Video surfaces of racist tirade in Calgary liquor store

Editor’s note: The video in this story contains graphic language

CALGARY (CityNews) – Another video of a racist incident in Calgary has emerged, showing a man verbally attacking a liquor store employee when he was told to wear a mask.

It happened at Fiesta Liquor in the city’s northwest on Saturday after the victim – a woman who works at the store — asked the man to put on a mask.

She was not wearing one as the bylaw states that employees separated by an installed screen, shield, or other barriers, do not need to wear a face mask.

Seconds later, the man begins aggressively yelling at her, swearing and calling her racist names for at least a minute. He was asked to leave the store.

CityNews spoke with another employee at the liquor store, who said the incident was reported to police.

The victim in the attack did not want to speak.

“It’s systemically embedded and when something is systemically embedded, it enables people to have this type of behaviour because it’s seen as normal. It’s seen as normal to have a racist mentality.”

Iman Bukhari is the founder of the Canadian Cultural Mosaic Foundation and said her colleagues are concerned with this incident and similar others.
They fear that protests, public consultations, and even the global movement sparked by the death of George Floyd, won’t be enough to stop this behaviour and more action needs to be taken.

“When we have council meetings, we’re still discussing if this is an issue at all. Yes, of course, it’s an issue, it’s happening we have so much proof. What more do you want?”

For the public, it’s hard to watch, but Bhukari said for those experiencing it, it’s unimaginable and attitudes need to change for this to stop.

“We can speak perfect English, we can have a Canadian accent but it’s never enough. And we simply cannot change our skin colour. So, we really need to do something if we call ourselves a multicultural country, a city for all Calgarians.”

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