A man at a North Carolina Food Lion complained about a woman’s behavior at the checkout, then told her ‘I’m white’ and ‘And I’m proud of it’

A Black woman at a North Carolina Food Lion filmed an older white man making remarks about race during a checkout argument, according to The Nerd Stash. The exchange took place at the store on Vernon Avenue in Kinston. An older woman who appeared to be with the man later led him away.

The woman, Candy Tilghman, filmed the man as he stood nearby with a cart full of groceries. He first complained about how she was behaving, then turned the argument to race. “The Blacks think they own the ****** world, but they don’t,” he says in the clip.

Tilghman tells him not to “go there” and says she is recording. He answers, “I don’t care, record me all you want.” The man then argues that he had only called her Black. “I ain’t said nothing but black. I ain’t told you no ugly word,” he says.

Tilghman did not engage with the man’s remarks on race

Moments later, he says, “I’m white,” and adds, “And I’m proud of it.” Tilghman does not take up the point about race. She tells him, “I don’t care who you are,” and “You’re out of control,” before the woman with him pulls him away. The video was reshared on X. According to the caption, Tilghman later said the “Holy Ghost” and her “love for Jesus” helped her stay calm, and she said she hoped Jesus would save the man’s soul.

The outlet stated it found no statement from Food Lion about the incident at the time it published. It did not report any police involvement, and the man has not been publicly identified. Speech that many people find offensive, including remarks about race, is generally protected by the First Amendment.

The Supreme Court made an exception in Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire in 1942 for “fighting words,” which it defined as words that “by their very utterance, inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.”

North Carolina’s disorderly conduct law covers a public disturbance caused by anyone who uses “any utterance, gesture, display or abusive language which is intended and plainly likely to provoke violent retaliation and thereby cause a breach of the peace.” A violation is a Class 2 misdemeanor.

The state also has an ethnic intimidation law, but it requires more than words. It applies when someone, because of race and other listed traits, assaults another person, damages or defaces their property, or threatens to do so. That offense is a Class 1 misdemeanor. The outlet did not report any physical contact or threat in this case.

Separately, North Carolina’s second-degree trespass law makes it a Class 3 misdemeanor to stay on someone else’s premises after the owner or person in charge says to leave. No report says whether anyone at Food Lion asked him to go, or whether any charges followed.