In Texas, a black restaurant owner scolded a room full of patrons on Sunday after some women began twerking in his business.
The viral incident that brought Kevin Kelley and his new restaurant, TRUE Kitchen + Kocktails in Dallas, into a media frenzy happened on Sunday evening.
According to Kelley, several women had stepped onto tables and began twerking against a glass wall placed in one area of the restaurant.
A video shared on social media showed a woman placing her hands against the wall and dancing to the upbeat music playing in the background.
“I invested a lot of money into buying this building and developing this concept so black people can have somewhere nice to go to,” Kelley begins, raising his voice at the crowd. “Somewhere we can feel good about ourselves as a – stop the music!”
“Real talk. All this twerking and s***…don’t bring it here because we’re a restaurant”.
Kelley then says that 75 percent of his customers are women, ‘and I want men to show respect for themselves and how they carry themselves when they’re here.’
“So how can I tell men to respect themselves when you all are twerking on glass? If you want to do that, then get the f*** out of my restaurant. Because I did it for ourselves and I did it for our culture.”
The crowd was shocked, but Kelley continues: “Don’t do it again. I don’t want to hear it. If you don’t like it, get out because I don’t need your money.”
On Monday, Kelley released a statement that claimed the issue revolved around three tables of customers who continued to twerk after being approached by him.
“We created TRUE for it to be a place music could be enjoyed while we sit and eat. No song played is excuse to stand on out furniture and do what this lady did,” Kelley wrote, referring to the woman captured on camera. “As for my delivery, I can assure you I was a gentleman earlier, but my nice words weren’t respected. TRUE will be for some and not all and this is ok.”
Kelley told TMZ Live on that day that he didn’t have anything against twerking, but did not want it in his establishment.
The root of the debate was encapsulated in Kelley – and what others – may or may not define as ‘classy’ behavior.
“We have so many classy and nice black women who come to this restaurant that define what TRUE Kitchen + Kocktails is, and the actions of the women standing on the sofa and pushing on the glass to twerk is not that,” Kelley said. “When we talk about advancing the culture, I’m mindful of how we all look…I’m very steadfast in making sure our guests carry themselves in the right way of this restaurant.”
The video was shared on Twitter on Sunday night and has already gathered more than a 2.5million views.