Bar

Anon

I was out with some friends in a club (a group of 4 young women) when a man, who was about 10 years older than us, started hitting on my friend, she told she wasn’t interested but he didn’t leave us alone so we all said she’s not interested and moved away, he wouldn’t leave us alone until one friend physically pushed him away. He acted extremely offended like we were the ones in the wrong and this is something I still think of about 4 years later. I don’t feel safe in clubs and if I can avoid it I don’t leave my house in an evening. Just a few months ago we were sat at a table in a bar and a man came and sat next to my friend, she told him to go away multiple times and he didn’t. His friend came and sat next to my other friend and said to us ‘what is up with her?’ Meaning the friend that told the other man to leave so we said ‘we want you both to leave us alone’ they didn’t get the message until being physically pushed away. My friend is not afraid to physically push people away!

Laura

I was in a small town pub down the country in Ireland, the kind where everyone knows each other, visiting my godfather to celebrate my 21st birthday with him. I am naturally outgoing but when I feel uncomfortable I become quiet and passive. There was music playing and my godfathers wife was dancing with some of the older men (in their 60’s/70’s). I sat and chatted with my god father and just watched the wife dancing. Then one of the men asked me to dance and me being a confident person I said no thank you outright thinking it would be the end of it. Now what annoyed me was that he couldn’t take no for an answer and that my godfathers wife tried to push me to dance with this stranger who number one gave me the creeps and number two smelt and looked filthy. He then proceeded to sit beside me and pester me saying why did I not want to dance with him, I made up an excuse saying I couldn’t dance and didn’t like dancing. He continued on and so did my godfathers wife. This went on another 30 minutes and completely ruined the night. It was only when I looked close to tears that my godfather stepped in and told his wife to leave me alone and told the man I didn’t want to dance that it all stopped. I hate that my voice wasn’t good enough and the man felt he had a right to get me to do what he wanted because I am a woman. It also changed my opinion of the wife for giving out to me for turning the ‘lovely old man’ down.

Ruby

I once went out to a bar with a friend, it was over the road from a train station. When I got off the train, I noticed a guy on the platform. He then followed me into the bar and I lost track of him. About an hour later I noticed he was sat on a table two away from us with a friend. I ignored him thinking nothing of it. Later into the night his friend left and he proceeded to sit down next to me and my friend. We were friendly but swiftly said we needed to leave soon for my final train and her bus. He then followed me to the train platform, and into the women’s toilets on the platform. I came out the toilet and he was stood with his dick out and asked me to suck it. I said no and tried to walk past him. He then pushed me against the wall and forced me to kiss him. I managed to shove him away and jump on the next train and call my boyfriend crying because I felt like I had just cheated on him, luckily he was lovely and said it wasn’t my fault.

Ruri

I work at a bar restaurant. It is a boys club of course. But I should be specific. I´´l give you couple of examples. The owners are men. The majority of the chef´s are men(the women are assisting chefs ofc), there is one shift manager that is female, we even have a Gin and Tonic menu named only after MEEEEEEEN!! But,.. not to lose here as well, yesterday a boy that is 5 years younger than me, who is working as a chef in another restaurant, took an extra shift as a waitor and asked to be positioned at the bar. Of course while he is the little brother of the manager he got the position and none of the rest of us who have been working there longer and not just an extra shift!!Important here is to mention that the guy is the little brother of the manager. Anyways, at the end of the shift we are allowed to get one drink if we want to. When I finished, I asked my shift manager if I could get a drink and he said of course, why dont you ask the guys to make you one. i did ask this guy and the answer was: you have to pay! with a bodily attitude as if he is a big piece of bulk. I said excuse me? He laughted and said you have to pay. I replied what are you? Our boss or?… super angry. Then, the guy prepared drinks for the guys in the kitchen and said to me: why dont you make one yourself? I was FUUUUURIOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUS Now, I wonder.. Is this whole behaviour: a) a result of me being a rather weird person that the bartender didnt want to assist? b) the guy is the brother of the manager so he thinks he has the right to be bossy? c) he just treats women(even those of better and longer experience) different than men? or any of the given choices above as a combo? Just for you to think for yourself and contemplate.

elm

I recently had a very unpleasant situation that got stuck in my head and made me think… I was in Bar on a casual Thursday night, celebrating my last written exam of the semester. A guy came over to our table, intending to light a cigarette (clearly not sober). I told him that it was probably not a good idea (since it is forbidden to smoke inside) and that I would accompany him out for a smoke. My intention was to avoid trouble and to get him away from my friends at the table. Since I wanted to smoke anyway, I thought, that was the easiest way out. Still I tried to keep the conversation as minimal as possible. He introduced me to his girlfriend (who was with him and seemed all sober). We talked together for a bit and we smoked and he started joking with me. I didn’t feel like joking with a drunken guy so I sought to finish my cigarette and leave. He tried to convince me to stay, started hugging me on the street although I told him to leave it. He took my cigarette out of my mouth, which I didn’t want back after that, and continued smoking it. I told him that it had been rude and that I have had enough and that I was going to leave now. He grabbed my arm and didn’t want to let me go. Then, he hugged me again and kissed me on the cheek, even tried to kiss my mouth. I could barely keep him off me… His girlfriend tried to pull him away. He said he would “rape my fucking ass” if I wouldn’t come with him. Well… I was perplex and couldn’t even say anything but was happy to be able to leave… I never had been sexually assaulted or herassed before. This is, surely because I am a guy…! It left me thinking how it must be to deal with situations like that as a woman. Being stared at, groped, catcalled or whatever. It almost makes me vomit..I felt so weak, unable to react and completely overwhelmed. I used to think that woman need to protect themselves from these kind of people and that, sadly as it is, that it is “normal”…especially if alcohol is involved. Well, I changed my mind. It should not be normal at all. It should be normal to just be and do whatever you want. It is those invasive people that need to change their behaviour! But they won’t change, unless every single one of us stands up against sexisim, racism, homophobia, etc.! I have heard people say: “Things like that happen when people get drunk” and “you need to be prepared for that”… Well, I wasn’t prepared and I think it is nothing anyone should ever need to be prepared for…! Because for me it was one of the most humiliating feelings I could imagine…

Hannah and two others

When I was at the club with my three friends I was one of the first to get to the bar to order a drink, but a large group of men pretty much pushed past me to order their own drinks. I thought the bartender would serve us in order, but the men who arrived first. I waited and when I was finally served I was taken with no respect other than a drink and an outstretched hand, even though the other people had been treated with a smile and a small conversation.

20s, Female, England, Bar

Stand back up straight after leaning over bar to talk to bar staff about my order for my colleagues. Stranger guy next to me leers over and informs me how he ‘was so tempted to spank your ass’. I’m just kinda shocked and mutter a no. Regretting my choice of short dress. He informed me ‘bet you’d secretly love that’ Wish I’d called him out, but I didn’t.

Marie

Just the other night I was in a nightclub with a group of friends. There had been a few guys (strangers) that had come up behind me and some of the other girls and tried to dance with us, but we were able to move away or turn to block them out of our circle. There had also been guys that touched my butt as they walked by. Then later one guy came up behind me and tried to hold me and dance up against me. I pushed him back, but then he just came closer and pushed into me and tried to hold me again. One of my male friends physically pulled me away into another space and then the rest of my friends moved so that the guy was cut out of coming closer to us. I was pissed off but embarrassed that I couldn’t fend off the guy on my own so I didn’t really say anything. The next day when my friends and I were discussing how the night was someone said ‘there were a lot of creeps there’. I’m so sick of not being able to go out with my friends without being harassed by boys/ men. In another club when I was on holidays I sat down on my own inside because I had a stomach ache and there were no seats outside where my friends were getting some air. At least 3 different guys approached me trying to chat me up even though I don’t speak German and repeatedly said ‘no’ and ‘go away’. I ended up going outside so that I could stand with my friends even though I felt physically sick. In my home city I once went to a gay bar with my friends. When I got a taxi home with my male friend and asked him if he enjoyed the night he said that he did except for when he went to the bathroom on his own and 2 different men squeezed his butt. I said ‘That’s what it’s like for girls in every other club’. He was shocked. As a gay man he has never groped a girl in a club but my other friend who is straight just seemed uncomfortable that I was pointing out the behaviour from men that girls and women experience regularly (every night out).

Ciara

I was waiting to be served at a (busy) bar on a Saturday night. I hear a comment about me from the man next to me but didn’t quite catch what he said. Naturally, I just gave him a dirty look and continued to try and catch the attention of the bar staff so I could order a drink. This guy obviously didn’t like the look I gave him and, among other things, told me I was being ‘disrespectful’ – to which I responded by saying i didn’t own him any respect (obviously). This was followed by a heated argument, where I was called fat, a dirty slag and he threatened to pour his pint over my head. Throughout the argument i kept my cool but did repeatedly call him vile and he said ‘other girls don’t think so’…(so witty)….I said I felt sorry for them. So I just carried on with my night in the bar etc ignoring his presence. He then came up to me and my friends again and told me that if I carried on the way I was I’d end up in hospital…I couldn’t help but smirk when he was talking to me, partly out of sheer disbelief of what was being said to me… Anyway, he continued being abusive towards me and my friends (but mostly me), telling me that I would end up alone, that I was a ‘helmet’, disrespectful etc.I defended myself eloquently without raising my voice or swearing – I also reminded him that he came up and spoke to me and I asked him to leave repeatedly. I told him I thought he had a problem with women, to which he replied saying that I was not a woman, I was a piece of shit. To me, the last sentence summarises this post perfectly – he was disgusted by the fact I said he has a problem with woman but I was not a woman, I was a piece of shit.

Phil

At the weekend I went into the Golden Lion Pub in York (UK) with my Wife, we sat at a table and where able to enjoy a drink watching the football on the TV, have a quiet chat about our week and the game that was on. A group of 10 young men on a Stag party arrived, dressed in women’s clothing they had ‘bought for a laugh’ from a charity shop. Within minutes of their arrival they took over a quarter of the bar area and they began to loudly share with one another and anyone within ear shot their sexual exploits from the weekend and in very graphic detail describe their sexual encounters. It was abusive and offensive language, degrading and shameful behaviour. Not in the slightest entertaining, not funny, not banter.. I was sickened by their behaviour and that I and my wife could not avoid hearing them. I am embarrassed to admit that feeling out numbered I did not intervene and felt helpless to the point of abandoning our drinks and leaving the pub. I feel I let my wife down in not stopping it. Four days later and I can not get this event out of my mind.