Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

OTHER VOICES:

A bad review for Obama hugger

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A guy named Tom in Binghamton, N.Y., really didn’t like the video of Scott Van Duzer giving President Barack Obama a friendly bear hug in Van Duzer’s Fort Pierce, Fla., pizza restaurant.

So a day later, the man in New York went online to Yelp, a site that allows customers to write their own restaurant reviews. He wrote a review giving Big Apple Pizza in Fort Pierce the lowest possible rating — one out of five stars.

“If this guy calls this PUKE pizza, he has to be an obuma maggot,” Tom’s review said. “Learn how to cook. We’ll never be back and get some service.”

A scathing review, especially considering that Tom never set foot in Van Duzer’s restaurant. I can say this with some certainty because Tom apparently wasn’t sure whether he had the right restaurant, so he wrote another scathing review for a different Big Apple Pizza restaurant in Port St. Lucie, Fla.

“This is the worst slop I ever ate,” he wrote in that review. “My family & I will ‘NEVER’ go back there. Maybe he can hug o’bum’o again. Service is terrible for sure. Stay clear of this rat infested place.”

The New York man wasn’t the only person willing to write a fictitious review aimed at depriving Van Duzer of future business. Hundreds of other fake customers from all over the country, people who are bound by their common hatred of America’s president, turned their vitriolic imaginations on the restaurant they never visited, in an attempt to hurt a small businessman who sinned by not validating their political views.

“I ate there and immediately started to get sick,” wrote John from Glendale, Ariz. “Worst food, service ever. Dirty floors, kitchen, tables. Looked like roach droppings on the walls too.”

John, like many others, had never been a restaurant critic on Yelp until he took aim at the Fort Pierce pizza place after Obama’s visit.

“Worst pizza ever. Disgusting. Yuck. It’s unclean and greasy. Do not eat here,” wrote somebody from Jacksonville, Ill.

A reviewer from Portland, Ore., wrote, “no matter how long, hard and high up in the air the pizza store owner hugs the bro ... the pizza still sucks and the unflavorful (sic) crust tastes like crap.”

Before the presidential hug, Big Apple Pizza in Fort Pierce had two customer reviews on Yelp during the past three years. Both reviews were from local people who wrote favorable comments.

Between Sunday’s hug and Tuesday afternoon, there were more than 3,000 reviews from as far away as Hawaii. Many of them said nothing about the food. They were just commentaries in favor or against Van Duzer for hugging the president.

I commend the haters who at least had the decency to unsheathe their swords during the attack.

“I cringe at the thought even of eating at this Big Crapple Pizza,” one wrote. “Knowing O’Hussain was there totally creeps it out for me.”

Or as another put it: “If you were a real republican you would have body slammed the socialist President Obama.”

There’s at least an upfront quality to that kind of cretinism. But masking your obsessive hatred in a food review of a restaurant you never ate in is scraping the bottom of an already deep cesspool.

“I wouldn’t even recommend this pizza to be fed to your enemies dog it’s that bad,” wrote another long-distance reviewer from Illinois.

The negative reviews led to a counter wave of positive reviews from people who also had never eaten at the restaurant.

“I wish Yelp would remove ALL the reviews related to the bear hug of President Obama, including this one,” wrote Jed from Falls Church, Va. “But until then, I hope this 5-star post helps outweigh the irrationally angry 1-star ones.”

By Wednesday morning, Yelp stepped in and deleted about 90 percent of the reviews.

But within hours, trouble loomed again.

Florida’s politically androgynous former Gov. Charlie Crist, a man who knows all too well how people overreact to hugging Obama, walked into Van Duzer’s restaurant Wednesday afternoon for a big-hug photo op.

Oh, brother. Expect another wave of fictional restaurant reviews.

Frank Cerabino writes for the Palm Beach Post in Florida.

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