Help me understand this...

[moonshadow]

This is not meant to be a debate whether a business should be turning certain colors and such away, I'm just trying to understand the "why".

I admit I'm not really in the motorcycle club scene so maybe I just don't get it...?

Both say these bans are in the interest of "inclusion" and making everyone feel safe.

I'm just wondering who was complaining?

This is NOT me sounding off... I honestly don't care either way, I've never dined at either establishment, I'm just genuinely curious.

According to their website, The Gaurdian Riders advocates for children and battered women. Why are people offended by this?

https://wcyb.com/news/local/some-bristo ... -clothing#

[Fred in Skirts]

This is not meant to be a debate whether a business should be turning certain colors and such away, I'm just trying to understand the "why".
I admit I'm not really in the motorcycle club scene so maybe I just don't get it...?
Both say these bans are in the interest of "inclusion" and making everyone feel safe.
I'm just wondering who was complaining?
This is NOT me sounding off... I honestly don't care either way, I've never dined at either establishment, I'm just genuinely curious.
According to their website, The Gaurdian Riders advocates for children and battered women. Why are people offended by this?
https://wcyb.com/news/local/some-bristo ... -clothing#

All it amounts to is some old fart (maybe a young fart) does not like the way a motorcycle club dresses and wants to impose their way on them, so they complain to the management and certain types of clothing gets banned. I am for the clubs here as they say they will vote with their money, by going some place else to eat.
I am sure many of us here have done the same, I know I have. There are certain places where I don't spend my money because I did not like what they stood for.

Good for the MC clubs!!

[Ozdelights]

I consider this to be another case of 'banning all because of the actions of few.' Some outlaw clubs use colours to identify and target rival gangs in public. Action should be taken against these but stopping all clubs wearing colours in public is IMO overkill.

Just an observation, I've been wrong before.

[moonshadow]

Well, it's not really my scene anyway. I hate it for the MC, but they seemed to handle it admirably.

I have my watering holes that I like. But mostly Liz and I pack a lunch, or for dinner we usually eat at home. Otherwise we're camping and cooking something on our little charcoal grill. Food Lion carries a seasoned salmon on a cedar plank that when cooked on the charcoal grill is to die for.

...and I can wear whatever I want while I enjoy the meal.

[rode_kater]

I guess it makes you wonder where the constitutionally protected freedom of expression went. Oh right, the UK has no constitution, oops.

I put this down to the UK never having gone through things like "all the Jews having to wear yellow stars during WW2", so there's no general recognition how important this all actually is. This is maybe a (mostly) harmless example, but you're getting close to a line.

[moonshadow]

The "inclusion" aspect is what's getting me confused. They apparently banned what is basically the "uniform" (their words) of a pretty harmless motorcycle club. We're not talking about the Pagans here.... these people protect women and children.

How is this "inclusive"?

So when I hear the word "inclusive" in the modern context, I assume we're talking about women, non-white races, non-Christian religions, and LGBTQ. I'm left wondering, has anyone in these groups complained? How are they not feeling safe?

I don't have a motorcycle, so I'm not into motorcycle clubs, but they do seem as American as apple pie. I do love motorcycle culture, I get excited when I'm being passed by a swarm of them on the highway. My late stepfather was in a Christian motorcycle club, and once I helped out one of their functions. I can say it's a sweet sound listening to a few thousand Harleys all rumbling at the same time as the pull out of a K-Mart parking lot bound for Washington D.C.

This ban kinda bugs me.... I don't think I'll be visiting the establishments either... just on principle. Apparently motorcycle people and MIS have one thing in common... people complain when we enter establishments....

Well, us "moral degenerates" have to stick together.

[rode_kater]

The "inclusion" aspect is what's getting me confused. They apparently banned what is basically the "uniform" (their words) of a pretty harmless motorcycle club. We're not talking about the Pagans here.... these people protect women and children.

How is this "inclusive"?

What you're seeing here is literally how language is deformed. You thought you knew what inclusive meant, but if enough people start using it like this it will start meaning something else.

You see, "inclusive" is a term that you can't really be against. Nobody says they don't want to be "inclusive". So instead they change the meaning of the word "inclusive" to mean something else. The same has happened to "liberal", "feminist", "communist", "socialist" and any number of other words.

So when I hear the word "inclusive" in the modern context, I assume we're talking about women, non-white races, non-Christian religions, and LGBTQ. I'm left wondering, has anyone in these groups complained? How are they not feeling safe?

This sounds like you're using the word "inclusive" in the meaning used by the liberal elite. They are bad and so they are introducing you to the new meaning of "inclusive" by "the people".

This is how you get Newspeak.

[crfriend]

This is how you get Newspeak.

I have been railing about this for years. After all, George Orwell warned us!

[Modoc]

I don't think a public establishment should restrict what customers wear in general. Having said that this is not a new practice. Some establishments have in the past, and may still, for all I know, required jackets and ties or not allowed t-shirts jeans, or bare feet, or had any number of other dress code requirements. This more or less sounds like the same thing to me. The article doesn't divulge the owners' specific reasoning, therefore only speculation is left. It might help their case if they did, simply because then the real issue could be addressed. If after making their case customers decide to support or not support these establishments then the proprietors can decide if it's policy worth continuing.

[moonshadow]

After a little mulling around and internet searches, I get the feeling this was a blanket response to MCs in general, but mainly to avoid interactions with what's known as the 1%ers motorcycle clubs, which in fairness can be VERY dangerous to triffle with.

I'm learning that much like other major non MC gangs, wearing the "wrong colors" in the wrong territory can result in extreme acts of violence. It's pretty serious stuff.

It's still a shame that the 99%ers (the good guys) have to pay the price for the 1%. That would be like one man wearing a skirt engaging in a life if crime and as a result, all male skirt wearers pay the social price and are banned from public interactions.

Very similar to how one trans woman has an inappropriate interaction in a women's restroom, now new laws are passed to prohibit all transwomen in ciswomens spaces.

Or....

How one lunatic shoots up a shopping mall, now they want to snatch guns from all law abiding citizens...

See, everyone does this. We all pay the price for a few. And is why I've often said "this is why we can't have nice things".

Indeed, this is the catch 22 of a free society, and an issue that we as a civilization have grappled with for many centuries, as evidenced from our founding documents.

[crfriend]

It's still a shame that the 99%ers (the good guys) have to pay the price for the 1%. That would be like one man wearing a skirt engaging in a life if crime and as a result, all male skirt wearers pay the social price and are banned from public interactions.

This is a very common behaviour exhibited by authoritarian regimes, and the USA is increasingly becoming one. I'm not sure that anything can now be done about it, as I think the USA has turned a corner and is now on a hopeless slide to oblivion.

A cheery thought, I know, but I'm not about to give up my skirts any time soon.

[Barleymower]

It's still a shame that the 99%ers (the good guys) have to pay the price for the 1%. That would be like one man wearing a skirt engaging in a life if crime and as a result, all male skirt wearers pay the social price and are banned from public interactions.

This is a very common behaviour exhibited by authoritarian regimes, and the USA is increasingly becoming one. I'm not sure that anything can now be done about it, as I think the USA has turned a corner and is now on a hopeless slide to oblivion.

A cheery thought, I know, but I'm not about to give up my skirts any time soon.

Another way of looking at it, is the minute effect of a couple of cases are used to vilify an entire population.

[Ozdelights]

In some ways it is just laziness of those meant to protect us. It's easier to ban everyone rather than find an effective solution for the 1% causing the problem. Often it is much less than 1%.

[Jim]

It's still a shame that the 99%ers (the good guys) have to pay the price for the 1%. That would be like one man wearing a skirt engaging in a life if crime and as a result, all male skirt wearers pay the social price and are banned from public interactions.

This is a very common behaviour exhibited by authoritarian regimes, and the USA is increasingly becoming one. I'm not sure that anything can now be done about it, as I think the USA has turned a corner and is now on a hopeless slide to oblivion.

This was a private company engaging in this behavior. Without government intervention, many more corporations and individuals would act prejudicially. We need to distinguish between authoritarian regimes and authoritarian cultures.

[crfriend]

This was a private company engaging in this behavior. Without government intervention, many more corporations and individuals would act prejudicially. We need to distinguish between authoritarian regimes and authoritarian cultures.

That's a good distinction in this case, and it points up precisely how much of a slippery slope we're on.


One of the problems with mass punishment is that sometimes it's easy to stray across the boundary, be unaware of it, and get caught up in the messy results. I came into accidental violation of a stricture of "NO POLITICS" in a place I now frequent (having met a very nice retired EE there) when I wore my electric blue dress shirt with a canary yellow skirt (the colours of the Ukranian flag). Nobody gave me any grief about it at the time, but had they wanted they could have tossed me out on my ear. Ditto a very flashy outfit I had on yesterday evening of a pink dress shirt, a vivid purple skirt, and a black waistcoat. Had there been a ban on such colours I would have fallen foul of that -- even though I was dressed in the colours of the historic pdp11 computer -- and I'm well known as a computer historian!