Posted on 06/26/2014 6:22:12 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Earlier this month, the story of a little girls experience at a local Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) went viral. According to reports, three-year Victoria Welcher, who had been disfigured in a pit-bull attack, was kicked out of a Mississippi KFC restaurant because her face was making the other diners uncomfortable.
Victorias family posted a photo of the child on Facebook with the caption, Does this face look scary to you? Last week at KFC in Jackson MS this precious face was asked to leave because her face scared the other diners. I personally will never step foot in another KFC again and will be personally writing the CEO. According to the grandmother accompanying Victoria: I ordered a sweet tea and mashed potatoes and gravy. I sat down at the table and started feeding her and the lady came over and said that we would have to leave, because we were disturbing other customers, that Victorias face was disturbing other customers.
Many media outlets carried the story, and nearly all reported it as if it were fact no allegedly, no reportedly; the familys story was simply taken as fact and reported as such.
As reporter Sean Murphy notes:
National and world media such as CNN, Nancy Grace, Huffington Post and The Today Show jumped on the story, lambasting the employees, KFC and YUM! Brands, KFCs corporate owners.
What, did they walk over to the table and say hey, youre ugly, you have to leave. What happened Dave? wailed Grace, the HLN hysterical talk show host, which was answered by little-known talk radio host Dave Maxson.
No, Nancy, it was even worse than that. It wasnt youre ugly. It was you are scaring people. You must leave.
Now, anyone with an IQ in the triple digits would know something was fishy here. First, if youve ever dined at a KFC, you know the employees dont care much what you do after handing you your food. Theyre certainly not looking at you once youve sat down nor are other diners and, should a crusty, cantankerous jerk be offended by the physical appearance of another person, the manager might stop long enough to listen, roll his eyes, ignore the fool, and continue tending to the biscuits. The idea that any diner complained, and that an employee would walk over and ask a little girl to leave due to her scarred face, is hard to believe both because its far too much effort for any fast-food employee and because it would require a truly evil, sick individual.
We have also seen several cases of such complaints turning out to be false after the hoaxer got a financial windfall.
As if on cue, as soon as the story broke, donations poured in from the gullible, to the tune of $135,000, thanks to a Facebook and Go Fund Me page, in addition to gifts and offers of free surgeries. KFC, facing a public relations nightmare, pledged to donate $30,000 to Victoria.
Surprise, surprise: It seems to be a hoax. KFC diligently investigated and found absolutely no footage of the girl and her grandmother at a local store, nor any order for the items the grandmother claimed to have purchased. In fact, on the day in question, Victoria and her grandmother were elsewhere, according to the grandmothers Facebook timeline. The grandmother also claimed it happened at a KFC restaurant which as it turns out has been closed for three years. The family then tried to change its story and claim the incident occurred at a different KFC restaurant. And there are even more discrepancies, all detailed in a news story in the Laurel Leader Call. Many of those who donated are now hoping Go Fund Me will refund their donations.
While we empathize with Victoria, there are many families with equally tragic stories who are in need of additional funding or even, unlike Victoria, lack health insurance. They do not, however, resort to lies, trickery, and disturbingly elaborate falsehoods in order to scheme others out of their cash. A con mans motives matter not only the con.
In our politically correct society, however, there are two options when these stories surface: 1) Play it safe and avoid any aggravation by sharing the story along with an Horrible. OMG, totally boycotting KFC! Prayers up! Tweet, or 2) Be the voice of reason and nervously pipe up: Well yeah, this sounds horrible but why do you automatically believe the familys story? Of course, thats the point in the party where the music comes to a screeching halt and youre suddenly a pariah for not buying the story hook, line, and sinker.
Because, in our culture, part of being politically correct means never questioning certain narratives. You must sacrifice your common sense on the Feel Good / I Believe You No Matter What altar.
The story must fit a liberal-issue checkbox. Notice the family did not claim a random stranger told Victoria he found her face disturbing they cleverly claimed it was an (evil) corporations employee. And not just any corporation but one that earns the disdain of liberal elites.
Two similar hoaxes last year captured national attention. Dayna Morales, a gay waitress in New Jersey and former Marine, claimed a family stiffed her on a tip and instead left a nasty, anti-gay note instead. Moraless story soon unraveled no message was left, and, on the contrary, the diners left her a handsome tip. This was all, however, after Morales slyly collected thousands of dollars in donations. As a gay woman, she was immune from skepticism. Shortly prior to that, a black female waitress at a Red Lobster in Tennessee claimed a customer wrote None on the tip line and, below that, the N-word slur. That, too, turned out to be a hoax but not before she collected a cool $10,000 in sympathy cash. As a black woman claiming to suffer from the trauma of a racial slur, she, too, was immune from questioning.
Is the success of these scams purely due to Americans generosity? Not at all. Part of this is due to our politically correct culture: a gay woman, a black woman, a little girl as the victim of a corporate giant . . . one must not dare question motives. (Of course, if a straight white male claims to be a victim, bet your bottom dollar that the media will go through his claim with a fine-toothed comb.) One must not wonder whether a victim is truly a victim. Just go along, post a Tweet expressing your sympathy, and dont ask too many questions.
This is what our politically correct culture has wrought: a pat-on-the-back culture where scammers and con-artists can and do thrive.
A. J. Delgado is a conservative writer and lawyer. She writes about politics and culture.
Everyone is a drama queen in their own way. Playing a victim card is easy, that's why its easy. To not be that way takes virtues which a debased and degenerate society does not have.
We'ev stopped seeing the moral quotient as essential to economic and societal success.
Here’s the problem — even if most Americans don’t fall for it, it doesn’t matter.
They continue to vote for people in Washington who will use this as basis for MORE WELFARE, MORE TAXES, MORE REGULATION and MORE COERCION.
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.
I’m afraid most voters are NOT vigilant at all.
B I N G O!
We have a completely shallow and unprofessional mob of ‘journalists’ who encourage this kind of thing.
They have forgotten how to BE journalists (i.e. RIGOROUS, UNBIASED. OBJECTIVE)
Although everyone else on the planet has caught on to the scam, Americans are helping to keep those African email scams alive. Low information types.
The Just-Us Bruthas, Jesse and Al, have made a lucrative living off this kind of thing. I never believed this KFC story from the get-go. Nothing about it even remotely rang true.
Why does America keep falling for political con artists?
There is another consequence, whether intended or not: many of us will no longer believe any “victim” story because too many have cried wolf too often. Then, when the actual victim of an actual misfeasance occurs and we turn away because of all the false alarms before, we will be attacked as the cruel and uncaring, which we are always being accused of anyway.
Actually ... it wouldn’t be politically correct to tell that little girl to leave. So that’s how we know it wasn’t true and never happened ... :-) ...
When I read a story about the black college student with kkk and racial graffiti with a noose on the door,the lesbian who is attacked in her home alone tied up with dyke scrawled on her forehead, or the muslim who has who is cornered by anonymous white guys with no witnesses and told to leave America or else, and even the homosexual waiter with fag written the the receipt I have one simple rule - What a cute PC sympathy fantasy story to gain attention & donations!
The most recent Gallup Trust poll (there was a thread on it a few days ago) had “big business” as being in the bottom five (along with Congress and the Press) when it comes to trustworthiness.
Con artists know this, know that the gut reaction of the public is going to be to believe the little guy over the big corporation.
But it’s also a reinforcing feedback loop, in that stories like this are accepted as truth (even after being discredited) and serve to further erode trust ...
Dewey's educational theories were presented in My Pedagogic Creed (1897), The School and Society (1900), The Child and the Curriculum (1902), Democracy and Education (1916) and Experience and Education (1938). Throughout these writings, several recurrent themes ring true; Dewey continually argues that education and learning are social and interactive processes, and thus the school itself is a social institution through which social reform can and should take place... (Wikipedia)
it has worked beautifully... people are under the impression that we have public education... we do not... it is government education and has been for a long time... the public, local citizen have no say in their children's education... and it baffles me that conservatives hand their children over to the government day after day, year after year...
an excellent but very heavy book on the subject: The Underground History of American Education by John Taylor Gatto...
mis dos centavos...
So.. the most accomplished and successful CON is the best choice!
That is their view and that is why we get creeps like “O” and the Clintons in the WH.
Just more “Slouching Toward Gomorrah”.
To be honest, a lot of people here fell for it.
***
Chortle!
Well said.
I am happy to say I never fall for these anymore. Every sob story that comes down the pike, I think, “Mm hmm.”
Because the stories are just so fun to share on Facebook! Then read all the witty replies..
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