City bar says no to gays

Sydney’s popular bars and clubs are renowned for their strict door policies, encouraging, or perhaps forcing, hopeful attendants to dress appropriately and to act in a suitable manner. In fact, Sydney-city club and bar regulars are alltoo aware of the subjective manner in which security and management decide who enters their premises and under what circumstances.
At a recent incident at an acclaimed Sydney bar, two gay men were refused entry on an early Saturday evening, when only minutes earlier, their friends (all of whom are straight) walked right in without any problems. For those not familiar with club procedures, management on this particular occasion used the oldest trick in the book, and denied both men admittance by asserting there was a guest list and that their names were not on it. Both men were told to step aside and make way for oncoming patrons.
One of the gay men, Rami Tamer, says he is certain that his refusal was based on his perceptible sexual orientation. We arrived as a couple and most people would have picked it, just as easily as people can pick straight couples -“ we looked the part, he said.
Tamer and his partner accepted security’s refusal and notified their friends they would not be joining them. In recalling the incident, Tamer said. All I wanted was a valid reason why we were refused entry but the security guards and doorman were extremely rude and insistent that they would not let anyone else in.
Security and management continued to admit both men and women who were neither on guest lists nor members, in clear view of both the gay men and witnesses. Tamer says the attitudes of the doormen and management were disgusting and in clear discrimination of gays. They were looking down on us like we were trash and not good enough for the club, he said.
Friends inside the bar’s premises came outside when notified that Tamer and his partner were refused entry. One friend, Keira Smith, said she approached security in an attempt to make sense of the refusal and reason with them. I told security that refusing them entry would mean that a large group of us would have to re-locate, but they didn’t sympathise at all and just became aggravated, she said.
Clubs often reach their capacity and when they do, legally, no one is permitted to enter the premises. Security also has the power and responsibility to refuse entry to waylaying drunks. But how far should management and security discretion go when deciding who is most worthy for admittance?
The bar’s management assures their door policy is not discriminatory of homosexuals. They say that people are only refused entry when inappropriately dressed, behaving inappropriately, or when the club reaches its crowd capacity in which it then resorts to guest lists and members only. But regardless of these guidelines, they also point out that at the end of the day management reserves the right to refuse entry. Management and their hospitality group refused to be named or quoted on the matter.
Reviews of the bar in question describe its crowd as glammed-up singles who come to enjoy the bar’s passing parade of eye candy (City Search Editorial Review) -“ an image the bar is perhaps trying to uphold. Past patrons in online forums further describe the bar as pretentious and overtly obsessed with dress code. Tamer and Smith were aware of the club’s strict door policy but never quite imagined refusal at 7.30pm when people are still having dinner. Tamer said, We got there when the bar was barely full, and we were both dressed more than appropriately. I was wearing a brand new outfit, including a blazer.
Rachel Evans from Community Action Against Homophobia (CAAH) says that many trendy clubs in Sydney are simply not willing to set a precedent by admitting gays and lesbians, fearing that their club will transform itself into another gay nirvana.
Evans believes mainstream clubs often discriminate on the grounds of sexual orientation, but is also adamant that many gays will not voice their individual experiences. We want the individual to rise up and confront these places so we can stage action against it, she said. This type of bigotry and homophobia has risen out of the context we live in, by which Australian laws still do not permit complete equal opportunities for gay people.