Last month the Daily Kos community was galvanized behind ex-Marine and waitress Dayna Morales, as she claimed a couple refused to tip her based on her being gay. According to Morales, a couple that she served left no tip on a $93 bill, instead writing a note stating that they didn't "agree with her lifestyle".
Such stories are sadly common, so the story generated considerable and fair outrage within this community. A post by Jen Hayden made it all the way to the front page, and was further "liked" on Facebook over 6,500 times. Morales, an ex-Marine, had set up a PayPal account and as Jen's article detailed, had promised to donate a portion of those proceeds to the Wounded Warrior project, a worthy recipient.
However, as time passed, we learned that Morales' story started to unravel. One week after Jen's post, a post by member Heavy Mettle reported that the family in question indeed did tip Morales, and produced their own copy of the receipt in addition to a credit card statement that showed a tip of $18 (a solid amount for a $93 dining bill).
According to the family:
The husband and wife, who asked to remain anonymous, showed NBC 4 New York a receipt that appeared to be printed at the same minute, on the same date, for the same $93.55 total, except with an $18 tip.
They also provided a document they said was a Visa bill, which appears to indicate their card was charged for the meal plus the tip, for a total of $111.55.
The couple told NBC 4 New York that they believed their receipt was used for a hoax. The wife says she is left-handed and could not have made the slash in the tip line, which she said looks to be drawn from the right.
"We've never not left a tip when someone gave good service, and we would never leave a note like that," the wife said.
The husband said he and his wife have both worked in restaurants and believe in the value of tipping, and noted that he didn't vote for Gov. Chris Christie because the governor doesn't support gay marriage.
Another short
diary posted by member ffour included links to stories that claimed the ex-Marine has a reputation for being a "habitual liar".
It seems that those reports are indeed correct, as a story posted by ABC News states that Ms. Morales has been fired from the restaurant after conducting its own investigation.
From the ABC News story:
The waitress and former Marine who has been accused of orchestrating a hoax by claiming a family left her a homophobic note instead of a tip, is no longer working at the New Jersey restaurant where she'd claimed the incident occurred.
Dayna Morales made national headlines and received an outpouring of public support and at least $3,000 in donations after she claimed a family stiffed her and left her a note on the receipt reading, "Sorry, I cannot tip because I do not agree with your lifestyle and the way you live your life."
But after an unidentified couple came forward days later with a customer receipt and bank statement to prove that they had in fact left Dayna Morales an $18 tip on top of the $93.55 check, former friends of Morales also came forward claiming she was a compulsive liar.
Following the allegations against Morales, her employer the Gallop Asian Bistro said on Saturday she no longer would work at the restaurant.
The restaurant posted a message on its Facebook page that read in part, "In light of the investigation and recent events, both Ms. Morales and Gallop Asian Bistro have made a joint decision that Ms. Morales will no longer continue her employment at our restaurant. We wish her well in the future."
Even more disappointing is the fact that Ms. Morales has not donated any of her PayPal donations to the Wounded Warrior Project charity. Other former friends of Ms. Morales have come forward saying that she has previously lied about having cancer and a "whole other mess of things".
I'm updating this story for two reasons. One, I feel like it is important to offer this community a conclusion to this story and correct the record, given our investment in the early reports. Remember, we are the reality based community. And two, to provide the following commentary; it really pisses me off when things like this happen. Not because this is some major setback in the equality movement, because if you are so "on the fence" that this one story would make you suddenly anti-equality, then you weren't on our side to begin with.
Why stories like this piss me off is that there are A LOT of LGBT individuals that deal with real discrimination, and now their stories will suddenly be discounted. Cue the "well, maybe it's not as bad as they are making it out to be" or "I'm not sure if that is really true" comments.
So overall, I'm saddened by this story and angered that someone would dupe people. Also, as a reminder from being burned in past incidents, this community needs to do a much better job at researching stories before getting outraged at them. I mostly followed this story on Facebook, and some of my friends were insistent that "the family called the credit card company to add the tip after being caught". Really? That sounded ridiculous two weeks ago, and even more so now.