Woman Kicked Out Of IHOP For Kissing Her Girlfriend

[matcom]

:grr:

<snip>

Just one kiss. That’s all it took — to get thrown out of the IHOP in Grandview.

“It was a kiss I would share with my uncle,” Blair Funk told me. Except it wasn’t her uncle she kissed. It was her honey, Eva Sandoval.

Two young women sharing a kiss didn’t seem inappropriate to the other couple in the restaurant booth that night, Jackie Smith and the woman with whom she shares her life, Toni Smith. But someone watching the scene was offended.

So later, the manager confronted them in the lobby and told them to get out.

The way Blair tells it, “He said, ‘I have to tell you, we’ve had some complaints about public displays of affection, and we’re a family restaurant. We can’t accept it, and we won’t accept it.’

“The way he worded it was like: We don’t accept you.”

These days it’s rare for gays and lesbians to be denied service in restaurants for acting like who they are. Blair assures me that she and Eva did nothing that wouldn’t have been appropriate for a man and a woman to do at a dinner date. No heavy makeout. No groping.

However, incidents like this one are not unheard of, and the people affected often can do nothing about it.

There is no federal law prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation. Neither Kansas nor Missouri are among the few states that protect gay people from being discriminated against in areas of employment, housing and public accommodations.

Kansas City does have an ordinance protecting gays, as do St. Louis, Columbia and University City. But if you’re anywhere else in Missouri and you’re gay, you can legally be denied service in restaurant. Landlords can refuse to rent you a place to live.

You can even be canned from your job on the suspicion that you’re romantically inclined toward members of your own sex.

“Many people are shocked to hear that people can be fired from their jobs for being gay or being perceived to be gay,” says Julie Brueggemann, executive director of the Missouri gay rights group Promo.

http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/16913352.htm

[EFerrari]

1. IHOP in Grandview? What is their address so we can distribute it

to our networks?

:mad:

[Orsino]

5. Here it is, I guess.

There's only one in Grandview, MO:
12128 S US Highway 71 Grandview, MO 64030-1129 [phone]
http://ihop.know-where.com/ihop/cgi/site?site=05335&address=

Better yet, here's corporate:

Our Restaurant Support Center is located at:
450 North Brand Blvd
Glendale, California 91203
Phone: [phone]
Our hours are 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time
http://www.ihop.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=21&Itemid=5

[951-Riverside]

6. [phone]

[Jamastiene]

2. IHOP should be ashamed of themselves.

Glad I don't like IHOP anyhow. Never go there and now, I never will.

[sasquatch]

3. I think lots and lots of lesbians should just go there and make out

:D:evilgrin:
In all seriousness though, that isn't a bad idea.

[Pushed To The Left]

4. They need to be picketed severely and taken to court!

Even if there isn't a federal law on the books , I'm sure there is a way for a well-funded gay rights organization or the ACLU to make their lives very difficult. Maybe there could also be some pressure put on the national IHOP organization to make this practice against their policy. If they think what this franchise did was okay, then maybe the whole organization needs an ACLU beatdown!