Gay bar wins right to ban Straights

[Enoll]

News link. (http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=269523)

Well, I'm guessing Australia is about to go to crap.
I couldn't belive this when I read it in the paper today.
I mean, what would happen if one of us bi's went to the door?
"sorry, you're 'part straight', no entry".

[glantern954]

My wife and I were once kicked out of a gay bar. We were watching a drag show at a bar we regularly frequented with many gay friends from a local online group. She was leaned back in her bar stool against my chest and I had my arm around her. Apparently somebody was offended by the horrible sight and had the bar tender ask us to cease and decist. I thought he was joking, so I just laughed it off. But when he came again, he said he was going to have to ask us to leave. Inside I was furious, but I said to myself that it wasn't worth arguing over.

When we told our gay friends many of them called the club and complained.

[Enoll]

Is this supposed to be the war that we're supposedly sitting in the middle of?

[rissababynta]

gays are a group of people who know very well what it is like to be discriminated against. so what whatever happened to treating others as you would want to be treated...

[the mage]

I wonder how long they'll be in business with an exclusionary attitude like that?
Here in Toronto the bath houses are able to keep women out (seems pretty logical there)and the gay male strip club was able to keep women out too, but guess what?? In these tough times the ladies are now allowed in on Sundays to watch the boys strip and they have a separate weekday section of the bar too.

[mark123]

LOL!!! I guess you need a "GAY" or "BI" endorsement on your driver's License to get in! LOL!!!!! My question is, How can they tell if someone is straight or gay if he or she comes in alone?
:rolleyes:

[Enoll]

LOL!!! I guess you need a "GAY" or "BI" endorsement on your driver's License to get in! LOL!!!!! My question is, How can they tell if someone is straight or gay if he or she comes in alone?
:rolleyes:

I was wondering that too.
They could always say "you don't look gay or bi", but then that'd end up with
an even bigger fight than there is now.

[bearisbare]

(This happened in Montreal last month.)


Woman bounced from Montreal gay bar

University student complains to Quebec human rights tribunal

May 31, 2007 04:30 AM

MONTREAL–University student Audrey Vachon sat down at a city patio for a late afternoon drink with her dad last week. What happened next prompted a complaint to Quebec's human rights tribunal.

The patio belongs to Le Stud, a self-styled "hard, manly and virile" leather bar on the fringes of Montreal's Gay Village.

Audrey's father, Gilles Vachon, said a server sidled over and said "This establishment is for men only. Please leave."

Audrey Vachon, 20, said she has never felt singled out the way she was on that day."I've frequented other places in the Village ... and it's the first time I've ever come up against this kind of closed-mindedness. In fact, it's the first time I've ever felt discriminated against."

Her expulsion has provoked a storm of criticism of Le Stud's owner, who said it is house policy to admit only men – other than on Ladies Night on Wednesdays.

Gaycities.com gives Le Stud five stars and describes it as "bears and queens, leather and jeans."

MontrealPlus.ca explains its narrow dance floor "encourages friskiness. Also, the many televisions continuously display porn flicks."

Gadoury owns several other establishments in the Gay Village, which admit women, he said.

Montreal's Gay Chamber of Commerce and Société de développement commercial du Village called on Le Stud to "respect the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms," which bans discrimination based on gender or sexual orientation.

Société executive director Bernard Plante said heterosexuals should understand why gays might prefer to be with each other: "I dream of the day where I will be able to walk into a restaurant with my partner holding his hand and maybe giving him a kiss. That's still not always possible in this day and age."

That's not an appeal that holds much weight for Gilles Vachon.

"Here we are in a liberal country confronted by people who have used the charter of rights to assert their rights against discrimination, and who are now discriminating against others.

"I would never presume to discriminate against a gay person. Why should this be allowed to happen to my daughter?" asked Vachon. "I was angry when this happened. We should probably have stayed and forced them to call the police to remove us."

[bearisbare]

I was wondering that too.
They could always say "you don't look gay or bi", but then that'd end up with
an even bigger fight than there is now.

I've pondered the feasibility of going to a particular club night in Toronto, with my wife. According to its website, I have a strong sense I would be perceived as a straight man with his bisexual companion and somehow "invading" queer space. I read on the website that lesbian/bi/trans* women as well as trans and gay men are welcome. As for straight and bisexual men, nothing is said. I'm not going to accompany my wife to this event, not because of any feeling I have about its website wording, but because I look at it as women's space and it's her space, not mine. I'm cool with that.

Many years ago, my first queer dance club visits were to places that had mostly women. I just went for the music but I do remember many times being told "you know this is a gay club, don't you?"

At one particular place for a benefit evening for some cause, I remember always having to wait until some friends came by so I could enter with them. No matter what I said, being upfront about bisexual or queer, made a difference as long as I was alone. Once anyone else arrived to head in with me, my sexuality suddenly didn't make a difference.

[Hopeful Romantic]

As a Bi woman, whose best friend is a gay man. I am forever labelled as the "Fag Hag". It is something that I have come to accept, even if it isn't accurate.

When we go to bars together, I am the "semi straight" friend. Bi's aren't seen as welcome, as we are looking to "steal from both sides". It hurts, as a fellow member of the queer community, to be seen as "less than", but at the same time, I am blessed with friends that will defend the bisexual lass that is one of the clan.

[chook]

I look at it this way.....if it was the only pub in Melbourne They'd have a war on their hands but there are 100's of other wartering holes to go to.......so as far as I'm concerened the fucking queers can have a place of their own.



Cheers Chook :bigrin:

[DiamondDog]

I look at it this way.....if it was the only pub in Melbourne They'd have a war on their hands but there are 100's of other wartering holes to go to.......so as far as I'm concerened the fucking queers can have a place of their own.



Cheers Chook :bigrin:

As one of those "fucking queers" I personally enjoy going to places where heterosexuality isn't the norm and people aren't so hung up on labels.

I don't think that their discrimination is justified, but I don't see this as a good thing.

That said, I also know it's nice to go to places where heterosexuality isn't the norm.

When I go to gay bars, it's nice not to feel like a second class citizen. I mean I've been in gay bars where heterosexuals come in and people stare at you and act all grossed out if they see two men kiss, or call someone a faggot, and then get kicked out. :)

As far as the woman who is complaining about not being allowed at an all male gay bar what about all of those women's only spaces like gyms, clubs, discussion/group therapy/self help groups, the Michigan Women's Music Festival that bans transwomen/T-girls since they're not really women in the opinion of the event coordinators (see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_Women's_Music_Festival), or other places/events where women only are alowed that nobody says anything about how men aren't allowed in those spaces?

My gay male friends do happen to get annoyed at going to bars where there are lots of women and I can kind of see why they'd like a male only gay bar/club.

I've been to bear/leather events where while it isn't men only, it's predominantly male and it's refreshing.

I personally don't have any problems passing as heterosexual but I get cruised/hit on by random strangers in public, and even certain women can tell this about me.

My friend's sister knew and I did come out to her but I usually don't talk to her at all about ANYTHING sexual and we're friends but she somehow knew this about me and easily picked up on it.

[JohnnyV]

I don't think discrimination of any kind is good. Yes, there are understandable reasons for gay men who have suffered discrimination to *want* to keep out women or straight people, but there are also understandable reasons for white supremacists to keep out Latinos and Asians. And if you stop and think about it and put yourself in the shoes of an impoverished German in 1931 still angry about having lost a big, bad war against the rest of the world, you can almost get to the point of understanding why they came up with the idea of eliminating non-Germans from their ranks, beginning with Bolsheviks and Gypsies and then heading for the "fucking queers" and finally deciding to boot the Jews. Hell, I can understand why Ashkenazi Jews arrived in Palestine in the late 1940s and thought it was perfectly reasonable to create a "Jewish state" and limit the number of Gentiles to a manageable minority while keeping the rest of those prickly Palestinians in a permanent stateless limbo.

The impulse to exclude, shun, and exile is actually very human .... but it's very destructive and we always have to fight against it. Even when the exclusionary group feels in some way justified because of something they've been through, we all have to fight that urge to have a pure place free of the dreaded outsider. Otherwise, we begin with a little bar for ourselves and then end up wearing jackboots, waving a flag, and driving bulldozers over the refugee camps that we just shelled and tear-gassed!

Having said all that, I have to say, my wife and I go to gay bars and gay events all the time. We get a few rolling eyes and whatnot, but people leave us alone. I've never been mistreated. The key is to be respectful to the cultural viewpoint of the people who are running the bar, and don't do things that look like "showing off" your straightness. That's not to say though that people like GLantern weren't openly mistreated by intolerant homocentric gay fascists -- they have a right to be angry. I just think that in the majority of situations, bisexuals and straights can go into a gay setting and do okay. Or I guess I've been lucky.

Love,
J

[vittoria]

simply amazing

i've heard the phrase "turnabout is fair play" but THIS is interesting

i would hate for my favorite bar to ban me and my bi friends

theres nowhere here for bi people :(

so sad even those in the LBGT community discriminate...

[darkeyes]

simply amazing

i've heard the phrase "turnabout is fair play" but THIS is interesting

i would hate for my favorite bar to ban me and my bi friends

theres nowhere here for bi people :(

so sad even those in the LBGT community discriminate...Sad aint the word V....me thinks its appallin... for woteva reason...now we gettin like the str8 world?? Same discrimination?? Wen did we eva sign up for that? An wot happened 2 standin up for ourselves??? Discriminatin gainst the str8 world 2 stop a few bigotted thugs the way ahead?? Jeez...me thinks not....

[TaylorMade]

I just keep thinking, are there no decent bouncers in Australia? Because that's really all they needed.

But no. . . <sigh

*Taylor*