the peel vs straights & lesbians

I am not sure I feel entirely comfortable about the Peel's exemption to the Equal Opportunity Act that was reported in the papers today. The exemption would allow staff of the Peel to refuse entry to the venue on a perception of an individual's sexuality as apparently the gay male clientele had expressed concerns about the number of heterosexuals and lesbians entering the venue, all prompting management to apply to the Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission for this exemption. Tom McFeely, owner of the nightclub was quoted in the Age as saying that the move was necessary to ensure that the gay male patron felt secure enough to express his sexuality freely. 1 Cate McKenzie deputy president of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) who granted the exemption said that "[s]ometimes heterosexual groups and lesbian groups insult and deride and are even physically violent towards the gay male patrons" while others just came to gawk, acting as though the gay male patrons were animals in a zoo. She said, "To regard the gay male patrons of the venue as providing an entertainment or spectacle to be stared at, as one would at an animal at a zoo, devalues and dehumanises them." 2 Indeed the gay bars in Melbourne are few and far between argues McFeely, "We're the only one out of 2,000 venues in Melbourne. Those heterosexuals have other places to go to, my homosexuals do not." 3

But regardless the idea of prescribing behaviour to a person on the basis of their sexuality is blatantly discriminatory. To imply that an individual who identifies as heterosexual or as a lesbian will engage or is likely to engage in violence or verbal abuse or whose activities while inside will upset the clientele of that establishment goes wholly against my moral fibre. Could one of the 'straight bars' that McFeely refers to legitimately apply for an exemption on the basis that gay men make their patrons uncomfortable? I sincerely doubt it.

I personally feel that a gay man who is intimidated by a straight man or a woman, whether she be gay or straight, for who they are, is at best hypocritical and worst pathological. If a person's behaviour in any club, pub or bar is inappropriate surely then security have the right to eject them. As a community we should be engaging and open, not hiding in closets.

Now I do not pretend to know what evidence exactly was put forward to the Tribunal, something I believe you have to apply for, but I wonder whether this application for exemption has anything to do with the mens-only 'upstairs' section of the Peel that staff enforce with such admirable efficiency. In the decision by the Tribunal that it handed down there is no mention of the sex-on-premises above. Cate McKenzie states that men should feel safe to engage in activities such as "kissing, hugging, or expressing love, attraction or affection in a physically intimate way" that might be frowned on in a ‘straight bar’. Now unless you are ready to describe what goes on up there as expressing love and affection (and I’m not) then I would wager that engaging in sexual acts was left out of their application.4 With the Greyhound in St Kilda and an apparently "as-yet-unopened gay bar on Smith Street" both applying for sex-on-premises licences in order to attract 'punters', one wonders how much the Peel's concern for a safe and comfortable atmosphere is really there to allow gay men to have fuck and suck. 5


1 'Gay pub defends 'straight' ban,' The Age, 28 May 2007.
2 Matt Doran, 'Gay pub can out straight patrons,' Herald-Sun, 28 May 2007.
3 'Gay pub defends 'straight' ban,' op. cit.
4 Peter Rolfe, 'Sauna bid `sleazy',' Port Phillip Leader, 8 May 2007.
Danny Corvinni, 'Nightclub sex rooms and saunas,' samesame.com.au - forum, 23 May 2007.
5 Peel Hotel Pty Ltd (Anti Discrimination Exemption) [2007] VCAT 916 (24 May 2007)