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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/AITAFoodRevoker on 2023-07-09 20:11:02+00:00.

I own and manage a small but decent diner in the city. We are not part of a franchise or anything, I opened this place up myself. We get by with some profit, but we’re not exactly going to be the next new hit thing.

For about nine months, a woman has been coming in with her autistic son. When they come in varies, it can be once a week, once every two, or there’s been times she’s come in almost every day. Her son is between 17-21. He doesn’t really speak, and he’ll only ever eat one meal on our menu. If he thinks something is off or has been made wrong, he gets agitated and upset and will refuse to eat it. His mother explained its a ‘safe food’ for him, one of the few things he’ll eat, which is why they come here frequently.

Due to soaring expenses right now, I’m having to make some changes to the menu to either switch out or scrap dishes we don’t sell much of/dishes with high-cost ingredients. Unfortunately, the young man’s food is on the list. We just don’t sell enough of it on a regular basis to keep it and to warrant buying the ingredients, most of which go to waste or are used on other dishes anyway.

I did try and work out ways to keep it, but ultimately its just better for us as a business to switch it to a different menu item which I know will sell more. So we put out the announcements and taped up notices inside that we will be making these changes in three weeks, and which items we are getting rid of.

The mother came in with her son yesterday, saw the notices, and did not look happy. She came up to the bar and asked why we were getting rid of it. I explained and she told me that they buy it, so clearly its a ‘selling item.’ I told her we don’t sell much of it and its more cost effective to change it to a more popular option.

She began to argue with me about keeping it, and when I stood firm she said she’d just order other dishes and ‘make modifications’ to make it his favorite dish anyway. I told her we can’t do that. She said what if she buys another dish but we just make that one instead. I said again, can’t do it. Her son was getting upset at this point and she was getting angrier and eventually she began to shout at me for ‘hating autistic people’ and ‘driving her son away because he’s autistic.’

She did leave, but I’ve come to learn she’s blasted us on Facebook over ‘discriminating against her son,’ how we’re taking off a menu item just to stop him coming in, and how we’re upsetting him and ruining his life and safe food for him. I do feel really bad for him, I didn’t mean to upset him and I definitely didn’t consider him as a ‘reason’ to get rid of the dish.

Our local area is now divided, and we’ve had a few bad fake reviews left saying we hate autistic people. Some staff said I should keep the dish for him.

AITA for getting rid of the dish? As owner I can just choose to eat the loss and keep it on, but with things being so expensive and only increasing still, pretty soon it’ll be hard to afford to operate at all.