& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

[Guy Profumo]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-35160173

[sw2borshch]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

If you'd told me about this the day before it happened I could have had a pre-emptive word in the shell-like of Tim Martin seeing as he was in the Thomas Sheraton in Stockton as I was starting my Black Friday revelling. But you never.

[WOM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

What a tempest in a pint glass. Imagine a trained bartender erring on the side of caution instead of accepting the world's most unofficial looking laminated card (complete with poor punctuation).

[Guy Profumo]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

WOM wrote: What a tempest in a pint glass. Imagine a trained bartender erring on the side of caution instead of accepting the world's most unofficial looking laminated card (complete with poor punctuation).

Like it says. She's the survivor of a brain injury, and may have problems with memory, speech, or actions.

That probably extended to producing the card.

[WOM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

My point is that an official looking card produced by, say, the British Brain Injury Association or some such might have cut more ice than something somebody made in their bedroom. I can't really fault the bartender for not taking it as 'official'.

My "I'm part of an experiment and I'm allowed to drive drunk." doesn't work with the police here, either.

[Jah Womble]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

I think that the initial error can be excused, but to boot her out following her having shown a card - which might be poorly-punctuated but is nonetheless easy to understand - is rather poor.

But then again, this was a Wetherspoon pub - which, in my (third-person) experience, is not a chain normally noted for its refusal to serve drunks.

[WOM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Well, it says she has temper issues and swore at management after the initial rebuff. I can tell you from experience on the other side of the bar, you get walked out as soon as that happens.

All that aside, what the fuck is a woman with a brain injury doing trying to drink alcohol? In the list of things she should avoid for life, alcohol is up around #1 or 2.

[EIM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Once you've refused service to someone, you can't really go back on that, laminated card or otherwise. It's a bit of a shame it happened, and this sort of thing has nearly happened to me in the past, but I'm 100% behind the bar staff here.

[Bored Of Education]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Only on OTF can bad punctuation damn you from the courtesies shown to others.

[Gangster Octopus]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

When I've calmed down, I'll tell WOM exactly why he should fuck right off.

[WOM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Well, you've sort of blown your big finale, but go ahead.

[beak]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Might make myself one of them cards, like.

[NickSTFU]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Isn't this really about how people with brain injuries, and thus a disability, are actually perceived in a society that freaks out when someone isn't 'normal'.

Dunno like, but that's how I see it.

[Guy Profumo]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

WOM wrote: Well, it says she has temper issues and swore at management after the initial rebuff. I can tell you from experience on the other side of the bar, you get walked out as soon as that happens.

All that aside, what the fuck is a woman with a brain injury doing trying to drink alcohol? In the list of things she should avoid for life, alcohol is up around #1 or 2.

I'm also guessing (and I stress this is a guess) as this was her "first time back in a pub" since the accident, she wasn't entirely alone at this point, and that the people with her would point this out to the staff

[beak]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

WOM wrote:
All that aside, what the fuck is a woman with a brain injury doing trying to drink alcohol? In the list of things she should avoid for life, alcohol is up around #1 or 2.

Wait a minute, you're a neurologist?

[Jah Womble]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Regardless of the vagaries of all that, where does it state that she was buying (or indeed intending to drink) alcohol?

Despite my earlier comment, it seems to me that this has been dealt with as best as possible: I have a small amount of sympathy for the chain, who can't really be expected to know how to deal with something like this. Anyway, that's enough back-pedalling from me.

[dalliance]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Might have been avoided had she shown her card at the beginning rather than after swearing at bar staff and being asked to leave. As was said up thread, the bar isn't going to back down at that stage.

[Flynnie]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Might have helped had the card been professionally produced, instead of something made at home.

In other stories, the mum claims it's from Headway (the brain injury charity), which I don't believe. It's got no professional design at all, along with several grammatical errors.

compare:

[WOM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

george clarts wrote:

All that aside, what the fuck is a woman with a brain injury doing trying to drink alcohol? In the list of things she should avoid for life, alcohol is up around #1 or 2.

Wait a minute, you're a neurologist?

If you think you need to be a neurologist to have a competent grasp of alcohol's effects on the brain, you probably also think you need to be an astronomer to locate the moon.

[WOM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Guy Potger wrote: I'm also guessing (and I stress this is a guess) as this was her "first time back in a pub" since the accident, she wasn't entirely alone at this point, and that the people with her would point this out to the staff

Just in case it needs stressing, I'm not saying that this wasn't an unfortunate series of events. But it comes down to a person in a position of responsibility making a judgement call. You can argue over whether they made a wrong or right call, but they made it based on the information they had at the time. And I would have fired a bartender who changed their decision based on the card presented.

Then, if the customer had started yelling or swearing at me, as the manager, I would not have changed the bartender's decision. (Not that I likely would have anyway, because that's something you just don't do in the booze business.) But yeah, I'd have removed her from the premises.

[Bored Of Education]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

You could always get one of these as well

[Guy Profumo]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Flynnie wrote: Might have helped had the card been professionally produced, instead of something made at home.

In other stories, the mum claims it's from Headway (the brain injury charity), which I don't believe. It's got no professional design at all, along with several grammatical errors.

compare:

Why would someone who'd suffered a serious brain injury carry an official "I have autism" card?

They're entirely different things.

[MsD]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

WOM wrote:

All that aside, what the fuck is a woman with a brain injury doing trying to drink alcohol? In the list of things she should avoid for life, alcohol is up around #1 or 2.

Wait a minute, you're a neurologist?

If you think you need to be a neurologist to have a competent grasp of alcohol's effects on the brain, you probably also think you need to be an astronomer to locate the moon.

?
The brain has many parts and components, you can be affected in one part and not another, as I understand it, just from reading a bit of Oliver Sachs and reading up on epilepsy and drug abuse.

[WOM]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Indeed. Which is not the same as saying "alcohol effects one part of the brain and not others". If you want me to provide an entire link farm on alcohol's effects on the brain, I can. But I wouldn't have thought it was a point of contention that alcohol does, indeed, by its very nature, effect the brain. And for a person with a brain injury - and who reportedly presents with those injury symptoms, including, but not limited to, motor skill impairment, speech impairment and anger management - consumption of alcohol might not be the best idea.

Which, as I stated originally, was an aside, and nothing to do with her right to be served.

[Jah Womble]

& kick a cripple for me too, Mr Wetherspoon!

Quite. But as I suggested earlier, there's nothing in that piece to state that she intended to buy booze. She might've wanted a Coke.

Guy Potger wrote:

Might have helped had the card been professionally produced, instead of something made at home.

In other stories, the mum claims it's from Headway (the brain injury charity), which I don't believe. It's got no professional design at all, along with several grammatical errors.

compare:

Why would someone who'd suffered a serious brain injury carry an official "I have autism" card?

They're entirely different things.

I think his point was about the difference in professionalism/presentation - which might in some cases make a difference.