Fabric Focuses on Sex Pest Campaign
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London nightclub Fabric highlighted their ‘anti-harassment campaign’ against club creeps groping female revellers last week, stressing that ‘perpetrators could face a lifetime ban from the club’.
“All our staff are trained to remove any men who are harassing women in our club,” they emphasized in the statement (timed to coincide with international women’s day.)
“That includes leering, rude comments, touching and any behaviour that makes you feel uncomfortable. We’re here to help. Please speak out and notify our staff immediately of any issues you encounter and let us deal with it for you.”
The issue was first highlighted on Resident Advisor in 2010 when a clubber started a forum thread ‘Dangerous Men and Sex Pests in Fabric’ which provoked scores of anecdotes describing predatory men preying on girls. (RA: http://bit.ly/btEBi1 )
Describing how ‘Both myself, my boyfriend and our male/female friends were victimized or threatened in various ways, by various different people during the course of the night,’ ‘Doodark’ called for the club to adopt Berghain style selection policies.
“After clubbing around the world and feeling the freedom that exists in clubs abroad, i would love to see fabric addressing these issues at the door before entry much like they are at the Berghain in Berlin,” she urged, “which for all its bad press on these forums of being selective, does an amazing job of creating a safe party environment for its clubbers.”
Fabric owner Cameron Leslie responded in detail and vowed to tackle the problem head on.
“The truth of the matter with regards to getting rid of a small group of idiots who feel it is acceptable practice to physically violate others is something that is close to our heart and something we are attacking on a number of levels,” he confirmed.
“We have an undercover team whose sole responsibility is to protect customers from pickpockets and ‘gropers’,” he continued adding that they were tightening their door policy immediately though not to the level of selectiveness common at Berlin’s best clubs.
“There are many cultural differences between London and Berlin, and as such fabric & Berghain,” he pointed out. “You cannot measure the two because you are talking about two completely different locations with entirely different demographics.”
Jonty Skrufff: https://twitter.com/djjontyskrufff
