Watch: Kansas Mall Employee Reportedly Fired After Attacking MAGA Hat-Wearing Teen
One man was given a humiliating lesson in respect after slinging some vile words at a teenage fan of President Donald Trump over the weekend.
According to The Daily Caller, it all started when a 14-year-old boy walked into a Vans skateboarding apparel store at a mall in Overland Park, Kansas, wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat. An employee spotted the iconic headgear, and allegedly said “f*** you” to the teen.
When the boy’s mom stepped in, the employee’s anti-Trump bravado vanished.
Part of the encounter was recorded and made its way to Twitter, where it quickly went viral.
Trump Derangement Syndrome is real. A Vans store employee at Oak Park Mall, Kansas told a 14-year-old “f*ck you” for wearing a MAGA hat. Let’s get him fired. pic.twitter.com/PNkPqAxBci
— Ryan Fournier (@RyanAFournier) February 17, 2019
Although the video doesn’t capture the employee’s vulgar insult, it certainly records his apparent regret over being held accountable for his actions.
It opens with the mom demanding answers for the treatment of her teenage son. The Vans employee smugly replied, “I’m sure he’s heard it before.”
Wrong answer.
The mom then hits him with the three words every bottom-rung retail employee dreads: “Where’s your manager?”
What follows is the beginning of the end for the seemingly liberal worker. A man at the register, apparently a manager, looks around the store as he’s being told about his unruly employee.
The Daily Caller reported that the incident was even escalated to Vans’ corporate level, and ultimately ended in the vulgar employee losing his job.
“We did let this employee go. He is no longer with our company. The actions and comments from this employee at the Oak Park location is in contrast with our values and beliefs,” the company said in a statement.
“We have taken care of the situation,” it added.
Vans, for those who don’t know, is a Santa Ana, California-based company that trades in skateboarding shoes and clothing and also sponsors surfing, snowboarding and motorcross teams.
That kind of business might lean toward a more stereotypically liberal customer base, but that doesn’t explain the employee’s outburst by itself. Not even liberal businesses generally want employees insulting paying customers.
It’s a good possibility that this whole incident was another manifestation of Trump derangement syndrome.
Trump derangement syndrome, or TDS, is the anger, confusion, and mania exhibited by some in the left over the fact that Donald Trump is president. Even the esteemed mental health journal Psychology Today weighed in on the syndrome.
While the author, an assistant professor in the department of psychiatry at Canada’s McGill University, acknowledged that the syndrome isn’t officially recognized, he did point out that it has been widely observed:
“Many have argued that some people have been seriously disturbed and distressed by the policies, speech, behavior and tweets of President Trump, so much so that it has affected their cognitive, affective and behavioral functioning. Such people may need mental health support.”
What else could lead a grown man to verbally attack a boy who can’t even legally drive a car by himself? And in a workplace environment, no less.
Whether it was TDS or something else, it doesn’t excuse the former employee’s behavior.
Pro-Trump Americans have been demonized by the left and the mainstream media, leading to unfair smearing like what the Covington Catholic boys endured. The strange case of actor Jussie Smollett reveals that sometimes, unscrupulous people might even manufacture their own “MAGA hate crime” out of thin air.
Accountability appears to be the answer. This means accountability for everyone — from the nameless mall employee to newsroom editors. A consequence-free culture is not something we should embrace.
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