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A Dallas-area couple say they were asked to leave a restaurant last week — after the restaurant said they’d broken its policy against wearing masks.

Natalie Wester says she and her husband Jose were dining at the Hang Time grill in Rowlett, a Dallas suburb, when their server approached and asked them to take off their face masks. The couple, who are fully vaccinated for COVID-19, say they’re cautious about public outings because of their four-month-old immunocompromised child.

“About half an hour passes and our waitress comes sits down next to me and says ‘Our manager sent me over because I’m nicer than he is. And yes, this is political,’” says Wester. “She stated that we were not allowed to wear masks in the building per the management. He did not believe they worked and did not want anyone in his business wearing them.”

At this point, Wester informed the server that she and her husband wear masks to try minimizing COVID-19 exposure, in addition to seasonal illnesses like RSV and the flu. Wester’s son has cystic fibrosis, a genetic disease affecting the child’s lungs and digestive system. The condition makes it tougher to fight off infections, Wester explains.

“I informed my waitress of this information,” Wester says. “And she told me that she could close my check for me if it was an issue. Fine. My husband and I paid and left without a scene.”

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“About half an hour passes and our waitress comes sits down next to me and says ‘Our manager sent me over because I’m nicer than he is. And yes, this is political,’”

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Originally posted by ShiroKuro:
2. Why do people continue dining out in the middle of a pandemic? Esp. if they have health-compromised family members?

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In an incident Dallas resident Natalie Wester describes as “bizarre,” she and her husband Jose Lopez were recently instructed to take off their masks while inside a bar called Hang Time Sports Grill & Bar in Rowlett. Or leave.

Natalie Wester and her husband Jose Lopez were asked to leave Hang Time in Rowlett, Texas, because they were wearing their masks indoors. They say they were trying to protect their immunocompromised son Austin, who is 4 months old.

Bar owner Tom Blackmer doesn’t think the confrontation was bizarre: He does not want his customers wearing masks indoors, and he’s tired of talking about it.

“She was told on the way in that we don’t allow masks,” he says. It’s a decision he says he made in April — one that has been occasionally controversial, but most patrons just go find another bar.

“They have a choice to go wherever they want; there are thousands of bars around here. Go somewhere else,” Blackmer says.

Wester and Lopez have a 4-month-old son, Austin, who has cystic fibrosis, and they say they were wearing their masks because pediatricians at Children’s Health in Dallas told them to take “extra precautions, even without COVID,” Wester says. Both parents are fully vaccinated.

Blackmer thinks they should have stayed home.

“If you are protecting somebody, you should not go out,” he says.

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It’s a policy you don’t hear often amid the pandemic, but the owner says he considers it part of the dress code.

“I have spent my money on the business, my blood sweat and tears in this business, and I don’t want masks in here,” Tom, the owner of Hang Time, said.

He says it’s a private business and he has every right to refuse service to those who want to wear their mask.

“I feel the overall reaction with masks is ridiculous in the United States right now,” Tom said.

There’s no sign, instead the hostess tells everyone who wears one that they must take them off at the door.

“So when they put their masks on the other night, they were reminded that at the front to take it off. They didn’t want to, and so we asked them to leave,” the owner continued.

He said he was unaware of her immune compromised son, but that it’s a rule they believe strongly in and will continue to enforce.

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Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
More stupid Republicanism.

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“About half an hour passes and our waitress comes sits down next to me and says ‘Our manager sent me over because I’m nicer than he is. And yes, this is political,’”

I think I would have been less nice than the couple. I wouldn't have paid the bill. I would have assumed that it would be comped, given the involuntary ejection, and I would have left.