How Y’all going to call the police on Bishop William Barber? The Civil Right’s leader tried to bring a special chair into the disabled section of a Greenville AMC theater on Tuesday afternoon for a screening of The Color Purple but was told that he would not be accommodated. Oh, did we mention he was there with his mama?
According to NPR, Barber, 60, who suffers from ankylosing spondylitis, a type of arthritis that causes inflammation in the joints and ligaments of the spine, uses the chair because he can not sit in lower chairs.
He was allegedly told that the chair would create a fire hazard. However, Barber was attempting to use the chair in an area designated for the disabled.
“I’ve used this chair everywhere,” Barber said, per CNN. “Broadway, the White House, I’ve never had a problem.”
Barber left the theater voluntarily after Greenville PD responded when the Bishop failed to come to a reasonable accommodation by the staff. CNN’s report notes that the police responded to a call for “trespassing.”
“I felt like I wasn’t being heard,” Barber said. “It felt as though they weren’t even trying to consider making accommodations for my disability.”
“AMC’s Chairman and CEO Adam Aron has already telephoned him, and plans to meet with him in person in Greenville, NC, next week to discuss both this situation and the good works Bishop Barber is engaged in throughout the years,” a statement reads. “We are also reviewing our policies with our theater teams to help ensure that situations like this do not occur again.”
Guests requiring accommodations are encouraged to speak with a manager prior to entering a theater. However, civil rights groups are calling for reform for disabled customers.
“This incident serves as a powerful reminder that we must create spaces that are inclusive, fair, and respectful of the rights of every individual. Discrimination based on physical abilities has no place in our society, and we must take decisive action to address this issue,” the North Carolina NAACP, which Barber was previously the head of, said in a statement.
They added, “While AMC has issued an apology, there is an urgent need for concrete steps to ensure accessibility in all AMC theaters across the nation. The NAACP stands united in our calls for accessibility and justice.” The group has also created an online petition calling for AMC to ensure accessibility for all.
Barber retired from his role as pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church in June of this year after 30 years of service and is now at Yale University. However, he has cited his medical condition as one determining factor. In 2022, he spoke at the Root Institute in DC.
Bishop Barber was at the theater on Tuesday to watch a screening of The Color Purple and was accompanying his 90-year-old mother whom, he says, stayed behind to watch the film with an assistant after he left.
Known for his renowned for his work addressing issues such as poverty, inequality and racism, Barber was also the head of the North Carolina NAACP from 2005 to 2017.
During a press conference on Dec. 29, Barber said that with all the “real issues” Americans have to deal with that it was “shameful” for the two managers to refuse him accommodations pursuant to the American Disabilities Act when all he wanted to do was spend time with this mother. He said that the managers told him that they knew who he was.
Barber explained that the ADA comes out of the same history and legacy of the Civil Rights Act to protect millions.
He also noted that for the managers to describe him, as a Black man, to police as “arguing” with employees could have had a tragic outcome. He said that he worried about the situation escalating. He also revealed that the managers involved in the situation were minorities. One was a Black woman—the other he believed was Latino or of mixed race. “Black on Black, White on Black. Asian or Latino… Wrong is wrong,” Barber said.
Barber noted that he is featured in a movie called God and Country produced by Rob Reiner that opens in February, he said that while his chair couldn’t get in the theater that his face will be.
He said that one of the managers asked him why he was making a big deal about the use of the chair. He said that “we (Americans) are better with the contributions of everyone to our society.” He noted that being ejected from the theater was “wrong. Morally wrong, Constitutionally wrong, Ethically wrong.”
He said that the Greenville police actually apologized to him as they escorted him from the theater. He noted that he has retained two civil rights attorneys who will accompany him to his meeting with AMC president Adam Aron in hopes for systemic change in all 10,000 of the company’s screens.