I have found some very candid reviews on Trip Advisor regarding who’s gay-friendly and who isn’t–mostly the former, and mostly bed-and-breakfast inns, some of which are run by gay couples. Yes, they do tend to be costly, but it might be worth the extra $ not to have to deal with the hotel crap mentioned in this thread.
Does making hateful, incorrect comments to your guests avoid that reputation or give you a different sort of reputation?
Mix of both. Deciding who to rent rooms to is always a game of benefits and risks. Every time someone walks in to the lobby you have to make a snap judgement about how much they are likely to pay and how much trouble they are likely to be.
If a man comes in with a woman who is clearly a prostitute (you get to know them) there is a good chance that there will be trouble- wives calling at all hours, police, drug dealers who the pro owes money to. That sort of thing is not worth their money or the damage that having a police bust will do to your reputation with the rest of the guests staying there. I’ve had a few nights of no sleep because someone decided that a guest at my motel shouldn’t be with the person he was with. It can get really ugly.
Run of the mill adultry is a fact of hotel life though. If both people are from out-of-town (less drama potential) and acting like civilized adults they will gladly accept your money. Most hotel owners I know are very religious and don’t approve of it, but they also know what is or is not their business.
However, they do keep a pretty close watch. You probably can’t tell, but motel owners get a good sense of everything that goes on. They are instinctually trained to keep an eye on how many people are visiting each room, who is hanging around that they’ve never seen before, what kind of local no-goodniks are involved and even how long and how late people are going and coming in. It’s a matter of protecting their property and you wouldn’t believe some of the stuff happens when they let their guard down.
Once again, you really arn’t going to get too far in terms of actual change by going to the Red Roof Inn company. They have little control or interest over how individual motels are run. Your best bet is to find the managers of the motel and the property owner because they are the ones that have the power to fire the employee.
I don’t see that comment as hateful, more like condensention, but I wasn’t there at the time.
Could that give a hotel a reputation - I guess, but look at it from their POV, a married man shows up with someone apparently barely legal, if at all (from Bricker’s description) and claims she is his wife. You run a respectable hotel, maybe having a few families staying at the time. I could see them not really wanting you there, actually even if they carded her and she pulled out, of all things your marriage certificate, I could still see the hotel not really wanting the image of a older married guy sleeping w/ a underage girl displayed to the other guests.
(BTW this is about a post that** Bricker** posted, not the OP)
I haven’t got much time. I’ll leave you with a few links.
De groeiende intolerantie van religieuze groeperingen maken helaas weer duidelijk dat homorechten beschermd moeten worden. [The growing intolerance of religious groups makes it again clear that homosexual’s rights need to be protected]
http://www.schorerstichting.nl/nieuws_view.asp?ID=77
Joden- en homohaat: Amsterdam radeloos
04-10-2003
[Jew and homosexual hate: Amsterdam is desperate]
De Amsterdamse wethouder onderwijs Rob Oudkerk (PvdA) zit met de handen in het haar. De discriminatie en tirannie door met name scholieren met een islamitische achtergrond is zo dreigend geworden dat steeds meer leraren en leerlingen afhaken.
De haat richt zich met name tegen joden, homo’s en lesbiënnes. Dat meldt dagblad Het Parool.
[Amsterdam [ex] alderman of education Rob Oudkerk [labour party] is desperate.
The discrimination and tyranny by mainly students with islamic background has become so threatening that more and more teachers and students quit.
The hate is directed towards jews, gays and lesbians. From newspaper ‘Het Parool’]
Some more links, for translation either ask Coldfire [whom I challenge to give me ONE proof that these links - and my beliefs - are far right-ish…Are you MAD? I have voted godammit all my live for the PvdA]
http://sites.nps.nl/jerome/templates/hetrozerijk/welcome.cfm?contentpage=/jerome/index.cfm/site/Hetrozerijk/pageid/EEC721A5-508B-E1CA-3AC522D0E6153B1C/objectid/224D7444-D601-40DB-671E02EE488E763C/document.getE?
.
http://sites.nps.nl/jerome/templates/hetrozerijk/welcome.cfm?contentpage=/jerome/index.cfm/site/Hetrozerijk/pageid/EEC721A5-508B-E1CA-3AC522D0E6153B1C/objectid/224D7444-D601-40DB-671E02EE488E763C/document.getE?
http://sites.nps.nl/jerome/templates/hetrozerijk/welcome.cfm?contentpage=/jerome/index.cfm/site/Hetrozerijk/pageid/EEC721A5-508B-E1CA-3AC522D0E6153B1C/objectid/224D7444-D601-40DB-671E02EE488E763C/document.getE?
And there’s the case of Chris Crain recently.
Google for it. I haven’t the time.
Thanks for the kind words.
Yes, you’ve indeed shown a few instances of Muslim-related homophobia. All very sad examples indeed. Still, none of my gay friends seem to be too much afflicted by it. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not stating there isn’t an integration problem with Muslim youths.
You just vastly overstated the impact of the antics of a few louts on our country’s tolerance as a whole. And I think that’s a very unfair characterisation.
KCSuze, keep fighting for your rights.
I was at a queer banquet in a Holiday Inn in Decatur, Georgia. In the middle of it a religious fundamentalist hotel employee threw open the back door of the banquet room and shouted that all us gays and lesbians were going to be in hellfire. This caused an uproar and many became angry and shouted back, but my girlfriend next to me was very emotionally traumatized by the verbal assault and needed to be held and comforted for a long time after the hotel loudmouth ran away.
That employee was fired first thing the very next day. A couple cops were stationed onsite for the remainder of the queer conference. That’s all I personally know about Holiday Inn. Never been to Red Roof, but unless they settle this to your satisfaction, Suze, I never will.
Thanks for the kind words, everyone. Our next stay will be at a Motel 6, and hopefully the staff will be a tad more professional. I haven’t yet received a reply from Red Roof Inn, but they’re supposed to reply to me within three business days. It will be interesting to see how they deal with this.
kanicbird, I can understand that the sounds made during the throes of passion can travel. But as I said in my OP, the rooms on either side of us were unoccupied. And unless the guests and staff stood in front of our door the whole time, it would have to be pretty coincidental for both staff and guests to have heard us.
flickster, thanks for the info, there’s a Drury not far from where I live.
Coldfire, I probably should have taken it up with management, but GF was adamant that I not say anything. They asked me when we checked out if we enjoyed our stay, and I was very tempted to speak up.
Thanks Johanna, I had no idea the problem of gays experiencing bigotry during hotel stays was so widespread. What did the hotel employee think would happen when she interrupted your banquet? Did she think she’d get pat on the back from her bosses?
Thanks again for all of your support. It’s good to know that I’m not blowing this out of proportion and I have a real complaint.
Let us know the outcome, Suze. I will base my hotel choices from now on based on what I’m learning from your experience.
Get up, stand up
Stand up for your rights
Get up, stand up
Don’t give up the fight
I am not trying to judge you or anything, honestly. But, please try to explain to me how some moron yelling “your going to hell” would result in high levels of emotional trauma. My concern is really about why your SO would care what some moron yelled at the top of their lungs, when they would know that the person is an idiot and what they yelled was very unoriginal (i.e. I have been told this for being an atheist and it makes me laugh). Do you understand what I mean? I am not questionaing the response, I am simply wondering what the thought patterns are that result in this type of feeling. I hope I am being clear, if not, please inquire about the vague points so that I can rephrase my inquiry. No matter what, understand that this is not a criticism, rather and inquiry.
What ‘right’ was KCSuze denied?
Why is it that so many hotels are owned by Indian families?
Just trying to fight my own ignorance here…
Thanks!
I finally got an e-mail from them, I’m supposed to call a 1-800 number to provide more information about the incident(s). I’m not sure what more I can tell them, but I’ll just say what happened.
The right to be allowed to go about her private business and stay in a motel which had accepted her money in exchange for its services without being harassed.
Maybe you just live on another planet, but if I hand an institution some cash in exchange for a room for a couple of nights, I expect that as part of the contract, I will be treated with consideration and my privacy respected. If I uphold my end of the contract to pay for services and be a good customer, than you damn well better believe that the kind of harassment that KCSuze and her GF were subjected to would be a violation of my rights.
I am well aware of your feelings about homosexuality, kanicbird, but disapproval is not grounds for that kind of behavior. It constitutes a violation of the contract for the services of the inn, and it’s mean besides. I doubt that the management would approve of unprofessional behavior by staff, and those staff people should be reprimanded, both for unprofessional behavior and general asshattery.
I’ve never gotten a good answer to that questions (one Indian I asked tried to claim that motel ownership was a lot like farming…), but I can venture a few guesses.
First off- it’s hard work. Budget motel owners are generally on duty 24/7. It’s impossible to have a normal social life- if you want to interact with anyone on a regular basis you better be married. Family quarters are quite small (on hotel I worked at had a family of five in a one bedroom apartment) and there isn’t a lot of autonomy and privacy. It is, however, a great way to raise kids if you don’t mind the space problem. You can have two stay-at-home parents. Basically only people who have a family and are really in to it are going to want the job. These conditions (long hours, close family, little privacy, strong marriages) are not unusual in India and are going to be less unpleasant to an Indian family. I know there is no way I could stand it.
Secondly, there is a big support system. Where I lived all of the motel families belonged to the same temple. They went to the same weddings. They all knew the same people. It is probably pretty easy for a member of that community to get the money, know-how and opportunity to get started in the business. In India there is some expectation that prosperous members of a family or group will work to get jobs for the rest of their group. Nepotism isn’t considered a bad thing- it’s almost a social obligation. So when you are looking for someone to manage your new property, you are probably going to look for another Indian. And you expect the favor to be returned to your family. Jobs, marriages, family back in India (or wherever- plenty of motel owners are Indians from Africa)…all of these are tied together.
This support system also makes motel life more bearable. All the motel families I knew knew each other well and they had whole systems in place to allow them to have social contact despite their constraining work hours. Indian culture and motel culture have mingled and made it’s own little culture. And it’s hard for outsiders to get in to that and it’s hard for them to do without the support it provides. It’s hard to have normal friendships when you run a motel. So most of their social contact is centered on each other.
KCSuze Sorry you and your g/f had trouble there, I personally think it was bad judgment on the part of the hotel staff to say such things, and fully support you in your effort letting the inn know how you feel. I just don’t agree that this is a ‘rights’ issue.
You posting this indicated to me that you may think you know my feelings about homosexuality, but really have no concept as to how I actually feel on the issue. My question has nothing to do with homosexuality, and I would ask the same if this was a heterosexual couple just married by the pope himself that morning.
My major beef is throwing around words like ‘rights’ where they clearly do not belong. I would bet if this was that hetro-couple there would be no ‘rights’ mentioned at all, there would be support for the couple, but the word ‘rights’ would not be mentioned - as it shouldn’t in either case.
As far as I can see no-one’s rights are being infringed upon. The maid had freedom of speech, which you seem to want to restrict. KCSuze has the right also of freedom of speech, which she is exercising it here and in her complaints to Red Roof. Both ‘rights’ I support and don’t want anyone to infringe on them - unlike you. Also the management can discipline, train or can the maid at their choice, or the maid can quit (with other outcomes possiable).
The ‘right’ you claim, the so called ‘right to be allowed to go about her private business and stay in a motel which had accepted her money in exchange for its services without being harassed’, just is not a right. I do agree that when in the closed room they should have a reasonable expectation of privacy. But that does not apply to things outside that room, including sounds and public behavior of the couple outside of that room. I even support the right of the maid to exercise her free will and speculate as to the going on’s inside that room EVEN IF IT’S JUST BASED ON 2 WOMEN SHARING A ROOM - I hope you would not deny a person this ‘right’?
Sometimes I think I do, other times I wish I did.
I fully agree, but this is NOT A RIGHT!!! - AND THE MORE (ok I’ll stop yelling) you claim things are rights when they are not the more you water down the term ‘rights’.
I apologize for being snarky, kanicbird, but your question about rights is something that I doubt you would have posted, were we talking about a hetero couple. It may be that the question wouldn’t have come up if we weren’t talking about harassment due to homophobia, but I don’t think so. Freedom from baseless harassment is indeed something that people have a right to expect from others. In the context of a business or personal contract, even more so. No, it’s not a civil right, like the right to vote or something, but it is a right nonetheless, and one that both hetero and gay couples fully expect to be respected. If you disagree, well, fine, but that’s the way I see it, and I don’t see how discussing the little rights dimishes the big ones.
If such a comment was made and if I read it, most likely I would have posted the same question. I do admit that I may have had a lesser chance of reading it however if it were a hetro couple but this has more to do with verifying a personal theory that I have with so called ‘oppressed groups’, then to have anything to do with homosexuality.
I have to disagree with this, to enforce this you have to restrict other, more fundamental rights. It is more of an ideal - Do onto others as you would have them do onto you - Would you like the ‘Golden Rule’ aka 11th Commandment enforced, or perhaps taught in public schools?
I would agree with your statement if you replaced ‘rights’ with ‘reasonable expectation’ however
Slight correction, yes I agree you have the right to expect this, or for that matter the right to expect anything you want, again this is a free will issue and expectation does not mean you will get it, nor are you entitled to it. I can’t support a ‘right’ not to be harassed or for that matter disappointed, aggravated, or having your feelings hurt.
She did? I was a motel maid years ago. There were things we were instructed NOT to do-- disturb the customers before they checked out. Talk loudly near a guest’s room. And NEVER make a comment about a guest, ever.
Gosh, I didn’t realize my boss restricted my freedom of speech. I thought only the government didn’t have the right to restrict that.
“Rights” may be too strong a word for you, but in the context of being homosexual in a heterosexist world, it has a specific meaning for queer folks-- the right to privacy, which they obviously didn’t have since their whole trip seemed to be scrutinized by the staff there. Sure, most average folks wouldn’t think of not being singled out for humiliation isn’t a “right” per se, but for anyone who’s been targeted that way, relief from the asshats and idiots of the world sure feels like a “right” that has been infringed. Sure, there are heterosexual couples that get this, like Bricker and his wife, but I’m sure I can safely say that homosexual couples certainly get this unwanted humiliation quite a bit more.