Vander Von Odd Calls Out the Manchester Eagle For Its Transphobic Policies
If you’re in the United Kingdom, you’ll definitely want to check out the Dragula tour featuring the Boulet Brothers and Dragula alums Vander Van Odd, Meatball, Biqtch Puddin, James Majesty and Abhora. But after Friday’s Manchester show, the group had an unpleasant experience at the Manchester Eagle. And when Vander Von Odd and Meatball spoke out, they uncovered that they weren’t alone.
In a new video, Vander Von Odd (real name Antonio Yee), describes their experience with the Manchester Eagle. After the show, their group of 40 people were went looking for a place to hang out. They first went to the Eagle, but were turned away because the had one woman in their group and women aren’t allowed in at the Eagle. The group all went to another bar and had a great time, and the Manchester Eagle missed out on a whole bunch of sales.
That might have been the end of it, but afterward, Meatball and Von Odd did a live stream where they were discussing the Eagle’s policy. At the time, they were respectful to the establishment while criticizing their policies as misogynist — after all, this wasn’t a bachelorette party come to gawk at the gays.
But after their live stream, Meatball and Von Odd started finding out about how deep the misogyny and transphobia at the Manchester Eagle goes. According to Von Odd, the Eagle was known for turning away not only women, but trans men who didn’t pass “enough,” trans men who didn’t wear packers or non-binary people.
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On the Manchester Eagle’s Facebook page, there are a number of one-star reviews that criticize the bar’s policies — and not just the anti-trans, anti-woman policies. One man said the doormen refused him re-entry and them mocked him for being deaf. Another was mocked for being “camp.”
And another alleges a “race problem” with their doormen. He describes being turned away, despite being in full gear, for not fitting the bar’s image. He writes, “I understand having this arbitrary nonsense to discourage hen parties, but refusing entry to guys IN FULL GEAR just because they don’t represent this idealized post-Brexit xenophobic version of the UK is kind of insane. Didn’t seem like an isolated incident based on others I spoke to … You have a race problem among your bouncers. Y’all need help.”
Watch Vander Von Odd call out the Manchester Eagle below:
#femme #genderqueer
Posted by Antonio Yee on Saturday, September 1, 2018