By Gina McColl
Drink spiking, sleazy remarks, assaults. This week's investigation into endemic sexual harassment in the hospitality industry does not come as a shock to Rose Gaumann, the manager of Fitzroy's Kent Street Bar. She has plenty of her own horror stories.
"Having knock-off drinks with other bartenders in the area, I was hearing increasingly awful stories about what was happening in people's bars," Gaumann says. One local bar had five sexual assaults of customers and staff in a single evening. A manager of another was attacked by a group of customers. One bartender's drink was spiked by a patron when he bought her a shot.
Knock it off: six months ago, Kent St Bar manager Rose Gaumann started a campaign to encourage bar patrons to alert staff of any harassment.Credit: Wayne Taylor
"It was terrifying," she says.
Late last year, she decided to act. She put up posters in the bar encouraging anyone experiencing anything creepy or frightening – from a bad Tinder date to an overheard abusive conversation – to alert staff, with a pledge they would handle it.
Rose Gaumann with her poster asking victims or bystanders to call out harassment.Credit: Wayne Taylor
The "Well F--- That" poster got great feedback from patrons, Gaumann says. It gave an increasing number the courage to act and led to a decrease in serious incidents by nipping problems in the bud.
"One person pointed out a seedy guy who had sat himself down with a group of young girls, said it didn't look like he knows them and that the girls looked uncomfortable," Gaumann says. "I got him to sit at the bar with me."
The poster has dividends for staff too. "[In lots of venues] you have to just take men being creepy and saying inappropriate things, with management attitude being 'oh it happens, the dollar sign means more'.
"That we can say 'that's inappropriate' and people will back us up – it's a psychological boost."
Illustration: Matt Golding.
A poster and a word in someone's ear? It doesn't sound very powerful – but it is. It's called bystander intervention: where preventing sexual harassment is seen not as the responsibility of the victim, but a moral responsibility belonging to everyone.
Because bars, nightclubs and restaurants are workplaces as well as recreational venues, there is also a legal responsibility for employers to take steps to ensure their venues are safe, Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commissioner Kristen Hilton says.
"Under Victorian law, employers have a responsibility to take proactive steps to prevent their employees from being harassed and to assist their employees to take action if they have been."
Similar initiatives have recently emerged overseas. In Britain last year, a local council established the code "Ask for Angela", a phrase customers could use if they are getting harassed or feel unsafe. "If you go to the bar and ask for 'Angela' the bar staff will know you need some help getting out of your situation and will call you a taxi or help you out discreetly – without too much fuss", the posters in Lincolnshire venues read.
A scheme in the US saw customers who ordered an "angel shot neat" escorted by staff to their car, while an "angel shot with lime" would alert staff to summon the police.
In Melbourne, Gaumann organised an event last month for other bar owners and staff in the inner north, where they co-ordinated a crackdown on sex assaults and aggression.
"This is the realm of Chapel Street … we want to stomp out this negative behaviour before it consumes us, like it has in other nightlife districts," Gaumann says. A private social media page now describes harassers so they can't be ejected from one bar then cause trouble in the next.
Not everyone is on board. She visited the Fitzroy Police Station to invite a representative of the police to join the initiative, "but they were quite uninterested".
Yarra Police said it works closely with hundreds of licencees in the area as part of the Yarra Liquor Forum, and has recently focused on addressing sexual assault at venues and preventative steps staff can take."Victoria Police is extremely supportive of any venue operators who are actively taking steps to stand against sexual assault toward women or any behaviour that may negatively impact on their patrons," Yarra Inspector Dean McGowan.
The Old Bar in Fitzroy, another member of the anti-sleaze network, has had posters up since February warning that anyone accused of groping will be restrained by security and the police called. "Each night, all the ones in the men's have been screwed up. They feel like it's an accusation – it's pretty disappointing," co-owner Liam Matthews says.
He admits that legal consequences for offenders is more a threat than a promise, even when the police are called. "A lot of times it's really grey – people have been drinking, no [bystanders] will say anything," Matthews says.
"But if we make a formal [police] complaint, then at least when that person goes to another pub and does something, there's a record ... the person can't get away with it time after time."
Inspector McGowan cautioned against "bystander interventions" that might put a third party at risk, and said crime witnesses or victims should call Triple Zero."We do not encourage any behaviour which can place an individual at risk of harm if they attempt to confront an offender," he said.