On what should’ve been a regular day, Destinee Kerr walked into Rue De La Course, a popular Uptown café in New Orleans. She wasn’t there for fun, she had work to do. As a media correspondent and Xavier University alum, she was on a deadline and needed a spot to wrap up and post a video. So she grabbed a table, settled in, and got to work.
Nothing unusual, especially for Destinee, who had been to the café just the day before. But within ten minutes of walking in, the vibe shifted. The manager, a white woman named Danielle, came over and told her she needed to make a purchase. Destinee explained that she absolutely intended to, just as soon as she finished uploading the video she was working on. But that didn’t seem to matter.
Instead of backing off, the manager escalated the situation and, according to Destinee, even threatened to call the police. Feeling rattled and unsure, Destinee pulled out her phone and started recording.
“I was continuously harassed, not even 10 minutes after I walked in, and eventually began recording. As you guys can see, it escalated… and ultimately, I was threatened and called the police on.”
She was visibly upset in the footage, her voice cracking during the exchange. And although the police never actually came, the damage was already done. Destinee added in her caption that she was “told to leave despite empty tables. As a Black woman and paying customer, take your business where you’re respected.”
That moment turned into a storm. As Destinee shared what happened in a series of TikTok videos, people started choosing sides, and fast.
Some were quick to criticize her. “You can’t just loiter somewhere because you feel like it,” one commenter said, echoing others who claimed the café was just enforcing policy.
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But the support Destinee received was even louder. People began organizing boycotts, flooding the café with negative reviews, and calling out what they saw as blatant discrimination. Some white customers even remarked they’d spent hours there without ever being asked to buy something first.
And then there was a detail that really set people off. In a later video, Destinee revealed that the manager had brought up the 1930s in an Instagram statement meant to explain their side. Destinee pointed out the absurdity. “Now, this business did not open until the 1990s. Yet, what happened in the 1930s? Yeah, Jim Crow, segregation, and more. You help me do the math.”
One comment drove the point home, and reportedly got a “like” from the café’s own account. “So why don’t y’all just put a whites-only sign out in the front?”
Destinee, now exhausted by the whole ordeal, reached out publicly to Black community leaders, asking what she should do next. “Turn a blind eye? Ultimately, make a social media post?” she asked in one of her videos. But then she added, clearly frustrated, that a simple post wouldn’t be enough. Something more needed to happen.
And maybe it is happening. Her supporters have stuck by her, standing firm in their belief that what happened wasn’t okay. “Girl I 100% back you up! You were not wrong and were never wrong! Their racism will be the end of their business,” one follower commented.
The café eventually issued a statement, but instead of cooling things down, it stirred the pot even more. Many felt it doubled down on the very behavior people were calling out.
The statement read, in part, “Our staff is trained to ensure that all people who are utilizing the space have purchased something. Although we welcome all customers, we do have strict policies regarding those who don’t.”
That didn’t sit well with Destinee or many others, especially since no one had ever seen that policy posted inside the café, or anywhere online. She couldn’t understand why a place that supposedly trains its staff so thoroughly would threaten to call the police on a regular customer. And soon after the backlash, Rue De La Course quietly turned off comments on their Instagram account.
One viewer summed up the whole situation in a reply about the manager’s approach. “Girl, even if it says that, it’s bad business to harass you that way. Politely letting you know was enough. She was a problem to begin with.”
And another pointed out the irony of the café’s reaction. “A restaurant turning off their Instagram comments is insane, and this ‘statement’ is them doubling down on their ‘right’ to discriminate.”
