Ugh, This Viral Marriott Security Guard Video…

There’s video footage of a Marriott hotel security guard chewing out two people at a hotel, and it’s hard to know exactly what to make of this incident…

Marriott security guard chews out couple

There are two videos that were uploaded to TikTok yesterday, with one having received close to six million views as of the time of this post.

The video was recorded by a young woman who is heard crying in the video, and her boyfriend is depicted in the video talking to the security guard of a Marriott by the front desk. The conversation goes something like this:

Security guard: “You want sympathy?”
Guy: “I don’t want anything.”
Security guard: “You want the cops to come?”
Guy: “I’m going to take care of her first, okay?”
Security guard: “You’re disturbing my receptionist.”
Girl: “She was giving us attitude first.”
Security guard: “Young lady, at this moment right now, what you’re saying is irrelevant to me.”
Girl: “I’m aware of that, you’re making it very clear, I know that.”
Security guard: “You have nothing, so shhhh.”
Girl: “Don’t shush me, don’t shush me.”
Security guard: “Okay, please be quiet. Cause I don’t want to hear from your mouth anymore, period. I don’t need to hear you at all. Don’t cuss at me, young man.”

You can watch that video here:

At this point the guy storms out of the lobby, and I guess the security guard doesn’t like how aggressively he opens the door, which is when things are taken to the next level. At this point the security guard follows the guy out of the hotel, gets literally inches from his face, and starts intimidating him:

“Don’t push on my door, I don’t know the f*ck you think I is, but don’t push my door brother. I’m not the one you think I am, brother. I will take 20 years of military and beat your a$$, you understand me? Now don’t you ever disrespect nobody up in this hotel. You understand me? Because I’m not the one you f*cking think I am. You understand me? Ain’t no cameras outside this motherf*cker, we ain’t in the hotel no more.”

You can watch the video here for yourself (the video has some bad language, so be aware):

What’s the backstory of this incident?

The internet seems divided on this video:

• Many people think the security guard is a hero who is putting punk kids in their place, and that anyone who has worked a customer-facing job would want to do this
• Others think that the security guard was being incredibly unprofessional
• I’d note that many places are incorrectly labeling the guy involved in this incident as the manager, rather than the security guard (I’m guessing this might be because of how he phrases things, like saying “my door,” etc.)
• I think a lot of peoples’ opinions are informed by the name of the Reddit thread on this — “Old school manager puts cocky boy and his girlfriend in their place after he berated & cussed at a receptionist”

What many people seem to be missing is the alleged backstory of the incident. According to the same people who shared the video, here’s what unfolded that caused all of this:

We went to that hotel to stay the night there with my bf dad. My bf dad was really messed up on drugs and was falling all over the place and even knocked over a lamp. He could barely even speak sentences. We was far away from home so we decided we should call the cops to get help. We didn’t want cops to randomly show up without the hotel people knowing so we told the receptionist what happened. She was “blaming” us saying stuff like “you really want to call the cops on your dad” so we said yeah. After a while of her saying that she called her security. We explained to him why and he gave us attitude. I never cussed out the receptionist I said things like “his dad is f*cked up on drugs” but I never cussed at her. The receptionist commented herself saying she has the videos with the audio and could post the whole thing. I told her to post it and she hasn’t.

This is by all accounts an unfortunate story. A few thoughts:

• We don’t know the truth of how the couple acted towards the front desk associate, because that’s not on video
• The drug situation makes this a much darker story, and while the couple may have initially come across as punks, I feel they deserve some compassion; I can’t imagine how difficult it is to have parents with drug issues
• No matter how you slice it, the security guard took things way too far; of course the security guard should stand up for employees if they’re being harassed or mistreated, but he could also use a lesson in deescalating a difficult situation, and there’s simply no justification for literally threatening to beat someone up
• I think many people working in customer-facing jobs may fantasize about being able to act this way towards difficult guests, but this simply isn’t justifiable… period

Bottom line

Video footage is going viral of a security guard at a Marriott property chewing out two young adults in a way that I’ve never seen before. Ultimately we just have one side of the story, and we don’t know what happened prior to the video starting.

That being said, I can’t imagine any situation where this kind of behavior is appropriate. And while many may have at first said “the punk kids deserved it,” the parental drug angle here makes me more compassionate towards them.

What’s your take on this incident, based on what we know?