Having been in Michigan on a retreat with some female friends, I wasn't here to experience to initial article submitted by Hiraeth, provocatively titled Yuck! Dirty Bathrooms at Seabright Brewery! It is tough to be shaken out of ones idyllic mode by such remarks as were contained in the article. I won't argue the fact that the pictures (which I had not seen) are in less than "politically correct" taste. Indeed they are not what I myself would have chosen. I will however, argue that it is unfair and incredibly biased to use your platform to condemn a man and his business because you happen to be insulted by or disagree with his (or in this case his female manager's) decor selection, in or out of the bathroom. Would you discard a friend or picket his house because you disapproved the art displayed in the home? Would you bang your drum and encourage your other friends to avoid a woman friend's house because of the images she had tacked to her bathroom walls?
This business has employed hundreds of people and contributed tremendously to this community since its inception nearly 18 years ago. You are unlikely to excogitate the number of suggestions, insults, comments, compliments, rules, taxes, city codes, directions, insinuations and general "this is what you should do" commentary and directions that Charlie has experienced since our opening in 1988.
It seems terribly unfair to me that you can showcase your ideas and perceptions behind the relative anonymity of your article; which is given credence simply because it exists in the type of format that it does; thereby reducing my husband to something less than he actually is. I consider it much more offensive for someone to attack another person and his livelihood because she/he might disagree with the decor in the bathroom. Your description of the "crap" on the bathroom walls was especially demeaning and execrable. You should probably be aware that in this era of social ills and unavailable public bathrooms in Santa Cruz county, we have made our bathrooms available to anyone who needed them. This, in spite of the fact that Charlie had his bicycle stolen from one person who he let in specifically to use the bathroom even before we had opened for business. This, in spite of the fact that I personally shared the bathroom (inadvertently) with an employee from one of the upstairs businesses who was smoking crack in one of the other stalls. Charlie has scraped human excrement off of the sidewalk in front of the brewery as well as in front of the office door on more than one occasion. We have had real life "crap" and vomit and all manner of vile excretous matter smeared on the walls. The bathrooms have had items stolen and graffitied, toilets have been dismantled and defaced. We continue to offer the service of our bathrooms to all of our patrons. Suffice to say that the pictures on the walls pale in comparison to some of the real-life "crap" we have experienced.
Charlie related to me that during your telephone conversation he indicated that the female manager had made the design decisions about the bathroom. He implied that she was in the best position (being female and all) to judge what another woman might find offensive. At this, I believe that you suggested that she was young and not old enough to understand the implications and subversive messages the art might propagate. I would argue that she is an adult female, intelligent and very well versed in our culture (and counter-culture)and that she chose the pictures because she liked them. Moreover, while I can't speak for her, I think I can safely say that she would be offended at your inference that she is not sophisticated (or old) enough to make a decision about how to adorn the bathroom walls at her place of business. Your entire position smacks of the kind of paranoid damaging stereotypical labling (sexist, racist et al) that so many people attach to those persons whose opinions they oppose or do not fully understand.
Your opening paragraph pretty much said it all. It's a pity that you didn't stop there. It seems like a shameful waste of energy for someone of your prodigious skills to be wasting them on such a non-issue as a BATHROOM in a local restaurant. How about you leave Charlie (a loving, humorous, gentle, caring, devoted father, husband, friend, son, brother, uncle and community supporter) alone and find us a new president or at the least, labor doggedly at something else more worthwhile and commensurate with your formidable talents. Your choice, and isn't it nice to have one. Sincerely, Gail Meehan