Every time I think we might be making headway in the fight against ignorance some shit like THIS pops up.
I don’t want to turn this into a rant against all fast food workers because I’ve been there and they’re not all morons but Jesus Christ on a popcicle stick, how fucking stupid are these people who fall for this?
Dozens of incidents over a five year period and not one of these people thinks there’s anything odd about a voice on the phone ordering them to strip search customers and employees?
How is it that the victims of these searches complied with them? Can you imagine some pimply faced little burger flipping telling you he wants to reach up your ass because a man on the telephone told him to? Did nobody get their ass kicked?
I’m reminded of a story in Gerold Frank’s The Boston Strangler about a scam some perv was running in the mid-'60s.
He’d call up women who’d recently emigrated to the U.S., pretending to be a government doctor and asking them whether they’d come in for their one-year physical examination. When they’d confess that they hadn’t known of such an obligation, he’d sternly admonish them and then tell them they could comply over the phone, asking them to disrobe and carry out certain instructions.
Supposedly a lot of them were taken in by this.
I think that 17-year-old customer you describe is now entitled to tacos for life. At the very least.
I certainly would resist any effort by the manager of a fast food restaurant to pull me aside and search me for stolen goods, loudly and vociforously. So much so that the REAL police would be called, to lecture this idiot on proper protocol. (I can picture the idiot telling the cynical cops that a person on the phone told him to search me etc.) I’d also likely call the restaurant’s head office, and mail them a copy of the police report, telling them that they’d better educate their employees to the facts concerning citizen’s arrest, and the deputization of citizens, and that such will NEVER occur over the phone. I’d also be tempted to sue, with the purpose of getting word out about the scam, and exactly why it’s illegal etc.
The optimistic side of me remembers Milgram’s Obedience to Authority and recognizes that people tend to defer to perceived authority even when what they’re doing is outrageous on the face of it.
A deep, dark, cynical side of me wonders if male managers really aren’t that upset by the idea of performing strip (and cavity!) searches on female employees. I sure hope that’s not true – I don’t really believe it is – but sometimes…
Have you considered that the alleged criminal might have just been really, really hot? I mean, given that the police haven’t wrapped this up, I’d be rather curious if it wasn’t just a string of perverts copycatting either an actual incident or some other pervert’s “really good idea” to get away with it.
As for the victim, I don’t get it either. I could see having a hard time coming up with a suitable retort in that situation, but when it came down to someone actually trying to disrobe you by force and without even the pretext of legal authority, how did the manager get out of this without severe injury? It’s not like someone with their charismatic sociopath handbook was picking these girls up at the mall, if it happened as alleged he was just describing a stereotypical teen girl knowing there’d be one in the crowd. And even I’m not cynical enough to believe people are that easy to predict.
Hey, don’t knock it, you’re probably onto something. I came up through Burger King University, and I tell you, the male managers I’ve known have been a rare bunch. I can’t think of a single one of them who wouldn’t have faked the call himself.
See Interrobang!?'s point about obedience to authority. Although many people are willing to kick up a fuss over anything and nothing (something I’m sure those who work in fast food know all too well!), most people don’t want to cause trouble and will go along with orders from authority. Apparently even the limited “authority” of a fast food manager speaking on behalf of a police impersonator.
Given that a sadly large number of women are willing to “cooperate” with obviously criminal violent assailants in hopes of avoiding more trouble/injury, I can believe that a sizeable percentage of teen girls wouldn’t actually physically resist a supposedly police-ordered strip search. They might complain about it, but I think a lot would be afraid to get physical even if they felt suspicious, angry, and humiliated.
Maybe the person being searched is an accomplice of the caller.
The caller gets his rocks off imagining the search of his friend by an unknown manager, and the “victim” gets their rocks off by being searched by a stranger.
The caller was able to describe roughly what she was wearing. Unless this was generic clothing (shirt and jeans), maybe he knew.
Having spent a long time in fast food in HS and in University, and having met a long parade of fast food managers and assistant managers and junior assistant interim managers, I have to say that most all of them seemed afraid of the customers. I can’t imagine anyone I ever met doing this. It sounds very suspicious to me.
Why didn’t the girl resist? Because no one in life sits down and tells you “here are your rights…here is what you do…these people have no authority over you, and if they lay a hand on you you can break their balls…etc.”
Plus, sadly, Lamia is correct. Far too many women do cooperate with their attackers.
And to the person who said it earlier - “think” about suing? I a huge fan of tort reform and have a hatred of frivilous lawsuits like you wouldn’t believe, but this is one of those cases where I’d take them to the cleaners. I can’t imagine not winning this one.
Aren’t strip searches of customers by the staff at fast food restaurants protected by the Patriot Act?
The moral to the story: Use the drive thru.
What’s really frustrating is that if you want extra ketchup or extra pickles, you have alsmot no chance of getting a fast food employee to come through for you, but if you need a customer strip searched, they’re on the case.
Yes, both those things are absolutely sad. Let’s also add there is also a strong social pressure in general to NOT be the “whiner” who makes a fuss. People are for some reason conditioned to be more afraid of “making a scene”, calling attention to themselves, than of getting ripped off or mistreated. The lack of education about what are and are not rights is specially grievious.
THis seems suspcious. Why didn’t that girl fight back. They didn’t have a police officer with them, no court order, just some pimply burgerflipper. If that were me I would have screamed, slapped them across the face, kicked them smartly in the balls, and file a sexual harassment charge. I wouldn’t let any local fast food vedor touch ME.
THis seems suspcious. Why didn’t that girl fight back. They didn’t have a police officer with them, no court order, just some pimply burgerflipper. If that were me I would have screamed, slapped them across the face, kicked them smartly in the balls, and filed a sexual harassment charge. I wouldn’t let any local fast food vedor touch ME.
It wasn’t just this one girl. The article says that there have been dozens of cases like this at different FF joints all over the country over a period of years. The police thinks the calls have all come from one individual in Florida using a public phone and a phone card.
This isn’t a scam on the part of the victim. Lots and lots of managers keep falling for this.
