Brittany Payton, an anchor for FOX 32 in Chicago and the daughter of Chicago Bears legend Walter Payton, took to social media recently to speak on a horrific racist encounter she just experienced.
Via her Twitter account, Payton shared the details of the disgusting incident in three separate videos.
“Something just happened to me that, I wasn’t sure if I was going to say anything. I actually called my brother and told him what happened, and he said, ‘No, B, you have to say something, because people just need to know what it’s like and what happens. And it’s real,’” Payton began.
“I went to the store — haven’t left my house in days — and I went to Walgreens to get some sinus medicine because my allergies are bad,” Payton began. “My mom, who has been staying with us, decided to drive with me, it was just nice to get out, it was a beautiful day outside. So we’re at the drive thru at the Walgreens,” Payton continued, before mentioning a car that pulled up from behind them. “All of the sudden, I notice that the man got out of his car and he was standing outside of his car door. He happened to be a white man, probably in his 50s.” First, the man stood and stared at Payton and her mother. Then, he began clapping his hands, “like, come on already, get moving,” Payton explained.
The man then went to his trunk and grabbed a watermelon. “And I’m wondering ‘really?’ … There’s a lot of negative connotations when it comes to African Americans and watermelon, but I just kind of sat there again,” Payton said. But it only got worse. The man began “cooing like a monkey” at her. “And then I knew everything that he was doing, and the reason why,” Payton said, clearly devastated by the experience.
“It’s not the first racist thing that’s ever happened to me. I’m 35 years old. There’s been many times in my life that I’ve had to deal with racism,” Payton said. “But just today, with everything, something just broke. It’s ridiculous that people have to put up with this all the time, every day, and you just deal with it. You deal with it, and you go. And it happens everywhere. We just have to be better. It’s people like that man, who was behind me in my car, that is the reason things are going on today. People like that. It’s the reason there’s a problem. We just have to be better.”
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