US: San Francisco bar accused of anti-gay discrimination
A San Francisco bar has been accused of anti-gay discrimination by two women who claimed they were kicked out after responding to homophobic remarks, and who have since called for a boycott of the bar.
The women were kicked out of Zeitgeist after they responded to “four big straight men” who called them “homophobic names” before being asked to leave by the bouncers, reports SFist.
Saying they had marched for gay rights an hour prior to the event, the women posted on Facebook calling for an “informal boycott” of the bar they “culture of which they created an “unsafe” environment, and showed a “complacency in the face of blatant homophobia”.
They wrote: “On Monday 3/25 a friend and I were called homophobic names by four big straight men at Zeitgeist SF. When we responded the bouncer kicked us out and two more straight girls shook their heads at us, told us to calm down and leave. This was about an hour after we marched for gay rights. Not one person in the bar came to our rescue. Not one”.
The bar responded, however, to say that the claims were false, that the pair were kicked out for being drunk, and that the bar had always been supportive of the LGBT community.
It wrote: “Regarding this incident that everyone is referring to; the two ladies were asked to leave because they were highly intoxicated and became aggressive with other patrons and our staff.
“It had absolutely nothing to do with their sexual orientation. We are very disappointed and saddened that someone would throw around an accusation of this magnitude without the actual facts. Hopefully, this will be the last post regarding this issue.”
The report by SFist went on to say that the couple had not immediately responded to calls, however the report stated that the openly-gay editor of the site had never experienced homophobia in the bar before.
