Why some people just dont "get" the "Internet"…

(Alternative Title: When not to call someone a racist)

I am increasingly amazed at the interweb. People seem to not realise that the world is rapidly becoming more and more online to the extent that it’s probably likely that no matter who you are, your name, or your bussiness’ name is being Googled on a daily basis. Which brings me to the guy who called me a racist.

A while back a few of us went to a restaurant called Nonna Lina‘s for lunch. The entire event sucked. The food was bad, the service was bad and the owner/manager overcharged us. I was so appauled I wrote a very strongly worded email to the restaurant and BCC’d a bunch of my friends.

Now a little bit about expectations… What did I expect from them? We’ll, to be honest I expected a reply… maybe even a sorry. I would have been very impressed if they had said something like “Hey, sorry you had a crap experience, won’t you come and have lunch on us and see if we can make things right.”

Alas there was nothing… not even a nasty reply. (Actually their first email address bounced so I had to find another which didn’t bounce, so I know they got it)

So obviously they didn’t care… My little email and my 50 friends didn’t count. Then, a few weeks later, I posted the email on my blog.

So now I am the 3rd result in Google for Nonna Lina.

A month goes by and a few days ago I get an email alerting me to a new comment on the story. It’s from the owner. I assume he Googled his restaurant’s name and got a little fright… but not enough of a fright to apologize… instead he writes a badly constructed list of excuses, demeaning my own ability to discern good food from bad food. Insists that their shocking food is true Italian Fare… the fact that 11 people found their food disgusting must mean that I run in very plebby social circles.

Then he strangely tells me that I should talk more… weird… I think what he’s trying to say is that we should have spoken to him then instead of writing about it on the internet… except, he forgets, we tried to talk to him but he wouldn’t listen and instead walked outside and started smoking.

Then, as if all of this wasn’t enough, he calls me a racist because I said that his waiter’s English was bad and we struggled to communicate with him. I must point out that his email had shocking English too. So now I’m a racist who doesn’t like Italian people… I must tell that to my Italian friends. Also, I’m constantly ripping off my girlfriend about her funny colloquialisms. Dammit, I must be a racist.

Actually, it had never occurred to me that his waiter was black until he brought it up.