Racist SC sues store after getting the banhammer over his "religious beliefs"

[Crazedclerkthe2nd]

BIG SANDY — A Hawkins man is claiming his civil rights and religious freedom were violated earlier this year when a black man sacked his groceries and a Big Sandy grocery store owner banned the customer from the business.

DeWitt R. Thomas filed a federal lawsuit in July against Keith Langston, owner of Two Rivers Grocery & Market.

According to the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Tyler, Thomas entered the market on March 5 to buy food.

He stated in a nine-page, hand-written lawsuit that he told the grocery sacker, a black man, “Wait a minute, don’t touch my groceries. I can’t have someone negroidal touch my food. It’s against my creed.”

http://www.news-journal.com/news/loc...cc7900470.html

This was in Texas btw. Good on the store for getting rid of the asshole douche, I really hope that for some stupid reason he doesn't end up winning this lawsuit.

[Nekojin]

... "negroidal"?

[crashhelmet]

Questions run through my mind with this...

1st... If he's supposedly intelligent, why is he acting so ignorant?

2nd... Now I don't and won't claim to be a scholar on Vedism, but I do know it's one of the roots of Hinduism. What I also know is going to start sounding a little coincidental.

Vedism is followed by the Aryan people. The Aryan people of India, that is. Not the same Aryans that tried to win a world war and continue to do shit like shooting up a Sikh temple.

Swastikas are used throughout Vedism

This makes me wonder if he follows this religion out of ignorance or as a sham to hide behind and "justify" his racist beliefs.

[fireheart17]

Questions run through my mind with this...

1st... If he's supposedly intelligent, why is he acting so ignorant?

2nd... Now I don't and won't claim to be a scholar on Vedism, but I do know it's one of the roots of Hinduism. What I also know is going to start sounding a little coincidental.

Vedism is followed by the Aryan people. The Aryan people of India, that is. Not the same Aryans that tried to win a world war and continue to do shit like shooting up a Sikh temple.

Swastikas are used throughout Vedism

This makes me wonder if he follows this religion out of ignorance or as a sham to hide behind and "justify" his racist beliefs.

MANJI, not swastika.

Also, according to Wiki, Vedism is no longer publicly practiced. The dude doesn't have a leg to stand on.

[Nekojin]

After a bit of consideration: I so want to see this go all the way to the Supreme Court, and finally get a ruling that says that your freedom of religion stops at the end of your nose - that you cannot force other people to adhere to, respect, or obey your religion's dictates, and that you're free to practice your own religion as long as it's not impacting others negatively.

Sadly, this won't be that lawsuit.

[Lace Neil Singer]

The way I see it, religion is like a penis. You may be proud of having one, but there's no need to wave it around in public, or force it down the throats of the unwilling.

[telecom_goddess]

The way I see it, religion is like a penis. You may be proud of having one, but there's no need to wave it around in public, or force it down the throats of the unwilling.

Umm yeah....good point

[tabbyblack13]

The moment you refer to a black man as a "negro" you are using a racist comment. That alone can and should get you banned from the store. The lawsuit to me is just revenge for being kicked out of the store.

If he didn't want someone touching his groceries then he should get off his ass and bag it himself. Preferring one skin color over another to bag groceries is another sign of racism. Claiming religious belief shows that this "religion" has racism based values. With that in mind, how can someone truly call this a religion?

[Polar Bear]

If I were the bagger, I'd sue the man for verbal abuse and mental anguish.

[draco664]

The moment you refer to a black man as a "negro" you are using a racist comment.

It shouldn't. No more so than using 'Caucasian', or 'Mongoloid'. They are anthropological terms that refer to the base ancestry location of an individual. That they happen to have derogatory meanings should not automatically mean that their use is bad - especially if it is technically and contextually correct.

That alone can and should get you banned from the store. The lawsuit to me is just revenge for being kicked out of the store.

I disagree that it should be enough to get you banned, but agree 100% that the suit is revenge.

If he didn't want someone touching his groceries then he should get off his ass and bag it himself. Preferring one skin color over another to bag groceries is another sign of racism. Claiming religious belief shows that this "religion" has racism based values. With that in mind, how can someone truly call this a religion?

Shit dude, most religions have some basis for kicking selected other people in the danglers. Usually, it's the people who pissed off the original prophets of the religion.

If I were the bagger, I'd sue the man for verbal abuse and mental anguish.

Why? A bagger probably gets minimum wage - and even if he had a 100% chance of winning, he's got about four-fifths of six-eights of fuck all chance of collecting anything. Any lawyer acting on his behalf is going to ask for cash up front, which he's unlikely to have.

It's a waste of time, money and effort for no gain besides some ephemeral 'got ya!'. Not worth it.

[smileyeagle1021]

The only thing that this guy really has on the store owner is the bit about locking the doors to keep him from leaving (assuming that is the truth)... up til that point, he has every right to say he doesn't want a black person handling his groceries (it's ignorant and racist, but legally he can say and request it) and the store owner has every right to say that either he let the black person handle his groceries or take his business elsewhere.

[Seifer]

Businesses have the right to refuse service to anyone. They weren't kicking him out because of his religion, they were kicking him out because he was being verbally abusive to a staff member. I doubt he'll win his lawsuit, even in Texas.

[bainsidhe]

There's some info missing here. I thought it wasn't criminal trespass until the guy knowingly enters somewhere he isn't permitted. Instead of just banning the dude, they go straight for the jugular? And then, instead of letting him leave the place he wasn't allowed to be, they lock the doors until police arrive (the owner even confirmed it, although he claimed it was because they were closing...).

Don't get me wrong, the guy is an ass and I applaud the store owner for supporting his employees, but I just don't understand automatically going to criminal trespass.

[wolfie]

It would be Karmic justice if, for civil suits, Texas used a system where the judge was selected randomly/by rotation/some other way in which the choice of judge followed an algorithm rather than someone making a selection - and the system happened to choose a black judge to hear the case.

[MadMike]

Religious beliefs, my ass! This guy is an asshole, and "asshole' is neither a religion or a protected class.