On the night of Aug. 1, senior sociology major Darla Bunting was enjoying herself at the Santa Fe Café when bar employee Lee Majors – also known as “Cluck-U-Pac” for his likeness to deceased rapper Tupac Shakur and former employment at Cluck-U Chicken – grabbed the bar’s mic.
“This is especially for black people…” Bunting heard Majors say as he began warning the “Wing Night” crowd against the type of fighting that had occurred outside the bar the previous Wednesday.
“We have gave y’all a day and a time,” Bunting said Majors continued, “now do not act up.”
Bunting was so turned off by the announcement and its targeting of black people that she bought nothing and left the bar early, she said.
Since then, the former Black Student Union president has been voicing her concerns about the night on Facebook – gaining a lot of attention for it – and actively working to schedule a meeting with Majors and Santa Fe managers to talk about the incident.
Yesterday, Bunting spoke with one of those managers, and said a meeting has been scheduled for Tuesday. At the meeting, Bunting said she hopes to address a number of concerns.
“It’s not just about what [Majors] said, but more so about customer service in general and making sure everyone feels welcome at Santa Fe,” she said.
Aside from Tuesday’s meeting, Santa Fe owner Mark Srour said he is more than willing to meet with Bunting – and whoever else wants to talk about the situation – if concerns remain.
“That employee [Majors] was not representing Santa Fe at all, zero,” Srour said about the comments made last week. “Unfortunately, he got on the mic and said what he said, and now we have to deal with it.”
Srour reiterated his regret for what happened by adding, “I would never have those words coming out of my employee’s mouth.”
“We’ve already started the dialogue,” Srour said, “and we want to continue it.”
Bunting said she is happy with the way the bar has responded to her concerns.
“I’m very happy about the meeting and I’m happy about my interactions with the managers,” Bunting said. “So far, everyone has been open-minded and willing to get a peaceful ending to everything.”
The comments made by Majors last week stemmed from a fight that occurred outside of Santa Fe the week prior, when a number of black patrons were apparently involved in a scuffle with bar bouncers.
Prince George’s County Police Maj. Kevin Davis, commander of District 1, said although police responded to the fight, no one was arrested.
“When our guys got there, there were people pouring out into the street,” Davis said. “Our main thing was to ensure everyone’s safety and to get everyone out of there as quickly as possible and to create a safe environment out of a chaotic environment.”
Attention was brought to Majors’ Aug. 1 comments about the fight by Bunting, who at 10 a.m. the next day posted a note on her Facebook profile about what had happened at the bar.
In the note, Bunting lambasted Majors for voicing a message “filled with prejudice and stereotypes” and Santa Fe for putting him – “the Black man, one of our peers” – up to it.
“How long are we going to allow this to continue without ever speaking up and saying ‘You know what you’re wrong, and I’m not going to take it?'” Bunting asked in the note.
Not long after, responses to Bunting’s note started pouring in. Suggestions to demand an apology and boycott the bar soon followed.
In order to keep up with the influx of responses, Bunting started a Facebook group called “The Take Over! Breaks Over!” using an image of Martin Luther King Jr. and “urging everyone to protest Santa Fe until a formal apology is given.”
“If they do not see an apology as necessary then they do not need our business,” the page read.
Yesterday, only a week after the incident had occurred at the bar, the group had more than 250 members. However, a protest never came to pass after Bunting’s Tuesday meeting with bar managers was scheduled.
Instead, Bunting said she expected people to decide on whether or not to go to Santa Fe last night “on an individual basis.”
Contact reporter Kevin Rector at rectordbk@gmail.com.