Beer Culture with Des de Moor

Jonathan Williams (left) and James Bull attending Friday night's kiss-in. Pic: BBC

For all the undeniable advances of the past few decades, just how comfortable can beer lovers who happen not to be heterosexual really afford to feel when out enjoying a drink in a “straight” pub, even in a big and cosmopolitan city like London? This question has been on my mind over the past few months as I’ve been putting together my forthcoming guidebook to London beer, but the news over the past few days that two gay men had been expelled from a Soho pub for kissing each other has brought it sharply into focus.

I ended up putting two gay pubs in the book (The CAMRA Guide to London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars — see under London above) because I was keen to reflect the diversity of London’s pub culture as much as I could as a secondary mission to celebrating good beer. As most LGBT beer fans will know, London’s gay pubs aren’t exactly overflowing with craft beer, but with the help of an old friend I found a couple I was happy with. The last thing I wanted to do was discourage anyone of any sexuality from visiting any of the other places in the book and enjoying the true diversity of London’s beer.

Introducing the first of my “out” choices, I pointed out the dearth of gay pubs serving good beer, and commented: “Perhaps things will change if the development of a more youthful image for good beer continues, or perhaps as attitudes have grown ever more tolerant and people of all sexualities feel more relaxed in mixed company, there’s no need for a fine range of ales to be tagged with a rainbow flag. I hope that lesbian and gay readers, like me, will feel able to enjoy a beer in any place in this book.”

I confess to feeling slightly uncomfortable as I wrote these words. Yes, as a gay man, I do feel able to enjoy a drink in pretty much every decent beer outlet I’ve found in London, and certainly everywhere in the book. But I’m not so sure I’d be happy to express my affection openly to my partner in all of them, in the same way that straight customers do without a thought. A handful of venues spring to mind in the book where I’d be extremely wary of doing this if I wanted a peaceful drink — particularly some places that I admire in all sorts of other ways for being unpretentious, old fashioned local boozers of the sort that are becoming increasingly rare. I contemplated reflecting some of this in the book, but concluded it wasn’t entirely appropriate, especially considering the already lengthy word count. And I could trust most of my LGBT readers to pick up potential issues anyway — we’re all too used to being sensitive and discreet.

Then, the day after I signed off the final text, the news of the John Snow incident emerged to drive home the point. For those who haven’t followed the story, on Wednesday evening (13 April 2011) James Bull and Jonathan Williams, both in their 20s, went out on a first date in Soho. Though in an area full of gay venues, they opted instead to visit the John Snow, a smallish and fairly standard Samuel Smith pub in Broadwick Street, for the sort of reasons that anyone might choose a pub — they liked the cider stocked at Sam’s pubs and appreciated the generally cheap prices. But when the pair started kissing — in a relatively chaste and inoffensive way, according to bystanders — they first attracted complaints from a man drinking at a nearby table who claimed to be the landlord, and were then asked to leave by a female staff member, who accused them of behaving obscenely.

In a fine example of how a small incident affecting hitherto obscure individuals can quickly take on much wider resonance in our socially networked world, the two men’s unpleasant experience became a news story after Jonathan’s disgruntled tweet about it “went viral”, eventually being picked up by the BBC and the Guardian. Prominent gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell offered his support. On Friday a hastily organised kiss-in at the pub attracted 300 people, and messages of support from a variety of groups including even the Conservative party gay group. Predictably, the pub played safe and closed its doors, so the event took place outside. Another has been called for Thursday.

Journalists’ sympathies for the couple were bolstered when approaches to the pub itself for comment were met with a hostile response, culminating in threats to report people for harassment if they continued to call. The landlord allegedly told one enquirer unapologetically that he could kick people out if he wished. The pub’s owners, fiercely independent and slightly eccentric Yorkshire brewery Samuel Smith, have also refused to comment so far — no surprise to beer writers as they’re well-known for their lack of media friendliness, and are no doubt all at sea in trying to cope with this unwanted attention. Their reaction contrasts with that of pub owning company Punch Taverns, who were involved in a comparable incident last summer when members of a Labour Party LGBT Group were refused service at the Greencoat Boy in Westminster — the pubco quickly apologised.

The legal situation is interesting. Licensees do indeed have the discretion to exclude anyone from their premises, but they musn’t discriminate on the grounds of sexuality in the provision of services. If a case was brought under the Equality Act, the pub would have to prove it treated heterosexual couples in the same way. And while it’s possible staff are equally squeamish about snogging straight couples, it’s rather unlikely.

In some respects this incident seems relatively minor — there are arguably more pernicious forms of discrimination and certainly much more serious outcomes of individual homophobia, such as the brutal murder of Ian Baynham in Trafalgar Square in October 2009. But the way James and Jonathan were apparently treated in the John Snow, and the discomfort I felt when writing the lines quoted above, demonstrate in a very significant and intimate way just how far we still have to go to achieve true equality in our everyday lives.

Expressing affection in public, within reasonable limits, is something that heterosexual people take for granted, and quite rightly, as the affectionate bonds we form with others are at the core of our humanity. For gay men, and others whose relationships don’t conform to the traditional stereotypes, it’s constantly in the back of our minds that such an apparently natural act could provoke hostility and even violence. Seeing this demonstrated in the apparently convivial atmosphere of a pub selling craft beer sadly reminds me that, no matter how much as a gay man I value beer and pubs, I remain an emotional second class citizen in most of them, forever feeling circumspect about things that others are openly able to express. And that’s why we still need places like the two gay pubs listed in my book.

Luckily I didn’t include the Snow in my book, but a couple of other Sam’s places are in there. I hope that James and Jonathan pursue their complaint against Sam’s as far as they can and hopefully exact at least an apology, which may discourage other places from behaving similarly. In the meantime, wouldn’t it be great if some of London’s many other “straight” pubs made a point of welcoming kissing couples of any gender? Particularly the ones that do good beer.

Read more about this story:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-13103647
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/apr/15/john-snow-kiss-in-london?INTCMP=SRCH
http://londonist.com/2011/04/gay-couple-removed-from-a-soho-pub-for-kissing.php
http://www.petertatchell.net/lgbt_rights/homophobia/pub-ban-on-gay-kisses-is-illegal-under-equality-laws.htm