San Francisco CEO kicked out of restaurant following racist rant caught on camera

allthecactifindahome · 2020-07-08T01:09:58+00:00

It's like he expects people to believe he was suddenly struck by racist lightning and then immediately recovered as soon as the video stopped. Act of god, sometimes crazy things just happen for no reason, could happen to anyone.

KWillets · 2020-07-08T00:13:37+00:00

RaaS (Racism as a Service)

EcstaticDetective · 2020-07-07T21:57:55+00:00

"I come to you now, at the turning of the tide."

POGtastic · 2020-07-07T22:46:51+00:00

Calvin and Hobbes frequently got me to smile and chuckle. The Far Side got guffaws, which Jane Goodall notes "is such a good Far Side word."

This one always gets me.

pjk9hp · 2020-07-07T20:46:43+00:00

People are embellishing and inventing a lot of facts that are not actually documented in the videos, either of the car incident or the original assault.

No evidence of "threatening to lynch".

No evidence of n-words.

No evidence of "white power".

No evidence the driver acted before the two protesters jumped on and attacked his car.

No evidence the driver set out with intent to commit a "terrorist attack".

suspicious_crocodile · 2020-07-07T20:22:56+00:00

There are usually three main types of "car drives into protestors" news stories.

There's the kind where somebody is lawfully driving in the road, a mob surrounds them and starts beating on their windows, and they take off because they're understandably terrified. Like this.

Then there's the kind where somebody is surrounded by protestors and drives forward at three miles an hour and the news turns it into "car drives into protestors!" as though they didn't have adequate time to get out of the way. Like this.

Then there's the kind where somebody filled with rage drives through a crowd because they're a murderous bastard, like this.

The point being, they aren't all the same. People like to believe one thing or another, usually based on what's being protested, and whether or not the protest aligns with their views, because once they've determined if they think the protesters are virtuous or not, they feel like they can decide whether the actions the driver took are justified. But that actually almost never has anything to do with it, and sometimes they're justified in continuing to drive (look at the case of Reginald Denny, who got brain damage for life because protesters pulled him out of his truck and beat him into the pavement) and sometimes they aren't. Because of the nuance in situations like this, I wish the news would stop editorializing them. But that's never gonna happen.

Does anybody have the raw video, rather than the cut up version that only shows the most shocking two seconds of it, intertwined with talking heads instructing us how to feel about the whole thing? I've followed a few links and haven't been able to find it. If anybody has stronger google-fu than me, I'd be much obliged.

Phrea · 2020-07-08T00:33:46+00:00

Patton Oswalt @pattonoswalt

Could everyone PLEASE stop sharing this video of Michael Lofthouse? He’s the founder & CEO of Solid8, a tech company based in San Francisco. If it goes viral it could hurt Michael Lofthouse and Solid8, his company. Let’s all be nice to Michael Lofthouse and Solid8.

:'D

thedrew · 2020-07-07T18:22:18+00:00

A pet peeve of mine is the absence of a human attacker in headlines about automobiles.

"Car strikes pedestrian"

Not

"Man drives car into pedestrian"

I understand that, historically, we needed to save headline space, but I'd argue that we never had that problem with "Man shoots." We were always able to put a human attacker in gun violence. I've never seen the headline "Gun shoots bystander" or anything similar.

The lack of agency for a motorist is historically intentional and has become routine. But it's insane, lazy, and treats auto accidents as a force of nature rather than the violence or negligence of a fellow person.

Sin_Cos_Im_Tan · 2020-07-08T00:50:27+00:00

Unfortunately, he's the CEO of Solid8, a tech company. Yet another wealthy sociopath assuming everyone else is lesser than...

The only minority destroying this country is the wealthy.

TurtleBird502 · 2020-07-07T18:32:55+00:00

Story time:

I lived in Louisville and my buddy who is black was my roommate. One day I say Hey, lets go kayaking at this place in Indiana. No big deal for me. Ive done it several times before. So he ask me where in Indiana. I tell him. No big deal. We go, have a blast and while I did notice several people staring while we were on the river. I thought nothing of it and even when I said something to my roommate he kinda laughed and shrugged and said he was used to it and they probably weren't used to seeing the "Mythical Black Man kayaking down a river"

We end up having a great day but on the way home, Im thirsty and pull into some redneck, back woods gas station thinking nothing of it. I look over and my roommate is giving me a look of... Like dude are you serious this is where you stop to get a Gatorade. I kinda laughed it off. He stayed in the car and wouldn't get out. So I ran in real quick and as I came out there were a couple good ole boys, jacked up trucks, the pussy ass loser confederate flag flying large and proud from the back of their pick-ups and they definitely were taking a notice to the black guy with long dreads sitting in a Jaguar in their gas station lot.

As I got in the car my roommate was visibly nervous and was telling me to just get out of their as he was starting to feel real uncomfortable.

As we got back on the road I immediately felt awful. I have never really had to worry about that. We talked the whole way back home about how those are the things he has to worry about and look out for. That he is used to it by now. I apologized for stopping and then staying there to go inside even though he felt uncomfortable. At that point I still couldn't see through my own eyes what he was feeling. I felt dumb. I felt out of touch. I felt entitled. I felt privileged. I felt sad because I love my roommate, I love the man he is, I love him as a person and I had never seen him as anything other than my friend and brother. He knew that I meant nothing by my own ignorance to the situation. He also understood that I had never had to be aware like that. We had such an open dialog and I asked lots of uncomfortable questions so I could try to see things from his eyes and walk in his shoes. It made me so angry that those guys don't know my roommate. His struggles, his life story.

I guess I always knew that this shit happened but seeing my usually calm and cool friend be so visibly worried and feeling completely out of place really hit me. I know I shouldn't have been so ignorant to these things but man, when we got home I gave my roommate the biggest hug in the world and told him I loved him and his family. We learned a lot from each other living together for 3 years. Lots of tolerance, lots of learning about how different and how exactly the same we are. It pains and saddens me to no end that I still live in a country and world that can openly hate someone just because of the color of the skin or the way their hair is done. I hope one day we can all find our way to being kinder and more caring to one another.

AmberFur · 2020-07-05T13:57:29+00:00

I know you probably didn't get as far as to reading the article, but even the title said it was a closed highway.

Wazula42 · 2020-07-07T17:03:58+00:00

I think Americans in particular have lost any sense of justice that doesn't include violence.

TheCaptainDamnIt · 2020-07-07T16:32:22+00:00

Not just protest, this sub has an absolute hard-on for rationalizing into existence any technicality or fantasy fear that allows them to justify killing someone.

mlyfen · 2020-07-07T05:04:32+00:00

I’m an international student, and I just want to rant about this. I came to the US for my education, I came here to get a degree from a good university, I came here to do research with some of the brightest minds in the world, I flew half way across the globe, to a country I’ve never been, to get myself the best education I can get, all just to ensure my family back home will be well provided for in the future.

Seeing this today sucks. It sucks so hard. There’re so many of us who worked so hard to get into these universities, who pay double/triple the amount in-state students pay, who would fight tooth and nail for the chance to just work in the US and get a better life. To see this happen, especially during a pandemic which isn’t slowing down, is just so demoralizing and it’s so frustrating I can hardly even hold it in.

I just want to tell any Americans reading this post this: most international students leave their entire lives behind, to study here, not because it’s some fun study abroad thing, we come here to get an education, something that never in a million years, we can never get back home. We don’t ask for much, just please, let us stay and wrap things up the right way.

Wazula42 · 2020-07-07T16:11:11+00:00

One has only to look at any token video of protesters blocking traffic to see a thousand highly upvoted comments drooling over the prospect of driving over them. Its psychotic and normalized.

brandnewlow1 · 2020-07-07T21:18:53+00:00

Less degrading than law? Doubtful.

/edit/ Thanks for the gold, kind stranger!

Jubilies · 2020-07-07T20:55:02+00:00

Terrorism. They’re using terrorist tactics.

High_speedchase · 2020-07-07T19:26:40+00:00

Hi, Bloomington local here.

No one was attacking the car. The protest was breaking up and crowds of people were walking home. Yes, some were in the street. The driver of the car had to wait briefly for protesters to cross the street, a common scene one might recognize from after a football or basketball game in this college town.

Rather than wait, the driver started pushing ahead. Protesters asked them to wait a couple of minutes for the street to clear, and one put a scooter in front of the car. Cue passenger getting out and throwing scooter in a rage. A woman stopped to stand in front of the car to prevent it from moving forward into the crowd. The driver revved the engine and hit the gas, striking the woman who was thrown up onto the windshield. A man grabbed onto the windshield wiper and sideview mirror in an attempt to get the car to stop. The driver accelerated to about 50 miles per hour and drove through 2 red lights before turning, throwing both people from the car.

All of these facts have been reported in local media and verified by video.

Any by the way, the first thing I learned in driver's ed was "the pedestrian has the right of way." I don't think that has changed in the last couple of decades.

ericmm76 · 2020-07-07T19:02:32+00:00

Um if people are surrounding your vehicle you don't go.

glix1 · 2020-07-07T21:41:14+00:00

Lol one person was in front of them and they slam the gas, what part of that were they fearing for their own safety. What mob? what group? It was one person. Drivers should be locked up.

If you are fearing for your own safety if there is one woman standing infront of your car, I pray for you.

gusterfell · 2020-07-07T18:29:12+00:00

So? Someone getting in front of your car doesn't give you the right to hit them.

pushymagnet · 2020-07-07T21:22:01+00:00

If someone attempts to run over a police officer, they’re allowed to shoot to kill. Maybe protesters should start carrying to defend themselves.

heavymcd · 2020-07-07T18:03:17+00:00

I’ve made some statements regarding theft and driving in the past that I’m not proud of today. I think a lot of people just have very retributive tendencies. I got over it, but I still kinda “get” the mindset.

Like, ultimately money isn’t just money...it’s time, a resource we all have a finite amount of. You get money by giving up time. So a $1K bike could represent almost half a month of my life spent working, depending on my job. I wouldn’t say that somebody trying to illegally take half a month of my life deserves to lose the rest of theirs, but I can unfortunately understand the sentiment. And when you put it in those terms, you can start to rationalize weird parallel offenses. Like, kidnapping me and forcing me to work without pay for you for four days straight would be a host of very serious felonies. But taking eighty hours of my labor for yourself after the fact is laughed off in polite society as no big deal. Stay too long in that headspace, and shooting people over property...or escalating a confrontation over property as an excuse to “defend yourself”...can eventually sound reasonable. It isn’t. But you get there.

I’m not defending this mindset, to be clear. It’s pretty gross. But I’ve been there, so I do understand it...to a point.

As for running over protesters, people become fucking monsters behind the wheel of cars. Everybody around them is an obstacle, nobody is human, they are the only thing that matters on these roads that we all in theory share. Just watch how people drive sometime under normal circumstances, the dangerous shit they’ll pull to gain three car lengths. It’s no mystery why they’ll work daily to justify to themselves why they can run people over who block a road outright that they intended to use. It’s vile. But it’s unsurprising.

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