Plenty of times, I've ordered nothing, or only a free glass of water, while I waited, and all I had to do was say I was waiting for people before ordering, and it was all cool. And, I can't even count the number of times I've used a restaurant bathroom while on road trips....almost always without ordering. I just go in, use it, and leave. No one EVER says anything.

Same here. There are lots of places in the country that don't have locks on bathrooms and don't require purchase for use of bathrooms. I grew up in such a place. Most places you stop at in between destinations (aka: "flyover country") are like this, usually because they are small towns that don't generally have problems with people violating bathrooms.

I've also been to plenty of places that require purchase to use bathrooms. In those cases, I purchase something and use the bathroom. I don't do what these guys did: Ask to use the bathroom, get told I needed to buy something to use it, refuse to buy anything and sit back down, then be told by employees that if I don't buy anything I'll be considered as trespassing and the cops will be called, refuse again to leave or buy anything, have cops called and when the cops come and give me three opportunities to leave I refuse them all, then get arrested.

I've never done anything like that. I wouldn't think to do something like that. I'd wager that you have never done anything like that either and wouldn't imagine doing anything like that. Objectively, that has nothing to do with race. They weren't arrested for being black. There's a a whole series of events that explain why the incident happened, and it makes sense.

Considering all of that and the degree to and speed of which the media jumped on this to force a narrative tells me it's manufactured.

And, on a side note, what about all of the protests against the Vietnam war in the 60's and 70's? Do you think that was manufactured outrage, too?

I have no idea. That's not something I've looked into. There are many manufactured protests these days, however.