A restaurant in Washington State is getting flak for using its “No shoes, no shirt, no service” policy to boot a pregnant mom whose stomach was protruding, well, quite a bit. On Sunday, Charisha Gobin and her family stopped by the Marysville location of Buzz Inn Steakhouse. She was wearing a black crop top with “Weirdo” printed across it, and an ankle-length white skirt. The shirt didn’t cover her belly up, and a server felt letting her stay would be a health-code violation.
“I’m sorry, you can’t be here in that shirt,” the employee announced, Gobin tells KIRO. “I said, ‘Are you being serious with me right now?’ And she said, ‘Yep, you can’t be here.’” Gobin is almost eight months pregnant with twins; as a result, she says her stomach is “bigger” and more prone to “sticking out.” She accuses Buzz Inn of body-shaming her, arguing that “had it been anyone else, I don’t think there would’ve been any problem whatsoever.”
The server says what Gobin wore didn’t “count as a shirt,” and that she would’ve kicked out any customer who walked in dressed that way. But Gobin argues that her crop top was valid restaurant attire. “It had sleeves,” she explains. “I didn’t even have cleavage showing.” A picture she posted of her outfit on Facebook was shared hundreds of times, and of the response she’s gotten, Gobin says: “Everybody pretty much agrees — I wasn’t out of bounds or out of line in any way.”
Buzz Inn has issued a formal apology, promising to retrain staff on “how to not overly enforce a rule that is intended to make all guests feel comfortable”:
