Ohio ice cream shop asks customers to stop yelling at teenage employees about mask requirement

Angela Brooks was at her wits’ end when she took to Facebook at 10 a.m. on Tuesday. 

"I've been trying not to say anything, but it is getting out of control," she wrote on the Facebook page for Mootown Creamery, a homemade ice cream shop in Berea, Ohio. “Stop yelling at these young girls. Stop slamming doors. Stop swearing at them and making a scene. STOP!!!”

The young girls she’s referring to are the teenage employees at Mootown Creamery, which include her own daughters, who have been called “paranoid,” “anti-American” and other expletives by customers upset at the state’s requirement that employers and employees wear face coverings. The store also asks that customers wear masks, but they are not mandated by the government. 

"Do you know how hard it is to work a summer rush in a face mask? With a line of customers to the door, some waiting outside, online orders dinging on a tablet, the phone ringing off the hook," the post continued. "Does it feel good to make a 16 year old girl cry in the bathroom? Or sob on her way home from work? Does that make you feel better about Covid? How would you feel if someone did this to your child?"

Her anger soon went viral and the post was shared more than 2,000 times the next day, with more than a thousand sympathetic comments. Many wanted to know how they could support the business and its young employees, so Brooks set up a virtual tip jar on GoFundMe that has raised nearly $3,500 — all of which will go to the shops' sixteen teenage and young adult employees, she said. Some of them are working their first job and others are planning to attend college in the fall. 

"The outpouring of love, support and kindness has been overwhelming. We had no idea that the Facebook post would go viral. Obviously we struck a chord with so many of you," Brooks said on the website. 

Some Americans have been hesitant to follow public health recommendations to wear face coverings and follow social distancing measures, even protesting local and state government policies. 

"It just kind of makes you feel like you're doing something wrong, even though you're just enforcing a rule that I didn't even create and there's nothing I can do about it and I'm just going along with it. So it just kind of makes you feel bad about yourself in a way," one employee told FOX8.