Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy said Monday he believes an antisemitic sign at his Philadelphia bar Saturday night was most likely intended as a joke but that there was nothing funny about the offensive display.
"Maybe it wouldn’t have shocked me as much if I didn’t see it in a bar that I owned," Portnoy told NBC News. "But the uptick in antisemitism has been noticeable."
He's outraged by it and pushing for accountability. Two women who served the group and delivered the sign to a crowded table at Barstool Sansom Street in Center City Philadelphia have been fired, he said. The servers have not been identified.
The patrons ordered bottle service along with the custom sign. It is not uncommon for bars to offer personalized signs with bottle service orders.
A student at Temple University, 2 miles north of Portnoy's bar, was placed on interim suspension for alleged involvement in the incident. The university said it’s investigating.
But, Portnoy said, it's not clear whether the servers or the customers who ordered the sign actually embrace the hateful sentiment of it. He described the motive behind the sign as “just pure idiocy.”
Portnoy said he spoke to two customers involved in the order, asking: “What are you thinking? I’m about to go nuclear on this.”
Vladislav Khaykin, an executive vice president at California’s Simon Wiesenthal Center, home of the Museum of Tolerance, said, “What happened at Barstool Samson Street wasn’t a joke; it shows how increasingly normalized antisemitism has become in public spaces.”
Khaykin continued: “This incident underscores how acceptable mocking Jews has become. We appreciate that the business owner acted quickly. One reason we are seeing so much hate offline is because of so much unchecked hate online.”
Portnoy, who is 48 and Jewish, said critics have falsely painted him as lacking the appropriate level of alarm. He offered two customers involved in the incident trips to Poland to see the concentration camp and memorial at Auschwitz and learn about the Holocaust.
Later Monday, Portnoy vented on social media, posting a video in which he said one of the customers involved in the incident had walked back any responsibility for the sign. Portnoy said that person will no longer be offered the trip to Auschwitz.
“I am so sick of dealing with” this incident, Portnoy said in the video.
Some Jewish people criticized Portnoy, characterizing the Auschwitz offer as a "paid vacation" for bad behavior. He countered, though, that "if you pay attention at this trip, it's hard not to come back and feel differently about this issue.”
Portnoy is no stranger to making headlines, but the recent attention is perhaps a bit more personal. He said something has shifted in the American social atmosphere that has almost normalized antisemitic sentiment.
"To feel like you're hated, for really nothing ...," he said, "it's creating an unsafe vibe for people. You're talking about me, my parents, my family. Like, do you even know what you're saying?"
