Harun Nasrullah

On June 1, a Muslim woman filed a lawsuit against a McDonald’s restaurant in Massachusetts, US, for intentionally placing bacon on a Filet-O-Fish burger she had ordered for her child. Ghadir Alahmar, wearing a hijab and abaya, entered the Chicopee restaurant with her twin 7-year-old sons on June 29, 2020, according to the complaint.

She ordered a plain fish sandwich and had one of her sons repeat the order to a worker in case they did not understand her accent.

Having received their order, which included fries and cookies, they walked to a nearby school playground where they planned to eat.One of her sons noticed the bacon. The sandwich not only had bacon on it but appeared to have extra bacon, the complaint says. They did not eat the bacon, but one son ate the lower half of the bun and part of the fish filet, according to the complaint.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations filed a discrimination complaint on the woman’s behalf with the Massachusetts Commission against Discrimination. “It is commonly known that Islam forbids Muslims from eating pork,” the complaint says. “McDonald’s employees willfully added bacon to the complainant’s food in an effort to offend, humiliate, and cause distress to the complainant and her young children.”

The complaint is the first step in the process of seeking monetary damages, said Barbara Dougan, a CAIR lawyer, who said, “Religious discrimination in a place of public accommodation is not only illegal but also morally reprehensible.”

She also hopes it prompts McDonald’s to better train its workers to prevent a similar incident in the future.

experience prompted one of the children to ask his mother if “they hate us…McDonald’s made my children and me feel unwanted and worthless by intentionally stuffing a fish sandwich full of bacon for no other reason than to punish us for our faith and religious convictions,” Alahmar, said in a statement.