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The Dome is okay, we need a “Maximum Bob” |
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Written by Al Hollingsworth
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Sunday, 30 December 2007 |
I am certain that college students across Canada are in a state of confusion following the silly flap at Gary Hurst’s “Liquor Dome.” So too are thousands who have attended conferences at the World Trade Centre and other metro sites. Isn’t Halifax known as a “party town”, a “happening place”?
Apparently these were hidden slogans known only to the thousands of people who have flocked to our bar area over the past quarter century. And, when they surfaced after a so-called December 24th brawl, the puritans who run the berg began beating the drums of restraint. “The drinks are too cheap,” they crowed. “The length of the drinking hours are far too long,”echoed from Ecum Secum to Hubbards. Balderdash!
These silly people would probably like to go back to the days when taverns were forced to close at 6:30 pm and remain closed for one-half hour. That way those terrible men (women were not permited in taverns in those days) had to rush home to the wife or mother. Try that one today and you just might have a real brawl.
If the bar owners apply the rules, cut off patrons who consume too much, escort drunks from the premises, and employ a sufficient number of employees for effective crowd control, then they are doing their part. Raising the prices of drinks and reducing the hours bars can be open is regressive and threatens their very existence.
What happened on Christmas Eve is not the norm. Perhaps because it followed on an unfortunate incident involving a patron and doorman, we have this knee-jerk reaction.
Take the bars out of downtown Halifax and you will have Bleaksville. It will also make the area less appealing to visitors, and tourism will suffer.
Gary Hurst is right on the money (no pun intended) when he says any changes should be applied to all bars across the province. As long as breweries bottle beer, wineries produce wine and the distillers distill, there is going to be drinking. Some will drink in a responsible manner and others will binge drink and become a problem. So, let’s deal with the latter.
Tighten up the laws and increase the penalties. Then throw the book at them, every time they break the law. Hefty fines and jail time just might cause them to think before they drink.
I have never darkened the door of Gary’s “Dome.” I do know him personally, having coached him in hockey at QEH. That was nearly 50 years ago so I hardly think that brief association would colour my thinking.
No, I try to be a fair-minded individual and believe in people being treated in a equitable manner. I don’t see this happening here. Political leaders rushed to judgment and quickly put the worst possible spin on the incident. Halifax, once again, made national news and it didn’t look good on us.
Thirty-eight people were arrested that night and taken, I suspect to jail. If they were charged, and I trust all were, then let the courts deal with them. Hopefully not in a pussy footing way. One of my favorite authors is Elmore Leonard and one of his books I enjoyed the most was “Maximum Bob,” the tale of a judge who applied the full weight of the law to all who were found guilty. I say we need our own Maximum Bob, and not a bunch of sniveling prudes who make our municipality and our province a laughing stalk.
(Al Hollingsworth is a retired journalist and former military policeman who, from time to time, dealt with real brawls, not imagined ones)
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