A Black cashier at a Louisiana store claims a customer refused to let her handle his bottle of wine and made a racist remark about her hair and hands. She posted surveillance footage of their encounter on TikTok, where the video has sparked divided reactions from netizens.
Some viewers said they were outraged by what the cashier alleged, while others questioned whether the video alone supported her claims.
The footage showed the customer approaching the checkout area with a bottle of wine shortly after another customer finished checking out. When it was his turn, the cashier reached for the bottle, but the man appeared reluctant to let it go. For a moment, both of them held onto it before the cashier released her grip.
The man then moved the bottle over the checkout equipment himself. The cashier reached for it again and took it from him, but before she could finish processing the item at the register, the man took the bottle back and walked away.
The original audio did not accompany the posted surveillance footage, so what was said between the pair during the interaction cannot be heard. However, the cashier alleged that the customer “didn’t like the idea of me touching it with my ‘greasy nappy hair fingers.'”
She further claimed that after the customer walked away from her checkout, he got another bottle and took it to a different cashier.
Netizens React to the Louisiana Store Incident
Several viewers took the cashier at her word and condemned the customer’s alleged behavior. “Soo unacceptable. I’m sorry this happened to you!” one person wrote. Another said, “Man these ppl go out their way to be racist.” A third asked, “Why would he even come in your line in the first place? It’s crazy they try to flex their racism like that.”
Others mocked the customer for being picky about who touched his bottle. “Acting like a hundred people didn’t touch it before it got to his hand smh,” one comment read. Another chimed in, “I wonder how he thinks the bottles got on the shelf. Does he just think the bottles were handled by white people wearing sterile gloves?”
Meanwhile, some watched the footage but were unconvinced the customer had said or done anything racist, especially because viewers couldn’t hear what was being said.
“Did he actually say what you quoted there? or are you just assuming he’s racist cause he’s a white person… I have a really hard time believing the white dude said what is quoted exactly on the screen,” a viewer stated. Someone else suggested that the customer “could be a germophobe,” which would explain why he didn’t want the cashier touching the bottle.
The cashier has maintained that the customer made the remark to her. She also claimed that the man was a regular customer and that this wasn’t the first time he had caused an issue at the store. As for what happened afterward, she said none of the other staff felt her experience needed to be escalated, so it ended there.
