Crabby

I'm not going into detail here, not because I want to defend this man or help him escape the well-deserved wrath he is currently feeling, but because he is certainly not the only person to be as he is.

There's a guy who owns some crab houses here in Baltimore County, and one in Harford County. Owning crab houses around a crab-happy town like Baltimore is also known as a license to print money, because we love crabs around here and will spend the money to get them on our tables at home (or at crab houses around town).

The man had black customers, white customers, brown, surely all types of people. If not for my wife being allergic to shellfish, we would probably have been his customers. Poor people, rich people, people who drink beer with crabs, people who will drink soda, those who only take water...you get the point.  The man had a great business going.

We love 'em.

So, for whatever reason, he decided to make a stupid racist joke on Facebook, linking the current protest movement and conflating those noble people seeking to change society with those scoundrels who see protest as a chance to burn stuff and loot stores. These are two different crowds, but anyway, he makes this idiot joke about how no one is going to burn the social services office haha ha haa.

Very funny. And then, once the fit hit the shan, people were aghast that the man who happily took their two hundred dollars for a bushel of dinner and shoved it into his pocket with all the other bills was happy to take green money from black people, but still disrespected them.  They let him know it, first online, and then by showing up at his places of business to let others know that they might wish to think twice before spending their money with a man with such a dark soul.

And THEN, because this is America, Land of Denial, the guy posts a nine-minute non-apologetic "apology," highlights of which include a shrugging, "I don't know, I went to bed a businessman and then woke up to find I'm a racist" and then the declamation that all such people drag out: "Some of my best friends are black."

Sir, some of your best friends are outside your business right now, and probably will be until you come to your senses. The world is moving quickly now, and people who fool themselves into thinking they aren't something when their words and deeds clearly indicate otherwise are going to be left behind.

This man is selling a line of bullhockey and a line of crabs. Fact is, plenty of other people sell crabs, and we can get bullcrap for free. Admit you were wrong, promise to change, and then, most important, SHOW US THE CHANGE.

Today would be a good time to start.