New York Uber driver allegedly kicks same-sex couple out of his car over “disrespectful” act
An Uber driver in New York reportedly kicked a lesbian couple out of his car for kissing, calling the act “disrespectful” – a comment which was caught on video following the incident.
Emma Pichl, 24, and her girlfriend Alex Iovine, 26, had just left a friend’s birthday party in Brooklyn when they ordered the Uber.
Lesbian couple says Uber driver kicked them out over a kiss https://t.co/a8EXxoF9n5 pic.twitter.com/QU8X0YMQVT
— New York Post (@nypost) June 12, 2018
“We got over the Manhattan Bridge into the city. We were sitting on opposite sides of the backseat. At one point we leaned over and pecked kiss, very fast,” Emma Pichl told The New York Post.
According to Pichl, the Uber driver then “pulled the cab over and said, ‘You should not do that… do not do that.’”
“And then he opened the car doors,” Pichl continues, “I thought he was kidding and then Alex said, ‘I don’t think he is.’
“He started yelling at us that we were disrespectful and inappropriate and that he wants us out of his car… We were going back and forth trying to understand.”
Pichl told The New York Post that neither herself, nor her girlfriend were intoxicated at the time. In a video posted to YouTube by Iovine, both women can be heard asking what the “issue” is.
“I said don’t do it,” the driver – who was later identified as Ahmad El Boutari – tells the women.
“You don’t do that here in the car… You are not allowed to do this.”
The video ends with Iovine telling the driver — after he had reportedly “grabbed” her arm — “I’m reporting you. I’m gonna get you fired.”
“I don’t care,” Boutari responds.
Pichl told the post: “We were in shock. Definitely very shaken and upset.
“We always thought we lived in this untouchable New York City bubble where LGBTQ is so accepted. We never thought something like this would happen to us.
“It was a good lesson to show it can happen to you anywhere.”
Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi later responded, saying homophobic drivers like Boutari “don’t belong on Uber.”
“This is an open society and Uber is a platform that is available to anybody regardless of your background, your orientation, and that is sacred to us.
“It’s an unfortunate circumstance and we will do everything we can for that not to repeat.”
Read the full story here.
