daily Dot, Lona claimed that she’s since discussed the incident with management.
“The managing partner of the restaurant sat me down and talked to me at work last night,” she detailed. “I told him my side of the story and how I felt they (management) didn’t do anything until the end of the table’s stay, after [the server] told them he’s not going back to the table and stepped out crying. The manager did apologize and said he left in the middle of the table being here because he didn’t think it would escalate more.”
“I was telling managers about them dropping the N-word way before he left and I was just told, ‘Are they calling him it or just saying it while he’s at the table?’ Not that it should matter in any way,” she continued. She noted that management did not try to punish her for sharing her perspective on the incident to TikTok.
In the future, Lona shared how she thought similar situations should be handled.
“They better just kick them out,” she stated. “There’s no way of knowing if they’re the same family from the previous group or if it’s new people, so to keep everyone safe and not have any of this happening again [they should be kicked out], because you never know how a situation will escalate.”
