“We had a good night,” a young acquaintance said. A group of students, male and female, dolled up and headed for a nightclub to celebrate the end of their exams. But it was an eye-opener, she told me, and not in a good way. Three members of the group were denied entry at the door: the only black, male students. When the group asked why, the bouncer – gatekeeper, arbiter, paveside general – characterised this frustration and reasonable request for information as aggression.
Disappointed, but keen not to ruin the event for everyone else, the barred trio hung around to watch as others in the line behind them were permitted entry. Then, older, wiser, sourer, they headed home.
Maybe they were unlucky, but maybe not, for there seems to be a lot of this about. Recently, the black newspaper the Voice addressed the issue with a front-page headline: “No Hats, No Hoodies ... No Black People?”
The paper highlighted again the experience of a student who filmed his encounter with a paveside general outside a club in the Midlands. “Is this because we are black?” demanded the student. “If it was my club I would let you in, but it isn’t,” the doorman replied. When the tape surfaced, an apology followed – which tells us that even the paveside general answers to someone. What’s going on?
There is, of course, the hoary old stereotype that too many black adolescents in one place raises the prospect of disturbance. There is perennially talk of quotas. But, without formal complaints and investigations – perhaps by way of undercover mystery shopping – these things are fiendishly hard to prove. And even when a venue’s unacceptable behaviour is proven, the club can always blame the paveside deity. So, effecting change is tricky.
Last month, Lee Jasper, the equalities activist and once adviser to a mayor of London, called on councils that issue nightclub licences to step up. “If any club is found to be discriminating, whether informally or formally, they should lose their licence automatically,” said Jasper.
Indeed that would concentrate minds.
The Voice, meanwhile, asks those who have been turned away – as well as doormen tasked with policing discriminatory door policies – to tell their stories. More light, more transparency, and probably more citizen intervention. If the authorities don’t name and shame the establishments with dodgy door policies, wronged clubbers with cameraphones undoubtedly will.
