People Put This Restaurant On Blast For Making A "Grab Her By The Taco" Joke

    The Mexican restaurant's owner said management would get sensitivity training.

    Ishmael N. Daro
    by Ishmael N. Daro

    BuzzFeed News Reporter, Canada

    A Mexican restaurant in Toronto has pissed people off after making a joke about Donald Trump's boasts of groping women.

    Jen Agg / Twitter

    On its Instagram page, La Carnita restaurant shared a photo of tacos with the caption: "What if Donald said, 'grab her by the taco'..."

    The post was a reference to Trump's 2005 remarks, caught on video, about how he used his fame to kiss and grope women without clear consent, including grabbing them "by the pussy."

    People were quick to call out the restaurant online.

    tanvi @tanviswar

    @la_carnita it was disgusting, tbh.

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    The joke "trivialized and made fun of sexual assault," some customers said.

    crazy girl @mira_elhussein

    @la_carnita not just rude and insensitive, it also trivialized and made fun of sexual assault.

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    Lori Harito @LoHo__

    @la_carnita And you can all stop suggesting that women can be grabbed. at all. Ever. With tacos, with money, with anything.

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    Jen Agg, a restaurant owner who brought the La Carnita post to wider attention, said the taco joke reflected a larger problem of sexism in the industry.

    Jen Agg @TheBlackHoof

    I'm not talking about people who work in restaurants (there's been tons of support there) I mean owners/chefs and people with power

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    Andrew Richmond, the owner of La Carnita, told BuzzFeed Canada that the offending image was deleted within half an hour of it going up.

    The restaurant uses social media "as it’s supposed to be used, which is kind of off the cuff," he said.

    But he said he realizes that as the business has grown, there need to be more safeguards to avoid similar problems. The company currently employs about 250 people, he said.

    La Carnita has previously been accused of promoting harmful messages, such as these signs that show a man peering over a bathroom stall.

    Twitter: @aratisharma

    The signs were changed earlier this year.

    “These are just things, as we grew, that we realized we had to change," Richmond said of La Carnita's reputation for juvenile humour. "This [taco photo] is yet another instance of that.”

    Richmond posted a full apology on Facebook, taking responsibility and promising to do better.

    "Our comments and actions have never been ill intentioned, but have crossed the line on more than one occasion," Richmond wrote. "We recognize that there are systemic and cultural things that need to be fixed to ensure that this doesn't continue happening. We are making this a priority." The restaurateur promised that management would receive sensitivity training and that a portion of food sales for eight weeks would go toward charity. He also promised to update customers after those weight weeks. "We're sorry to have let everyone down and we're trying to do the right thing to remedy and prevent this from happening again," he said.

    View this post on Facebook
    Facebook: LaCarnita

    "Our comments and actions have never been ill intentioned, but have crossed the line on more than one occasion," Richmond wrote.

    "We recognize that there are systemic and cultural things that need to be fixed to ensure that this doesn't continue happening. We are making this a priority."

    The restaurateur promised that management would receive sensitivity training and that a portion of food sales for eight weeks would go toward charity. He also promised to update customers after those weight weeks.

    "We're sorry to have let everyone down and we're trying to do the right thing to remedy and prevent this from happening again," he said.