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[geomon]

If they hired only women to work this event, he may have a point but men work at this theater too, they just won't be working the event.

This is such a fucking nothingburger.

 

[Mr. Phellps]

The only problem I'd see with this event is if they end up excluding trans women who haven't gone through transitioning but still identify as women.

Anything else this moron is complaining about is just bs. At the end of the day, this event hurts no one except the "What about men?" crowd.

 

[Trident]

IMO this is just dumb reasoning though, because where do you draw the line. Excusing something bad because it may not be systematic is extremely problematic...

Nah, they do line drawing in law all the time. For example, if I remember correctly, one factor in hostile work environment lawsuits is whether there was a "pattern" of offensive conduct - where's the line for pattern?

 

[Plumbob]

Guys (fellas)

If Alamo "gets away with this" (scare quotes here, not an actual quote)

What will happen?

Nothing.

The end.

 

[The Llama]

Nah, they do line drawing in law all the time. For example, if I remember correctly, one factor in hostile work environment lawsuits is whether there was a "pattern" of offensive conduct - where's the line for pattern?

The whole point of courts is to "draw the line," so to speak. But as you said one factor is whether there was a pattern. The original post I quoted seemed to indicate their preference that it be the sole factor.

 

[Admiral Woofington]

I can't recall who it was that I knew who actually tried to use slippery slope with gay marriage of "well whats to stop me from marrying my dog later"

and ever since then I just can't ever take slippery slope seriously anymore.

 

[IrishNinja]

blind hot take: ive read/heard from feminist circles for years that gay dudes can be misogynistic in certain instances, this seems like a pretty fair example

could be wrong, open to perspectives here etc

 

[JustSomeone]

One can only imagine what would be the reactions for a men-only screening of a film in 2017. My guess is they won't be as favorable

 

[A Link to the Past]

One can only imagine what would be the reactions for a men-only screening of a film in 2017. My guess is they won't be as favorable

I'd agree, but context is valuable in making these comparisons.

 

[Clancy]

One can only imagine what would be the reactions for a men-only screening of a film in 2017. My guess is they won't be as favorable

Men already try to squeeze women out of nerd culture and video games. They've been doing that for years. Don't see the problem with reversing the roles for once.

 

[Aarglefarg]

One can only imagine what would be the reactions for a men-only screening of a film in 2017. My guess is they won't be as favorable

One can only imagine what would be the reactions for a white history month in 2017. My guess is they won't be as favorable

One can only imagine what would be the reactions for a straight pride month in 2017. My guess is they won't be as favorable

There is no such thing as social contexts that change whether some things are appropriate or inappropriate. /s

 

[AtomskEater]

Texas still has at least one men-only golf club. I'm guessing whatever court this hits wouldn't wanna rock that boat.

In an alternate reality where I'm a lawyer with a lot of money and free time I'd just be really petty and challenge every men's only space I can find. I don't even care if dudes want a golf course all to themselves, but we can't sue over 2-3 women only screenings of a movie and not address institutions that are closed to people of certain types all the time.

 

[A Link to the Past]

This is always a good link to share.

http://kotaku.com/5824084/well-thats-one-way-to-combat-misogyny-in-gaming

An example of a company banning women from an event to avoid a situation where the men participating would abuse them.

 

[Admiral Woofington]

This is always a good link to share.

http://kotaku.com/5824084/well-thats-one-way-to-combat-misogyny-in-gaming

An example of a company banning women from an event to avoid a situation where the men participating would abuse them.

that first comment oof. made 6 years ago?

I'd like to point out that no one, more than likely, would raise a fuss if it was an all girls/women event. There's a lot of hypocrisy and double standard in the world of sexism.

It is silly. Wouldn't you want a higher turn-out by including everyone and just enforcing your rules? But it's their right to do so.

yeeeeeeeeah... about that lol

 

[Aarglefarg]

This is always a good link to share.

http://kotaku.com/5824084/well-thats-one-way-to-combat-misogyny-in-gaming

An example of a company banning women from an event to avoid a situation where the men participating would abuse them.

It keeps redirecting to their home page, including when I search on it from google. Maybe because it wants to go to the Australian site...

 

[Aytumious]

blind hot take: ive read/heard from feminist circles for years that gay dudes can be misogynistic in certain instances, this seems like a pretty fair example

could be wrong, open to perspectives here etc

Clearly they are homophobes.

 

[Zoe]

I'm hoping they have another theater availlable at the moment and guide them to that screening, leaving one theater for women only and another one for those that decided to come to make a statement.

They don't. The Ritz is their special theater that only has two screens. While they do show new releases sometimes, most screenings are specials.

On that particular day, the special showings are at 6:30 and 7:00 while the only normal screening is at 10:00.

 

[AtomskEater]

that first comment oof. made 6 years ago?



yeeeeeeeeah... about that lol

Well at least now there's something to link to if you see this argument in the future, lol.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I'd be lying if I said I didn't care about the principle, so even if there were men's only screenings in addition to the women's only screenings, I would still be perturbed. But is restricting access by gender under the premise of empowerment going to be a positive? If this event had gone ahead without any controversy, would that have been a good thing? Because men would have been disruptive? Would have ruined the atmosphere for women? By existing this event reinforces the idea that when it comes to the fight for equality men are less than, and in the public sphere it makes sense to separate men and women.

"By existing this event reinforces the idea that when it comes to the fight for equality men are less than"

Is this real life? Yes, Alamo-fucking-drafthouse is the leading authority and decision maker to what real equality is. They will have the final say in society to whether men and women are truly equal. This is quite melodramatic no? That one of the smaller movie chains in the US solidifies some idea that men are less than women in a fight for equality (which we definitely need some sources for this) and this movie theater on it's own has done such irreversible damage to the cause of equality.

These narratives of how these small players somehow have do such colossal social damage to major initiatives in society such as equality for all citizens and even more laughably reinforce some seeding portion of that movement that was never there to begin with. I'd love to hear your personal experiences of being a downtrodden white guy in this vicious world as you fight daily for equality for women. You can dislike what they're doing all you want but these exaggerations of the impact this has on society is just eye rolling.

 

[Astral Dog]

Oh dear 😯
It seems that Manoko has a Lawyer GBF

 

[Terrell]

I'm getting really tired of other gay men doing this shit. Especially once marriage equality became a thing, it's like a bunch of (predominantly white) gay guys decided anything else is a bridge too far. And it really speaks poorly to these gay men whose attitudes are, to paraphrase, "f**k you, got mine".

 

[pwack]

Title comes from the Washington Post:



The article itself basically describes a situation that infuriates me: this guy had no right to shut down these events, but is doing so because it aggravated him that the Drafthouse was shutting down the kind of people who would be irritated at a women-only screening.

What the actual fuck is this reasoning. It is not the Drafthouse saying that ALL screenings of Wonder Woman are woman-only, it is only a select few. If your hypothetical woman wants to see the movie with her gay best friend, go to one of the many other screenings for the movie being held.

What really gets me is this:

All this anger and self-righetousness is coming over one line, verbalizing something that would have been implied otherwise. Fucking hell.

If this should be merged into the other thread, go ahead and lock it, mods.

Albany Law School is a shithole. Not sure why anyone listens to their faculty. This guy also has published only two papers in the last ten years. He's not some legal heavyweight. Please ignore him and move on.

 

[Vermillion]

I knew this would happen just to prove a point.



As for this quote, I damn near said the exact same thing.

Slay said it about the black feminist festival. Seriously, no one is going to show up to those. Why take the extra step and say "no x allowed?" That's how you get shit like this.

 

[Amibguous Cad]

This is a fair point (although the link you just gave suggests no such holding has occurred in Texas), but my question would be this -- do you get the impression that any of the debate here, across the thousands of posts on the subject on GAF or the bazillions of tweets or comments section comments, is actually about the narrow technical details of the legality, or do you think it's stemming from a broader moral anger?

One presumes that there is not, even in places where such things are technically illegal, there is no great protest and social disruption surrounding "Ladies Night" (or "Singles Night", or "Couples Night", or "Kids Night" or...)? As a posted above noted, this seems like a clear cut de minimis harm.

I'm totally on board with the idea that if this is illegal, Alamo should receive an injunction and be asked to pay a fine commensurate with the harm (I'm thinking a 10% off popcorn coupon to be split between the plaintiffs would deal with this grievous injustice). But that seems totally secondary to the "is this something that boils my blood?" question.

I am generally interested in narrow legalistic debates. But we don't have a thread about how the Supreme Court narrowly ruled that fish don't count as documents under Sarbanes-Oxley or whatever, so I suspect that's not the draw here.

I mean, a common law jurisprudence is probably the best social technology we have for coming up with consensus answers to thorny moral or political questions. A bunch of smart people apply the same principles to dozens of different cases, eventually a clear consensus view emerges. For example, people seem hung up on "well, you're okay with women's-only shelters," vs. "this is a slippery slope to legalized discrimination." Usually the argument ends there with both sides feeling the other is a hypocrite because they won't adopt the furthest extreme of their principles. Surely, at least a good starting point here is the 14h amendment standards of strict scrutiny (not typically applied to sex, would prohibit different sex bathrooms) vs. intermediate scrutiny (discriminatory actions on the basis of sex must pass a rational basis test).

But morally, yeah, it's important, and not for the bad reasons you imply. The draw here is that "Don't prohibit people from using public accommodations on the basis of immutable characteristics" is, practically speaking, the most important improvement in the moral character of America for the past half century. Even if it applies only to a few movie screenings, even if the thing that people are being barred from is frivolous, and even if its application is in this case harming only a privileged group and isn't really harming them much in the first place, it's a principle worth defending.

This is the easiest, slam dunk application of this principle you could possibly have, even if it benefiting minorities. The fact that people are willing to twist themselves into pretzels of illogic to reason why it doesn't violate the plain language of antidiscrimination statutes is troubling for those of us who hope to be protected by them in the future.

 

[A-V-B]

What are the odds of tomorrow Alamo being all like "shit, uh, we didn't mean it to be this way, here's a refund on all the sales for these screenings because they were based under these pretenses, and we'll work out something nice for everyone later"?

 

[excelsiorlef]

What are the odds of tomorrow Alamo being all like "shit, uh, we didn't mean it to be this way, here's a refund on all the sales for these screenings because they were based under these pretenses, and we'll work out something nice for everyone later"?

Zero... Drafthouse is pretty unique in their relative fearlessness in how they market things.

 

[GhostTrick]

Milo is gay

Gay doesn't make you not a moron if you're a moron.

First post rule always strikes.
Having a different gender/color/religion isn't a pass to say anything or make it more acceptable.

Then again, these screenings were a one time/one movie only. You could start wondering if said cinema claimed "we dont want men in our theaters, ever."

 

[A-V-B]

First post rule always strikes.
Having a different gender/color/religion isn't a pass to say anything or make it more acceptable.

Then again, these screenings were a one time/one movie only. You could start wondering if said cinema claimed "we dont want men in our theaters, ever."

But if it's discriminatory, and breaks a law, doesn't that kinda mean it doesn't matter whether it's once or all the time? I mean, unless there's a specific exemption that says "if you do it once in a limited circumstance, that's okay"

 

[Admiral Woofington]

Alamo is small enough with a cult following they could take the slap on the wrist and still be relatively fine. People saying "I refuse to go to alamo" aren't exactly going to hurt sales when they already had a niche theater and crowd that follow them wherever they go. Hell if it got down to legal fees I would donate money straight up. I love them so much.

 

[Cagey]

I mean, a common law jurisprudence is probably the best social technology we have for coming up with consensus answers to thorny moral or political questions. A bunch of smart people apply the same principles to dozens of different cases, eventually a clear consensus view emerges. For example, people seem hung up on "well, you're okay with women's-only shelters," vs. "this is a slippery slope to legalized discrimination." Usually the argument ends there with both sides feeling the other is a hypocrite because they won't adopt the furthest extreme of their principles. Surely, at least a good starting point here is the 14h amendment standards of strict scrutiny (not typically applied to sex, would prohibit different sex bathrooms) vs. intermediate scrutiny (discriminatory actions on the basis of sex must pass a rational basis test).

But morally, yeah, it's important, and not for the bad reasons you imply. The draw here is that "Don't prohibit people from using public accommodations on the basis of immutable characteristics" is, practically speaking, the most important improvement in the moral character of America for the past half century. Even if it applies only to a few movie screenings, even if the thing that people are being barred from is frivolous, and even if its application is in this case harming only a privileged group and isn't really harming them much in the first place, it's a principle worth defending.

This is the easiest, slam dunk application of this principle you could possibly have, even if it benefiting minorities. The fact that people are willing to twist themselves into pretzels of illogic to reason why it doesn't violate the plain language of antidiscrimination statutes is troubling for those of us who hope to be protected by them in the future.

Formalism without appreciation of context or intent (legislative or litigant) is a legal perspective best left to the confines of academia.

Roberts writing "the way to stop discriminating on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race" in arguing against affirmative action, for example.

 

[A-V-B]

Alamo is small enough with a cult following they could take the slap on the wrist and still be relatively fine. People saying "I refuse to go to alamo" aren't exactly going to hurt sales when they already had a niche theater and crowd that follow them wherever they go. Hell if it got down to legal fees I would donate money straight up. I love them so much.

I wouldn't exactly say cult. This isn't a single luxurious theater in Texas anymore. They are opening more and more venues. They want it to be a brand on some level. It gets to a point now where they're reaching general audiences. If they're damaging their new direction, it might be prudent to think about why that's happening.

 

[Telosfortelos]

Also, let's not act like the legal language got men pissed off.

Men were pissed off that they saw women getting something special that they thought they weren't.

The armchair legal talk came in the aftermath.

There are a great many that were pissed off the reasons you state. Anti-feminists communities were quick to attack and all. But it's incorrect to group all critics together with that group. There are people that legitimately worry that supporting events that restrict access to a protected group could legitimize criticism of things like the Civil Rights Act and give support to businesses that are looking to wholesale discriminate.

I don't agree with that criticism, but I'm open to being convinced.

Gender differences are more than just cultural (though they are that too, of course). I think men can dominate the experience of movies for women, particularly this kind of genre film, in a way that's disempowering for women. I think the experience of women seeing a super hero film, not as a girlfriend or wife or friend of the guys, but in a theater full of interested women, is worthwhile. We should never accept the exclusion of a gender from experiences, but because there are numerous Drafthouse showings where men can attend, I'm satisfied that men aren't excluded from seeing Wonder Woman at the Drafthouse. I wouldn't support the event if this weren't the case.

I wouldn't support this argument if the restrictions were by race, and I'm aware that could be perceived as hypocritical. While I think genders should not be excluded from experiences, gender is not race, and I don't think policies that protect race need perfectly mirror those that protect gender. I think it's crucial that we prevent businesses from discriminating based on phenotype or cultural backgrounds.

I hope to see Wonder Woman at the Drafthouse while I"m in Austin next week. I should probably buy tickets soon...

 

[GhostTrick]

But if it's discriminatory, and breaks a law, doesn't that kinda mean it doesn't matter whether it's once or all the time? I mean, unless there's a specific exemption that says "if you do it once in a limited circumstance, that's okay"

Positive discrimination exists. It's up to the judges to interpret whenever the discriminations laws apply to that.

 

[ElBoxyBrown]

I wouldn't exactly say cult. This isn't a single luxurious theater in Texas anymore. They are opening more and more venues. They want it to be a brand on some level. It gets to a point now where they're reaching general audiences. If they're damaging their new direction, it might be prudent to think about why that's happening.

They will never be as big as an AMC or Regal. The Alamo is still and probably always will be a small exclusive chain that can do stuff like this and not get massive blowback.

 

[A-V-B]

Positive discrimination exists. It's up to the judges to interpret whenever the discriminations laws apply to that.

So basically this has to be a case so we can define exactly what we think, legally, about this scenario.

 

[NimbusD]

This is always a good link to share.

http://kotaku.com/5824084/well-thats-one-way-to-combat-misogyny-in-gaming

An example of a company banning women from an event to avoid a situation where the men participating would abuse them.

lol first comment: "I'd like to point out that no one, more than likely, would raise a fuss if it was an all girls/women event. There's a lot of hypocrisy and double standard in the world of sexism."


People really don't understand that these things are different because of a larger context and not some black and white rule that stands in spite of anything other reasoning.

 

[Cynar]

Having women-only screenings is absolutely discrimination.

But a private company reserves the right to discriminate in my opinion so long as it isn't harming anyone.

Don't like that? Don't go to that theatre. Pretty simple.

Do you not realize what you wrote? Discrimination is harm.

 

[23qwerty]

Do you not realize what you wrote? Discrimination is harm.

Not in this case

 

[A-V-B]

Not in this case

How does that work, technically?

 

[23qwerty]

How does that work, technically?

No one is harmed by this, pretty simple really

 

[A-V-B]

No one is harmed by this, pretty simple really

No but I mean, legally. How does this work out? How do you present a case in this scenario?

 

[23qwerty]

No but I mean, legally. How does this work out? How do you present a case in this scenario?

Dunno my dude

 

[A-V-B]

Dunno my dude

Just hypothesizing here... like, in terms of approach: if you wanted to say it was legally justified, that there's some kind of positive discrimination/affirmative actioning taking place, wouldn't you first have to lay out a framework where woman are being culturally oppressed due to their gender in context to movie showings or movie theaters, and that you're enforcing new opportunities of participation to prevent active discrimination against them?

 

[Terrell]

But if it's discriminatory, and breaks a law, doesn't that kinda mean it doesn't matter whether it's once or all the time? I mean, unless there's a specific exemption that says "if you do it once in a limited circumstance, that's okay"

If this is discriminatory, using the same logic, any venue that provides private parties or events is being discriminatory.

 

[StrategyFan]

i can sort of see the legal side of it, but usually people save that reasoning for essential things that are funded/regulated by the government, not luxuries (movies) run by private enterprises

 

[A-V-B]

If this is discriminatory, using the same logic, any venue that provides private parties or events is being discriminatory.

But isn't one deal struck between two particular, definable groups (the party host - building owner/land lord/steward - and the singular enterprise of potential attendees who have specifically initiated/created the setup of the appointment with that host) and the other deal initiated by the business owners, directed towards individuals of the general public with an already defined service, space, and time?

Then, in the first case, would possible discrimination happen between the building owner(s) and the people trying to set up the private party (you can't have a party here because you're all gender/race/color/religion)? Then the question could be... would that even stick because it's a completely private kind of business transaction? Like, could a church turn away a group's offer based on a difference of religions and you couldn't take that to court? But once it goes to a totally public offer where it's not any single group dealing with the organization in question, as in not being on a one-to-one basis... and there are loads of individuals...

shit, I dunno. Keep in mind I'm not a lawyer, just trying to run this through my head

 

[Amalthea]

Nobody would give a shit if there weren't some dudes who can't let women have something they don't.

 

[CloudWolf]

”There is also the fact that what they were doing is illegal," he added.

Women-only events are illegal now? Better start cracking down on sauna's.

 

[Aarglefarg]

Women-only events are illegal now? Better start cracking down on sauna's.

Places like that can be required to get exemptions from discrimination laws.

 

[DR2K]

blind hot take: ive read/heard from feminist circles for years that gay dudes can be misogynistic in certain instances, this seems like a pretty fair example

could be wrong, open to perspectives here etc

Liking dick doesn't stop some men from keeping all the flaws and misconceptions they had prior. I'd say gay men can be even more mysoginsitic than their straight counterparts from my experience.