Social Melbourne cafe that boasted about charging male customers an 18 per cent 'man tax' is closing down

I could have told these ladies from my own ample sales/business experience that being “woke” is an effective tie-breaker when all other things are equal however people absolutely don’t pay a premium for woke.
I don't think that's always the case but when you are trying to break into the food industry, a notoriously competitive one with little room for newcomers, its probably not the smartest risk to take.
 
Simple solution if you're a man, just say you're a woman. They can either take the man tax off or you can label them as transphobic if they don't remove the tax. Turn the leftist propaganda back on them.
 
No doubt this is exactly what they were hoping to do, but that's banking on a very narrow clientele, who would even be limited in what kinds of friends they could bring there.
If you were a woke lady who wanted to bring your male friends there you could just take them on the three weeks out of the month that they don't charge extra. But I think a lot of guys would boycott it out of principle. Reminds me of an anecdote of a friend of mine who once quit working for a coffee place not unlike this one because one of the managers admitted to him they discriminated against the guys by having them work in the back while the ladies got to work the register.
 
You're working double time to insinuate people would never visit a vegan place with their vegan friends. I've been to plenty of places outside of my norm because friends wanted company. Gay and hip hop clubs, wine tastings, hookah bars and such.

Now if those places advertised that bald bastards were going to be charged extra and will be treated like 2nd class citizens I would have declined. To put it politely.

It's weird he's trying really hard to say the sexist policy didn't affect them. Granted I live in Massachusetts, but we have two vegan places around here that have been wildly popular for about 10 years now on top of all the other niché vegan places that have been in business a while now. The vegan taco place around the corner wins a bunch of awards and tends to be the go-to place my friends go for tacos. If the food is good, people go to vegan places.
 
If you were a woke lady who wanted to bring your male friends there you could just take them on the three weeks out of the month that they don't charge extra. But I think a lot of guys would boycott it out of principle. Reminds me of an anecdote of a friend of mine who once quit working for a coffee place not unlike this one because one of the managers admitted to him they discriminated against the guys by having them work in the back while the ladies got to work the register.

The principles of the customer aside, what is your view on whether such policies should be allowed. Should businesses be allowed to discriminate based on sex? Race? Religion? When and how should government intervene, if at all?

I realize this was in Australia, but I'm more interested in the US, where anti-discrimination laws seem to prohibit a lot of this kind of stuff.

My view is that race is a good area for the US to legally prohibit businesses discriminating because the US has too long a history of abusing such discrimination. But in other areas, like a ladies only gym, discrimination by sex make sense to me. I'm asking because people seem hot to trot to increase the amount of protected classes. I'm trying to make up my mind about when and where I think discrimination is wrong and where I'm OK with it.
 
The principles of the customer aside, what is your view on whether such policies should be allowed. Should businesses be allowed to discriminate based on sex? Race? Religion? When and how should government intervene, if at all?

I realize this was in Australia, but I'm more interested in the US, where anti-discrimination laws seem to prohibit a lot of this kind of stuff.

My view is that race is a good area for the US to legally prohibit businesses discriminating because the US has too long a history of abusing such discrimination. But in other areas, like a ladies only gym, discrimination by sex make sense to me. I'm asking because people seem hot to trot to increase the amount of protected classes. I'm trying to make up my mind about when and where I think discrimination is wrong and where I'm OK with it.
I don't think we should allow sex discrimination generally but there should be some exceptions allowed, certainly more than with the other protected classes. In fact I think society needs more gendered spaces for men and women and boys and girls. If an establishment is founded specifically to service one sex or the other then it should be allowed to discriminate on that basis. Best example being the Girl Scouts or your hypothetical ladies gym/spa.
 
I don't think we should allow sex discrimination generally but there should be some exceptions allowed, certainly more than with the other protected classes. In fact I think society needs more gendered spaces for men and women and boys and girls. If an establishment is founded specifically to service one sex or the other then it should be allowed to discriminate on that basis. Best example being the Girl Scouts or your hypothetical ladies gym/spa.

OK, so you'd be OK if the entire service was reasonably geared to one sex or the other. I think I agree, and perhaps what irks me about hits one little cafe ten thousand miles away is that it allows both customers but treats them differently. I think if it were simply a cafe for women I' d pay it no mind. I think I also agree about the need for more gendered spaces. I look for places my sons can be with other boys.

Race is much harder to handle, but we've seen a renewed interest in limited segregation in things like campus housing.
 
Lets fight inequality by treating people unequally! Logic!
They call it equity

IISC_EqualityEquity.png
 
Neither. I can't see people who care about that stuff not attending the store because they likely agree with the issue. The people who disagree with it are unlikely to the be the type of people who frequent vegan cafes in the first place.
well, I think a bigger factor is going to be that in Australian capital cities like Melbourne there are about 10 cafes per city block. Can't really afford to muck about with divisive controversial marketing strategies.

Also, a lot of café business comes from neighbouring businesses having employees go on break to the closest café for a regular coffee. If one place is charging 18% more, the word will get around and nobody from that business will go there. They will go in groups to somewhere else. Costing hundreds of dollars a day to the vegan café. Renting in the inner north of Melbourne is going to have astronomical commercial rent, you can't make ends meet doing what they did.

It's already $5 a coffee before adding the "man tax". Ain't nobody putting up with that price, especially when you're told why you have to pay more and can never get seating.

I know this because I'm a coffee snob in a capital city in Australia and I've lived in neighbourhoods exactly like the one this café was in.
 
Last edited:
OK, so you'd be OK if the entire service was reasonably geared to one sex or the other. I think I agree, and perhaps what irks me about hits one little cafe ten thousand miles away is that it allows both customers but treats them differently. I think if it were simply a cafe for women I' d pay it no mind. I think I also agree about the need for more gendered spaces. I look for places my sons can be with other boys.

Race is much harder to handle, but we've seen a renewed interest in limited segregation in things like campus housing.
The race question is more tricky. I don't think businesses open to the public should be allowed to discriminate on that basis but maybe private clubs or something of that sort should be able to. The question of campus housing is an interesting one, not really sure what to think on that.

Good on you for doing that for your sons btw.
 
business alienates half its customer base. big surprise it shuts down lmao
 
A safe space for lesbians? Were lesbians in danger outside the vegan cafe?

<{walkerwhut}>
 
Back
Top