Ever since the video of the Sesame Place theme park employee ignoring two Black children went viral, more parents have come forward to show the discrimination their children have faced at the hands of theme park characters. One mother recently shared a video of her daughter being ignored by the Chuck E. Cheese mascot despite her kid standing and jumping around right in front of him.
The mother, Natyana Muhammad, took to Twitter where she accused the employee dressed as the Chuck E. Cheese mascot of discriminating against her 2 year old daughter and continuing to give the white children standing next to her high fives.
“On July 30 at Chuck E Cheese in Wayne, NJ, my 2yo was racially discriminated against. As you can see, he gives all of the yt kids hi-5s & PURPOSELY ignored my black baby,” Muhammad tweeted. “When confronted, he ignored me as well. The manager, Angie Valasquez, made excuses for him. Saying she’s ‘sorry I feel that way’ but he didn’t see her, even after showing her the PROOF in the video.”
Muhammad was the interviewed by ABC 7 New York where she went more into detail on her and her daughters experience.
“There were a bunch of caucasian children who were there on stage that received a high five,” Muhammad said. “My Black child was the one being ignored.”
She then said that despite her daughter in front of the character and visibly excited to see him, the employee did not give her child a high five and ignored her. “When she turned around she was excited to see him, she saw that he was giving all the other kids high-fives. She put her hand out. It was her turn. He like put his hand in and then down, and acted like he didn’t see her.”
Muhammad even said her daughter went around the employee and kept trying to give him a high five and was still ignored. “She even went around him to continuously give him a high-five, like, ‘OK, do you see my hand?’ It’s not just that he ignored my daughter, we were at a birthday party, so he didn’t acknowledge the table we were at, either.”
Following the incident Chuck E. Cheese, the company, released a statement saying they are “saddened when any family or child has a less than perfect experience. We want to thank the family who brought this to our attention at our Wayne, NJ location and for giving the onsite manager an opportunity to apologize and address their concerns in person.”
