A New York diner waitress is being hailed as a hero across the internet after a video of her standing up for her staff went viral on TikTok.
The service industry is, to be blunt, a grim business indeed, and most people who’ve had to suffer through the long and stressful shifts move on and never look back.
One of the most consistently criticized aspects of the job is undoubtedly the abuse that servers are subjected to – and believe me, it’s a lot. I remember being verbally abused when I worked in a bar because we’d run out of ice after we had closed. I still vividly remember the look of pure contempt on the lady’s face as she told me I’d never get anywhere in life and that I had a horrible attitude – all because I’d apologized and said that we’d run out of ice and were closing. Fun times.
Unfortunately, staff in many cases aren’t supported by their employers and rarely find themselves being defended against the wrath of a scorned customer.
However, a waitress in a New York diner has done what we’ve all not-so-secretly wanted to do, and stood up for her staff – and she did not hold back as she told the customer how it is.
Posted on TikTok by user @louiscozz, the waitress in the Massapequa diner can be seen asking the customer to leave as he has been making staff and customers uncomfortable with some very inappropriate behavior.
The waitress, whose name is Sandra, reproaches the customer for making homophobic statements and looking at ‘underage girls.’ She tells him that he has gotten a coffee out of them, and now needs to leave as nobody wants to wait on him, assumedly over his bad attitude and lack of decency.
The video has garnered over 8 million views on TikTok, and the follow-up video is just shy of 750k.
Many have praised her actions over the net, with one user commenting “as someone who was routinely harassed by men at 16 when I worked at a diner while my manager did nothing about it, thank you” and another “normalize servers demanding to be treated like human beings.”
Whilst it’s incredibly problematic that staff are still tormented by the customers that they are providing a service for, the positive reception to Sandra’s crusade is a testament to changing attitudes regarding workplace conditions and the ‘customer is always right’ mantra.
Fair play to Sandra for being the change we want to see in the service industry – if only other people cared as much about their staff as she clearly does!
Check out the second video below.
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