Cheers!

The verdict is out – ladies’ nights remain!

On Monday, Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum struck down a lawsuit alleging that ladies’ night at nightclubs in Manhattan discriminate against men. The suit was brought on by attorney Roy Den Hollander, an ardent opponent of feminism, who most recently sued Columbia University for its women’s studies program and the lack of a comparable men’s program (yea right!). Hollander was not pleased with the suit’s outcome and said the decision is “consistent with the discrimination embedded in many of America’s institutions.”

This is just plain ridiculous! Seriously? I want to meet this guy so I can knock some sense in him or better yet throw my discounted drink in his face! There was a time when bars and pubs were exclusively male spaces and women were unwelcome or assumed only to be there for one thing, and it wasn’t alcohol. That’s discrimination - as is the fact that women still do not receive equal pay for equal work! If my logic were as good as Mr. Hollander’s I’d demand that women deserve to pay less for alcohol (and everything else for that matter) to make up for the wage gap – am I on to something? (I kid).

What concerned me about this lawsuit was the nightclub owner’s defense that men might actually benefit from ladies’ nights because of the abundance of women who attend. Really? Lots of women, lots of alcohol, and lots of men eager to “benefit” – this combination can easily put women at extreme risk for being assaulted, raped, or worse. Perhaps this is the more important issue.