What’s What
Omg yall, I had my first, truly weird Internet experience recently. I tried out this seafood spot in DC after coming back from celebrating my 30 fine and divine birthday in Miami; eating delicious seafood and delicious cuisines (period) for almost a week. Literally, every place I tried in Miami (over 7) was a hit, so I thought I was on a roll, no pun intended. When I opened the food at home, it honestly didn’t even look appetizing to me, but I ate it anyway because starving isn’t the word to describe how hungry I was. What I ordered was simple and what I anticipated to be tasty AF based on the five-star reviews so far: fried whiting fish with fries and a “Connecticut” lobster roll.
*if you have a weak tummy, skip the next section*
Yall, the food gave me diarrhea and I know it was the food I ate from there, because it was the only thing, I ate that day! Plus, I am very regular and had absolutely NO digestion issues in MIAMI, except when I ate too much cheese, which was ONCE. Anywho, the next morning after eating this food, I was hurttting and going through it for at least an hour. It was ungodly.
But what happened next was even more ungodly: the owner of the business found my personal but public social media page and DIRECT MESSAGED me a LENGTHY, borderline whiny and entitled dialogue about providing him with additional “feedback” to the 3-Star rating I gave. I’ll post the message below but not only was it unprofessional; the act of looking someone up, and privately reaching out to them on a platform DIFFERENT THAN THE ONE they initially used to write the public review, is giving: creepy, entitled, unprofessional, scare tactics, manipulation, intimidation, all the above and more.
Now, would I have had a problem with him saying what he said as a public reply on my public Google review? Not really; I would have just thought it was annoying and just wrote him and the business off like I’ve done before but again, the act of looking someone up, and privately reaching out to them on a platform DIFFERENT THAN THE ONE they initially used to write the public review, is giving: creepy, entitled, unprofessional, scare tactics, manipulation, intimidation, all the above and more. So now, we’re here.
What’s Luxe
What’s luxe is for customers and consumers to have the freedom to leave honest ratings, reviews, etc. WITHOUT a written review. Google doesn’t make it mandatory to elaborate with words for a reason. For example, if Google made it mandatory to leave a written review, I probably would’ve given the business a 1 star for its old looking and lackluster food giving me the runs and for Google making me put my personal business out there. And to me, that’s worse: to give a budding, Black-owned restaurant a review like that, potentially damaging their new business.
What’s also luxe are mature, professional, and non-entitled business owners who understand everyone isn’t going to like their business for whatever reason and it shouldn’t lead to psycho- or sociopathic tendencies like virtual stalking someone, a fellow Black American and Washingtonian (woman at that), because they left an average (not below average) review of your business.
Let’s chat. Has this happened to you before? What did you do? What would you do?
This experience reminded me of when a Black woman in Detroit was also tracked down and sent a DM to her social media page (from the business’ social media page no less) after choosing to spend her money to support a local ice cream shop. The fact that she chose to get ice cream at a local spot versus a chain is amazing and the fact that she was essentially e-stalked afterwards, for any reason, is atrocious.
Let’s all learn from both experiences, shall we? Say it with me: there’s food in the house and Costco is cheaper than wasted time, money and energy. Ommmmmmmmmm.
