Nightclub Lawyer Issues Embarrassing, Damning Video Statement

UPDATE: 9/22/2015 9:10 a.m.: Check out the follow-up video below.
This Houston nightclub story just keeps on giving. Amid a media firestorm touched off after African-American customers alleged that the club Gaslamp actively deterred non-white clientele, charging covers only to non-white patrons and turning away others for “dress code” violations tailored to provide a pretext for tossing minority customers.

There are some interesting legal issues at play here. But let’s skip over those and make fun of the bar’s dumbass lawyer who, for some reason, thought it was a good idea to make a rambling video presentation rife with damning factual admissions and botched conclusions of law. Glorious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xlZgm_51s0

Oh, just bask in the awkward smarminess.

We will tell you you need some girls, and that this isn’t “bro’s night out” because we don’t want you creeping out the girls we already have inside.

We will tell you you’re too cheap for our nightclub if you don’t want to pay a cover. Because we know that if you won’t pay a cover, you’re probably not going to buy any drinks.

…except we know white people will buy drinks, so we don’t need to worry about them. And here’s where things get dumb.

Though we do have these rules and policies, we do have too many exceptions, and we admit that, and it’s a problem. Sometimes the exceptions swallow the rule.

Oh Jesus. Bear in mind Gaslamp’s defense is their “race-neutral door policy,” which apparently is “swallowed by exceptions” and the dress code is “unposted.” Did anyone review this script?

Sometimes the door guy thinks you’re a smokin’ hot babe and you also get in free.

And there’s no way this is ever applied in a racist manner in a society beset by the white beauty myth.

We’re not in denial about this controversy.

Wait, what? What’s the strategy here? Is this an apology or a defense? I’m so confused. Because if it’s the former, “we deny that we did anything racist, but we’re going to post our dress code, introduce a complaint line, and redouble our efforts to regain the trust of our black patrons” would have done the job with the added advantage of not completely f**king your clients in a hypothetical future lawsuit.

The fact is that federal discrimination law doesn’t cover nightclubs.

Yes, nightclubs are officially sovereign soil ever since the 1854 Treaty of Douchebaggia. What the f**k, man? In fairness, Sutherland isn’t entirely wrong. As we learned just the other day, nightclubs have tremendous latitude under discrimination law to treat their female employees like utensils. But what federal employment discrimination laws say about hiring sex objects is a bit different than pretextually banning black people from your establishment. The latter relates to federal public accommodation laws, and those are pretty on point. I suspect Sutherland took 15 seconds to skim 42 U.S. Code § 2000a(e) excepting “private clubs” from the law and decided “Gaslamp is a bar but it calls itself a club… so that must mean us!” as opposed to actually figuring out what the law says. Hell, even if Gaslamp were a “private club” within the meaning of the statute, courts require formal admission procedures applied objectively in practice, which Sutherland just told us Gaslamp is entirely incapable of doing.

And this creates a legal problem for Gaslamp. And I say “legal problem” because now that their lawyer is going public that they’re “not in denial about this controversy,” we can ease off on putting “allegedly” in front of everything.

Because the video wasn’t mind-blowingly stupid enough, what follows is a downright ludicrous call for the voting public to pass a law to hold Gaslamp accountable. It’s a dispassionately presented attempt at an emotional plea from the bar to end the discrimination that the bar acknowledges it engages in routinely. Unbelievable.

You know what? Just jump to the 5:35 mark where, for the first time in the entire video, someone makes the creative decision to ditch the “proof of life” framing and introduce an artistic fade to a second camera. Classy.

For the record, Sutherland is a University of Houston Law grad, licensed in Texas, and marketing himself as a “Food and Hospitality Lawyer,” but from what we’re hearing from tipsters, it’s more accurate to say he’s a “lawyer who works in food and hospitality” — in that he’s actually been working as Gaslamp’s cook while he tries to get his legal career together.

If we may venture a professional assessment based on this video, Sutherland makes a mean Turkey Craisin Burger.

UPDATE: Sutherland has now issued “The Statement Pt. 2.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6M6Ymm6x_L0&feature=share

Not since Empire Strikes Back has a sequel so wildly outclassed the original. Just 45 seconds long, Sutherland provides security camera footage showing the aggrieved trying to skip the general admission line and refusing to pay a cover. It’s compelling evidence but raises a question: if Gaslamp had this video all along, why the hell did they put out that marathon of misstatement last week? Show this, slap on some platitudes about Gaslamp’s commitment to racial fairness, and then call it a day with your dignity intact.

Earlier: Borgata Retains The Right To Mistreat Their Sex Objects