The Charlotte Despard, Archway

Muswellhillgirl,�your experience is so very alien to my own.�

I am very obviously Jewish and regularly drink in this pub with Irish, Black, White, French and polish friends. I think I speak for them all when I say that we would not keep drinking there if the staff and management were anything other than completely welcoming!

I have never seen anything even approaching the behaviour you describe. I repeat, I have never seen anything even approaching the behaviour you describe. That does not mean you are lying. There may well have been louts there that night and you would be justifiably upset if what you heard was as you describe. I have just never seen anything approaching the behaviour you describe. My friends and I enjoy our regular visits to this pub and the welcome we get from the staff.�

I truly am sorry that you are so upset after your night out. I suggest, if you are not interested in talking with the management or indeed actually hearing from the "young Asian lad" you are holding up as the victim here (who I believe was there this very evening), that you simply drink somewhere else. I'm sure there are plenty of nice pubs in muswell hill for you and your husband to patronise. Perhaps you will even find one where all the clientele are to your liking.�

You have dismissed as biased, comments from a black customer and no doubt you will do the same again with these comments. That is fine, you are obviously upset. I for one will carry on drinking at the Charlotte despard until there is a reason not to do so.�

Please don't respond to this post, just go somewhere else and enjoy your evening

25 Jul 2010 23:44

The Charlotte Despard, Archway

Muswellhillgirl clearly visited a different charlotte despard pub.�

I drink there at least twice a week after a martial arts class in the area, and have done for the past two years or so.�

I am a religious jew and this very evening I stood there sharing a drink with a black man, a Pole and an Englishman. Whilst it sounds like the start of a particularly poor joke, my point �is that any suggestion that the management tolerate racism is scurrilous make-believe - I have never felt anything but welcome and have never seen any "BNP-types" in the pub - assuming we don't merely describe any white man with a shaved head and a St Georges t-shirt as a "BNP Type"; and we should not because it belittles honest to goodness racism.�

I can't comment about the evening in question and there may well have been bad behaviour and even racism. Sadly that is all too common in football. �What I can say though is that I have never seen anything of the sort, and I have seen enough of the business end of racial abuse to recognise it when I see it.

I also take issue with Muswellhillgirl's cliched pigeonholing of the various people in the bar - there are always going to be people in bars whom we dislike; part of being a grown-up is learning to deal with it... maturely.�

To other readers of this review, the atmosphere is good, music excellent, a pretty interesting collection of art on the Walls, and the staff friendly and welcoming.�

1 Jul 2010 00:34