A Peckham bar has lost its popular pizza service after social media storm erupted around the bar owner’s alleged racism.
Pizza company Dinner for One Hundred said it was ending operations at Bar Story in Peckham, one day after the allegations surfaced on social media.
The January 6 Instagram post by someone who claimed to have worked at Bar Story, alleged that the owner made derogatory comments to a man seeking employment. The negative comments were about the man’s homeland of Palestine, one example given being “Maybe if you told me that you worked in a bar in Tel Aviv we could talk. Then you could work here. But if you’re going to say you’re from Palestine, it’s no good.” The post said the writer resigned from Bar Story after the incident. It also claimed that Bar Story’s owner was implicated in several racist and homophobic incidents, as well as even sexual misconduct.
The Instagram post, which currently has 30,000 likes, prompted an outpouring of similar stories and several comments expressed solidarity. One said “I have been witness to his VILE behaviour on a number of occasions, through his disgusting behaviour towards young girls including myself and his abhorrent racist views. Thank you so much for sharing, he needs to be held accountable.” A few comments even contained offers of work for the writer and man seeking employment from other businesses in the area.
Bar Story has offered no public response and its Instagram account is in private mode, which is considered unusual for a public-facing business. It is unclear whether the bar always had a private Instagram account or whether it was switched in response to recent events.
The loss of the pizza service is seen as yet another example of the effects of social media storms. On the day of the first Instagram post making the allegations, Dinner for One Hundred said it would keep its staff on at Bar Story. A day later, it posted again to say it would be moving operations out of Bar Story, effective immediately.
