American Idol runner-up Bo Bice found himself at the center of a controversial incident when he claimed he experienced racial discrimination at a Popeyes restaurant at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta, Georgia. An incident that took place a few years ago brought to light issues of racial insensitivity and the role of social media in shaping public discourse.
Bice, 41, claims a fast-food worker told him, “He’s already got him, the white boy,” before accidentally giving his order to someone else, according to the Daily Mail.
According to reports, the women laughed as they referred to him as “that white boy”.
In the past, Bice claims one of the women made fun of his name continuously for five minutes, referring to him as “Bow-Bow, Boo-Boo, and Bo-Bo.”
Bice later shared pictures and the identity of one of the women on social media.
When asked why he was unhappy, Bice told WTTG, “If the situation was reversed and I used something that insensitive… I’d be boycotted, people wouldn’t buy my albums.”
His post was quickly taken down by Facebook, which called it bullying and said it was against its policy of “not identifying and shaming private individuals”.
The action angered Bice.
After his first post was removed, he added in a follow-up post: “Facebook deleted my post last night and in return silenced the opinion of you and me who are tired of the racist double standards that have infested our society.”
“You took Facebook on the side of CORPORATE POPEYE, but you should have checked the validity of their complaint,” he continued. “You can’t suppress my beliefs and opinions without it seeming one-sided,”
Bice won’t stop discussing the incident and says he thinks it’s time to start a conversation.
It’s crazy, he said, that he had to go on TV, “calm down” and make a fool of himself by tweeting and posting it on Facebook just to start a conversation so they could have an adult discourse together.
Later, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen expressed regret over the incident.
The business released a formal statement saying: “The company does not tolerate the behavior of one of our employees and we took corrective action as soon as we became aware of the situation.
Bice went on to ask that the worker not be fired but retrained.