A woman thought a server’s watermelon drink recommendation was a little racist—until she tried it.
In the viral video, Kay (@munchhousenbyproxy2), a Black woman, said that she asked her server for a drink recommendation and was taken aback by her suggestion.
“I think you guys would like the watermelon one,” the server allegedly said, possibly not catching on to the implication.
There’s a persisting stereotype that Black people love watermelon (we’ll get more into that history in a bit). Kay was surprised by the possibly racist recommendation but ordered what looked to be a watermelon margarita anyway.
It turns out the server was right. Kay and her lunch companion loved the drink even though they felt a bit iffy about the recommendation at first.
“Slurped it down like it was the last drink on EARTH,” Kay said in a comment.
The video has more than four million views and thousands of comments. Some people shared that they also feel split about recommending watermelon to Black people, while others said it shouldn’t be such a big deal.
“It took me a little second to get it because I said ‘yeah watermelon drinks are bomb’ THEN I GASPED,” a top comment read.
“I worked at a daiquiri shop one time and recommended the watermelon mixed with marg bc it was my fav and they sat in silence staring at me I was like no wait i’m so sorry,” a person shared.
“It’s even worse when you actually like it so it’s like… damn,” another said.
“Watermelon flavor anything is always good,” a commenter wrote.
The racist trope of watermelons
One of the most common food stereotypes associated with Black people is that they love watermelon. But how did the affinity of a refreshing fruit that everyone loves to eat when it’s hot out become weaponized?
In the Jim Crow era post-emancipation, some free Black people in the South began growing and selling watermelon. The green and pink melon quickly became a symbol of Black freedom.
So white folks, feeling threatened by Black Americans’ newfound independence, went and turned that symbol of self-sufficiency around, creating imagery that turned the watermelon into a symbol of poverty, laziness, and gluttony, according to research by the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
White people created racist, imaginary imagery in ads and postcards of Black people stealing, fighting over, and eating the fruit in excessive quantities.
“Watermelons being eaten hand to mouth without utensils made it impossible to consume without making a mess, therefore branded a public nuisance,” the museum’s website describes.
And the effects of this racist imagery continue to impact people today, with many Black people sharing online that they hesitate to eat watermelon in front of non-Black people.
“Just a few days earlier, I told them, I’d found myself in a familiar internal debate over whether to take a slice of watermelon from a luncheon fruit tray. In the pause before my fork stabbed a couple of slices, I worried anew that white people looking on would follow the crooked path of bigoted logic that says if one stereotype is validated, all the others must be true,” Keith Woods, a journalism executive, wrote in an essay.
The Daily Dot reached out to Kay for comment via Instagram direct message.
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