The Stand Comedy Club statement on cancelling Jo Cherry

[WandaWomblesaurus]

twitter.com/StandComedyClub/status/1653017007921545221?s=20

@CremeEggQueen - please can you provide your view on what’s been posted above about Boyle? What is it about Jos set that you think will be worse than this?

I wonder if this venue would do the same if Ricky Gervasr was to book them? I’m going to guess not.

Of course she can sue The Strand for no-platforming her, and The Fringe is they are involved. She could seek damages, including for injured feelings as allowed under the Equality Act 2010.

And according to discrimination solicitor Audrey Ludwig, she could also sue individual staff members for discrimination, if she wishes.

Of course she can sue The Strand for no-platforming her, and The Fringe is they are involved. She could seek damages, including for injured feelings as allowed under the Equality Act 2010.

Exactly. See Nottingham Council's apology to Julie Bindel after it cancelled her talk:

"Nottingham City Council now accepts that its decision to cancel the event was procedurally unlawful. Nottingham City Council apologises to Ms Bindel and Nottingham Women for Change for cancelling the event in this way and for the inconvenience caused as a result of this decision."

https://www.nottinghampost.com/news/nottingham-news/nottingham-city-council-issues-apology-7679208

Glasgow City Council had to pay out over £100,000 in damages to Franklin Graham.

Read the Graham v Glasgow City Council case.

Why is that? Do you think trans people aren't real?

What do you think the equality act is all about? Do you think you can discriminate on the basis of a protected characteristic, because you disagree with it personally?

That's is the entire point of its creation.

To stop people being able to discriminate because they're prejudiced.

What does 'trans' mean?

I DO believe in fairies, I do, I do.

HW now on Radio Scotland claiming that trans people have no representation. On a publicly funded radio station. No hint of irony.

I'm still laughing over the utter idiocy but blisteringly angry too that these self-righteous tw*ts are discriminating against a Lesbian with Gender-Critical views.
I hope they have to pay big damages and it's widely reported.

I don't get how people can say this has nothing to do with her sexuality when her sexuality by the nature of bring homosexual requires recognition of sex.

But is the cancellation by The Stand related to her sexuality?

I'm sure The Stand would have refused a platform to JK Rowling or Graeme Linehan or Jordan Peterson. I'm sure they would also have refused one to James Dreyfus or Douglas Murray but that wouldn't have been because of their sexuality either. They'd probably even no platform Blaire White.

Roddy Dunlop KC (Twitter) :
"All the “power to the people; withdrawal of labour” stuff is rather lacking in the whole “vicarious liability + strict liability + discrimination law = this is gonna cost” type of analysis."

I think Cherry's Lesbian sexuality informs her GC views, like it does mine, but she was dumped for being GC not a lesbian ( because to those idiots lesbians can include transwomen (men).

I'm a regular at one of The Stand's main venues...they operate in a very particular way which is actually quite different to other comedy venues (unusual rules about positioning of chairs for health and safety and frequent reminders to customers not to adjust layout, emergency exit protocols for basement, staff that are highly trained in appropriate response to hecklers that get out of hand in a tightly packed venue and might escalate a situation with their friends, checking customers are confirming to rules about no large single sex groups etc etc)

And that's aside from staffing the bar and doing the sound tech that's required.

There is no way if a sizeable number if their staff decided not to work that they could safely host an act that was likely to be controversial. If would be completely economically unfeasible to try to train up unfamiliar staff with all the nuance of how they operate.

They're advertising for staff now -
g.co/kgs/C5TPL1 You saying that they can't train staff up between between now and August? Doesn't bode well for the Festival.

And with the exception of protocols for basement, that sounds no different to various venues I've worked.

The staff that I see where I go have employed there for years, there may be a couple of younger ones behind the bar that vary but the ones that are running the shop have been doing it for years.

If the staff that have worked there for years got ran over tomorrow I'm sure the company would manage to carry on just fine.

If I were management I would be very concerned if it were all fairly new staff who haven't had the years of experience of handling the crowd when something goes wrong, eg. when things blow up between drunken hecklers and the act that's on.

They have a responsibility for the safety and well-being of their staff and customers, I think it's fair of them if they have concerns if the event was overseen by relatively inexperienced staff. Presumably they could be sued for failing to ensure the safety of the staff and attenders of the event?

To be honest, given the list of 'unusual' jobs you've given, any good front of house staff member from another venue could learn the job without too much bother.

If I were management I would be concerned if my staff were bigots who refused to tolerate any acts that didn’t conform with their narrow world view. If they exhibited their bigotry by threatening to refuse to work for acts they wished to discriminate against leaving me (and them) open to discrimination claims, I would sack them.

How do you know they haven't gained experience of this elsewhere which is the basis on which they would be hired? Those skills aren't limited to the few Stand staff members already there.

And this of course.

It would be completed economically unviable to hire and train up staff in their particular operations and safety for what, is it one night? To run one night safely at what 2 hours max?) they would probably need multiple nights of experience for each member of staff.

Even that to my mind wouldn't be safe.

It's just not practical. I can't be 100% but they certainly don't seem to run as a wealthy venue, during Covid we donated money for the online shows to try to keep them and the circuit comedians going. Their shows are generally between £5-20 and small capacity.

They are currently advertising for staff to work between July 27th,2023 to September 3rd, 2023 i.e. the Festival.