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  • 2015-11-30 (xsd:date)
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  • Did Buffalo Wild Wings Ban Guns and Refuse Service to Armed Police? (en)
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  • On 23 November 2015, a Facebook user published a Facebook status update reporting that the restaurant chain Buffalo Wild Wings banned guns on their premises and refused service to police officers. Within a week, the claim had been shared tens of thousands of times: The rumor prompted a flood of angry posts to the Facebook page of Buffalo Wild Wings, accusing the chain of ejecting armed police officers (despite any specific information suggesting the rumor was credible): Although the level of outrage might have suggested otherwise, Buffalo Wild Wings didn't recently ban guns from their restaurants. Window decals announcing the policy (images of which are rife online), and forum posts dating back to at least 2004 detail the existence of a gun ban at some Buffalo Wild Wings locations. It should be noted that the chain's policy is not universal. During an earlier wave of anger over Buffalo Wild Wings' gun policy in January 2013, the chain released a statement that incidentally revealed the ban applied primarily to company-owned locations (not franchised restaurants): At the time that statement was released, KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh checked to see whether local Buffalo Wild Wings restaurants displayed the sign. Most did not: We were unable to find any incidents involving police officers, guns, and Buffalo Wild Wings in November 2015 that might have prompted the original post or subsequent sudden outpouring of anger. But in March 2013 (two and a half years prior to the November 2015 controversy), a now-deleted post on Patch Manasseh appeared to have kicked off the original rumor. A 7 May 2013 post on that site reproduced the claim, which looked to have originated with a concerned citizen: The subsequent deletion of the original post made determining its original claims difficult. A copied portion of the article indicated that it was originally posted on or around 27 March 2013, more than a month before the May 2013 followup. In the later Patch piece, the site reported that general manager of the Manassas Buffalo Wild Wings Scott Lupton immediately clarified that police were not subject to the gun policy. Moreover, Lupton attempted to locate the police officers described by LaClair to Patch, but was unable to: A 28 March 2013 post on FoxNews.com (published after the first Patch article and before the second) provided a date for the incident and included an update from Lupton in which he stated no one was asked to leave: That article included comment from Buffalo Wild Wings' corporate offices, clarifying that armed officers were universally welcomed: In April 2013 the Manassas location donated ten percent of a day's profits to Law Enforcement United in response to the controversy. A February 2018 rehashing of this item (in the wake of the Parkland, Florida, school shooting) included a digitally manipulated image of a Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant window in Morristown, Tennesee: That location bears no such wording its window: (en)
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