Pizza Race-Slur Outrage Is Out of ‘Order’

January 7, 2012

She ordered a pizza — and got an extra topping of racism.

When Harlem resident Minhee Cho, 24, ordered a small pizza from a Papa John’s restaurant, she was shocked to find that a staffer ID’d her as “lady chinky eyes” on her receipt.

“I don’t think a giant corporation should write those things on a receipt,” Cho told The Post last night. “That’s poor management. It was surprising to see that on paper; if they had said it in person, it would have been worse.”

Cho posted the receipt with the racial slur on her Twitter account yesterday, where it was viewed more than 100,000 times in less than four hours.

“I probably would not go there again, because they would probably spit in my food,” said a resigned Cho, who is Korean. “I live in Harlem; this is normal.”

“I live in Harlem; this is normal.”

A manager — who would identify himself only as Jerome — at the cheesy chain restaurant on Broadway near West 142nd Street said the slur was just business as usual.

“It’s a busy place, and it was a way to identify her and her order,” he said. “You know, we do stuff like that sometimes. We’ll write ‘the lady with the blue eyes’ or ‘the guy in the green shirt.’ ”

He said the cashier, a teen, meant no harm.

Cho’s Twitter posting set off a fierce campaign of prank calls that had the restaurant’s phone ringing off the hook with phony customers dialing in asking to order Chinese food or asking for “chinky eyes.”

“It’s affecting how we work,” Jerome complained. “This is a place of business. I truly don’t think it’s fair what she did; it’s just crazy.”

Shockingly, he blamed Cho for the distraction.

“I think the lady put it out there just to get some attention — some people like that type of attention. I truly don’t think it’s fair. It’s been taking up all our time. It’s been very disruptive.”

Cho said,“it just seems that he’s annoyed that they’re getting a lot of calls. I think the racist thing just caught fire.”

Papa John’s officials offered a formal apology on their Twitter account last night and said the employee who wrote the offensive receipt was fired.

Editor’s Note: Papa John’s has apologized read the story here.


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