A furious mom from Arkansas has accused a restaurant of discriminating against her child who was born without arms.
Little William Bancroft managed to live without arms. To feed himself, he always sits on the table and uses his feet to pick up food and drinks.
He was sitting excitedly on the table at a pancake restaurant when the manager told them that the boy couldn’t sit on there because of ‘health department issues.’
The restaurant manager also did not want William touching dispensers with his feet, saying it would be a sanitary problem.
His mother, Alexis Bancroft, told the manager that she had taken her son to the bathroom to thoroughly wash his feet.
“I asked her what’s the difference between hands and feet?” Alexis told Newsweek. “I asked, ‘Do you ask all your customers if they’ve washed their hands before they touch the syrup dispensers first?’”
The manager then came back to apologize but Alexis said that the damage was done. Her family also decided to leave for the way William was treated.
“Everybody was staring at us and everything. They were going to give us our food, but we decided to leave because of the way he was treated. He was discriminated against for not having arms,” she said.
Other customers who saw the incident were also upset by the way the boy was treated. One family also left because of what happened.
“We go to multiple restaurants around our area, and no one has ever said anything about him. Most people are just amazed that he can even feed himself with his feet,” Alexis added.
IHOP released a statement about the issue, saying the company and its franchises “do not tolerate actions that are or allude to discrimination of any type.” It will also ‘retrain’ its employees “to ensure IHOP’s level of service, particularly regarding guests with disabilities, is provided to all.”
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