# "Black people must leave...." A Walmart incident. **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 18, 2010, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887 "2010-03-18T14:42:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![The\_Facts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bb73d2/32.png) [@The\_Facts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Facts)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/21 "2010-03-18T16:21:15Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > Fascinating. If a customer standing in the middle of the store suddenly shouts “ALL BLACK PEOPLE MUST LEAVE!” is Wal-Mart liable for “pain and suffering”? No, that’s not something they can stop. They CAN take steps to make sure their PA system is secure. I suspect that had someone broadcast anti-white or anti-christian ideas, this would be a federal case. Beck and O’Reilly would be all over it. Trash the black folks… hell that’s just the way it is, don’t get all upset. ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/22 "2010-03-18T16:22:08Z")
> [@The\_Facts](#): > > The victim’s pain and suffering is the same, whether you meant it or not. Pain? Suffering? ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/23 "2010-03-18T16:27:54Z")
> [@The\_Facts](#): > > No, that’s not something they can stop. They CAN take steps to make sure their PA system is secure… Not unless it was done by some disgruntled, racist jackass employee with access to the PA. Yet, when I worked at K-Mart in 1990, the phones where mounted everywhere, and anyone could easily pick it up and hit the big shiny button marked so. And sometimes customers did. _shrug_ ---
**Author:** ![tetranz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a587f6/32.png) [@tetranz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tetranz)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/24 "2010-03-18T16:31:06Z")
A little off the topic but in the article about this at ABC News [ABC News](http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wirestory?id=10128584&page=2), when it mentions the woman named Sharon Osbourne there’s a link to a page about the one who’s married to Ozzy. Stupid word matching. ---
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/25 "2010-03-18T16:31:11Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > WalMart is not responsible for somebody making a racist joke. But they are responsible for how they respond to it. Do they investigate and fire the employee who did it (assuming it was an employee) or take some action against the customer. Or do they simply let it go - in which case they are endorsing it by having a policy that racist jokes are no big deal and not worth doing anything about. If it was an employee, chances are someone recognized the voice, or at least would be able to limit it to a few employees and do an investigation from there. Surely, we all know that anyone that did anything like that would get fired. Would we really expect Walmart to make a press release announcing that they fired some random associate over this? If it was a customer, how the hell will they figure out who did it? Chances are, whoever did it wouldn’t have done it in view of anyone else, and even if they have the person on camera, what good would that do? Should Walmart launch a likely expensive investigation to likely never find someone so they can sue them? The best Walmart can do is apologize, as they did. They could change PA codes or something, but what good would that do? They still likely be written down in most places, and even if not, what’s to prevent someone from telling a friend and them doing something like that again? Short of replacing their entire phone system in every store to require some sort of employee PIN to identify the user, I’m not sure how they could make any real steps to prevent this in the future. And I doubt that makes any financial sense because this is a rare occurence and that would likely cost millions to implement. As for the people upset over it, I suspect it’s a combination of over-reaction, greed, and all the rampant Walmart hatred. People over-reacting just need to get over it and realize that there is no way Walmart endorsed it. People being greedy need to realize there’s no money in it because there’s no negligence on Walmart’s part. Negligence would imply that there was some reasonable measures they could have taken to prevent this incident and they didn’t, yet it seems that a similar system is in place in most stores. And even if Walmart is negligent, what kind of damages would they pay out if found guilty? If you slip and fall, there’s potential medical bills and pain. In this case, how much money are hurt feelings worth? And people who hate Walmart because they’re “evil”, well, they’ll jump at any opportunity to get Walmart some bad press. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/26 "2010-03-18T16:37:28Z")
> [@The\_Facts](#): > > I suspect that had someone broadcast anti-white or anti-christian ideas, this would be a federal case. Beck and O’Reilly would be all over it. Entirely possible. And it would still be a non-story. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/27 "2010-03-18T16:38:16Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > Maybe it was. (Grows nervous) You stink. ETA: Oops - some random prankster typed that on my computer. It wasn’t me, really. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/28 "2010-03-18T16:38:56Z")
> [@Uncommon\_Sense](#): > > IT WAS A PRANK, GET OVER IT!! > Honestly, did you think it was a store employee that did this? And even if it was, the asshat jerkface will be fired yesterday. Asshat jerkface wasn’t fired yesterday. From your link: > [@](#): > > “I depended on Walmart for all my needs, because the store has pretty much everything you could want,” Covington said. “But until this issue is addressed in a way I’m comfortable with, I can’t walk through those doors again.” Apart from the fact that this woman depended on Wal\*Mart for all her needs, which sounds disturbing, I see nothing wrong with her position. Assuming it was some random asshole, Wal\*Mart’s is still stupid for giving any Tom, Dick or Harry access to their PA system. Now, if the perpetrator is caught and fired (assuming it’s an employee) and people are still bitching, then this thread will be appropriate. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/29 "2010-03-18T16:57:59Z")
> [@The\_Facts](#): > > Yeah, they’re all _stupid_ becuase they’re black, that’s it. You’re kind of bending over backwards to be offended here, it seems. No one here said they’re stupid because they’re black. It was mentioned that they were stupid for leaving the store, though. If they did, in fact, leave the store because of the announcement. Which the article doesn’t make clear. But all this talk of launching an investigation, making the PA system more secure, etc. is just way out of proportion. A jerk made a jerkish comment. So what? It happens. Life goes on. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/30 "2010-03-18T16:58:51Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Assuming it was some random asshole, Wal\*Mart’s is still stupid for giving any Tom, Dick or Harry access to their PA system. As far as I can tell, pretty much every big store gives nearly open access to the PA systems. It’s really only news because it’s Wal-mart. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/31 "2010-03-18T17:08:09Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > As far as I can tell, pretty much every big store gives nearly open access to the PA systems. It’s really only news because it’s Wal-mart. Yes, I gathered that from this thread. But it’s not news because it’s Wal_Mart, it’s news because it happened at Wal_Mart. If it happened at Target I’d tell them their PA system needed to be idiot-proof too. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/32 "2010-03-18T17:20:50Z")
> [@The\_Facts](#): > > I suspect that had someone broadcast anti-white or anti-christian ideas, this would be a federal case. Well, it is being investigated as a hate crime by the state. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/33 "2010-03-18T17:32:23Z")
> [@Blaster\_Master](#): > > even if they have the person on camera, what good would that do? Should Walmart launch a likely expensive investigation to likely never find someone so they can sue them? If they caught the person on camera, they’d most likely release the video to the media and hope someone recognizes the person and calls in with the person’s name. The only thing that I can see happening from there is either Wal-Mart would let the media deal with them, which would most likely just involve some ridicule by the public and maybe a formal, on-air, press release style apology and/or if Wal-mart got sued for anything over this, they would in turn sue that person to recover their money. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/34 "2010-03-18T17:42:31Z")
Maybe some shoppers could provide an anonymous tip to help Walmart find the perp 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/35 "2010-03-18T17:44:02Z")
> [@The\_Facts](#): > > Ever heard of “negligence?” Whether or not Wal-Mart made the announcement themselves is irrelevant. They don’t mean to make someone slip and fall … but if they leave a wet floor, they get sued. That’s the deal. The victim’s pain and suffering is the same, whether you meant it or not. What are the damages? Exactly how much pain and suffering are we talking about? How do you quantify them? ---
**Author:** ![dragoncat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6a8cbe/32.png) [@dragoncat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dragoncat)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/36 "2010-03-18T17:44:13Z")
Well, personally I was happy this happened at Walmart (and not Target, say), because to me, any reason for Walmart to get less business is a good reason. But I’m glad to have read this thread because I hadn’t really thought it through. Besides, how could the announcement have been made by a Walmart employee? They don’t have time on their shifts to make random announcements over the PA. ---
**Author:** ![Plan\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Plan\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plan_B)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/37 "2010-03-18T17:48:50Z")
I agree with **gyrate** , but maybe they could take that a small step further, like a corporate office statement that gets sent out to news organizations. Maybe they already did that. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/38 "2010-03-18T17:50:52Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > If it happened at Target I’d tell them their PA system needed to be idiot-proof too. Well, not completely. It still has to be usable by employees. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/39 "2010-03-18T18:02:32Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Yes, I gathered that from this thread. But it’s not news because it’s Wal_Mart, it’s news because it happened at Wal_Mart. > > If it happened at Target I’d tell them their PA system needed to be idiot-proof too. > [@VinylTurnip](#): > > Well, not completely. It still has to be usable by employees. [From here.](http://ns.c2.com/cgi/wiki?IdiotProofProcess) > [@](#): > > # “It is impossible to make anything foolproof, because fools are so ingenious.” --RobertHeinlein > > # “Those who try to build idiot-proof systems always underestimate the persistence and ingenuity of idiots.” --anon > > # “If you make your system more idiot-proof the idiots will build a bigger idiot” --anon > > # “You can make something foolproof, but not damnfoolproof” --anon ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2010, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887/40 "2010-03-18T18:19:32Z")
The prankster missed a golden opportunity - they should have said, “All people with screaming children, leave the store now.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-people-must-leave-a-walmart-incident/532887.md?page=3)