Earlier this month, there was a rather disturbing story emanating from South Africa, where a black Rhodes scholar, Ntokozo Qwabe, attending Oxford did no tip a white waitress at Obz Café in Western Cape because Caucasians aren’t giving land back, or something. The waitress, Ashleigh Schultz, was left in tears. Qwabe said he was elated. To make matters worse, Schultz has a mother stricken with cancer, but I’m sure Qwabe doesn’t care about that either (via Daily Mail):
Ashleigh Schultz, 24, was reduced to tears when Ntokozo Qwabe – a leader of the campaign to remove a Cecil Rhodes statue at Oxford – and a friend wrote on their cafe bill: ‘We will give tip when you return the land.’He bragged online that they had made her cry ‘typical white tears’, leaving him ‘unable to stop smiling because something so black and wonderful had happened’.
The incident last week at Obz Cafe in the Western Cape, South Africa, has ignited a backlash against Mr Qwabe, who was branded a racist bully.
Miss Schultz’s friends said she had already been feeling low as her mother has cancer.
One said: ‘She has a very sick mother she cares for, and had to move flat recently and is worried about all of this. She did burst into tears because she is having a tough time at present.’
[…]
South African Mr Qwabe is a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University, meaning he receives money from the Rhodes estate to study.
But he is also one of the leaders of the Rhodes Must Fall movement, which wants the statue of the 19th-century imperialist removed from Oriel College.
One of the online campaigns was triggered by an outraged South African, Sihle Ngobese, who decided to pay the tip himself and said: ‘Qwabe is someone that claims to speak to the downtrodden and the disenfranchised yet he has the audacity to bully a working-class young woman.
‘I just wanted to make a small gesture to show South Africans that if we love and respect each other it makes our country great.’
This story does have a happy ending. Mr. Qwabe’s vicious demeanor during this incident prompted donations on a GoFundMe page, which collected over $6,000 for Ashleigh’s tip. As for Mr. Qwabe, you’ve just painted yourself as a bully, and you appear to suffer from an appalling lack of self-awareness. As for Ms. Schultz, you’re in the restaurant business—some people are going to incredibly rude. Keep your head up, and I hope your mother a speedy recovery. Don’t tip because of some weak sauce social justice cause, that’s just lame, bro.
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