A man in Columbia, S.C., has accused a restaurant chain of giving him a receipt that called him a racial slur.
On November 7, Zhao Zhe went on Facebook to call out a local Firehouse Subs for giving him a receipt that called him "ch*ng ch*ng," a derogatory term that refers to people of Asian descent. A photo of the receipt identified the cashier who gave him the receipt as "Pamela."
"I won't judge anyone's personal ideas, but people should be responsible for their opinions in different identities," Zhao wrote. "You can insult me personally, but you can't insult my people. Thanks to the staff of the firehouse for ruining my good day."
The post sparked hundred of comments from fellow Facebook users, many of whom condemned the restaurant for allowing it to happen.
"I don't know you so I hope I don't offend you by hopping on here to say, please share one or both of these pics with the Firehouse Subs corporate Twitter account," one person wrote in response. "Pamela needs to lose her job, her manager need a stern conversation about the people he hires, and the company needs to compensate you for hiring a racist."
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In a follow-up post, Zhao said he ordered his food through DoorDash, a food delivery service, using his Facebook account. He added that he also received several messages from the restaurant's manager, who apologized and said that Pamela was not the person responsible for the receipt. Pamela had reportedly been signed into the cashier when the incident took place but never rang up Zhao's order.
"I have receive the texts from a firehouse manager. He tell me Pamela is not the one who write this," Zhao wrote. "If my face book post have effect his or her life, I am apologize for it. BUT Pamela is the name I see on the receipt, no matter who write “CHING CHONG”, this is A PERSON write this. So far I have not see any action on how firehouse manager want to deal with this racial discrimination except the apology FROM HIMSELF."
In response, a woman by the name of "Pam Brown Hoover" — presumably the Pamela at the center of the controversy — claimed that she had resigned from her job due to the backlash she received.
"Yes you have ruined more than just my day," she wrote. "Because of your post people felt the need to harass me and make phone calls to the store and call me a racist. I made the decision to resign my job be because I was truly scared."
In a back-and-forth conversation with another user, Hoover, whose age is unknown, revealed that an 18-year-old cashier had, in fact, rang Zhao's order up and didn't mean any harm by using the racial slur. Zhao's accusation comes just weeks after a 21-year-old black college student allegedly received a kitchen order that similarly called him a racial slur.
