A Baltimore mother is heartbroken after her 9-year-old son experienced race-related discrimination firsthand over the weekend at a restaurant in their city. Marcia Grant says she and her son Dallas had plans to dine at Ouzo Bay in the city’s Harbor East area but were turned away because he was wearing basketball shorts and a Jordan T-shirt.
Marcia, who shared her experience via her social media, directly asked the manager why her black son was being denied entry when they could see a young white boy dining in the restaurant wearing basically the same thing. Marcia reveals that eventually, they left.
“We had to leave. They would not let my son in,” she tells us. “He’s 9 years old. It was so hard for him. He goes to a school that’s about 70% white. They always teach the kids they are the same. It was really hard for Dallas to see a kid that looked like one of his friends at school sit and eat there and he couldn’t.”
The manager had a hard time answering Marcia’s question and even suggested if they lived nearby to go home and have Dallas change. The company that owns Ouzo Bay, Atlas Restaurant Group, responded Monday evening revealing the manager in the video has since been placed on indefinite leave.
