by John Stevenson
Alex
O’Brien has opened a vegan restaurant named Handsome Her in Melbourne,
Australia. Here are “House Rules” she
has posted: Rule #1: Women have priority seating.
Rule #2: Men will be charged an 18% premium to reflect the gender pay
gap….which is donated to a women’s service.
Rule #3: Respect goes both ways.
O’Brien’s
“man-tax” has caused a media kerfuffle in Australia and in Old Blighty. A headline on the website thesun.co.uk
explained her intent: “Feminist vegan hopes the move will provoke people into
discussing unfair treatment of women.”
Of
course the man-tax is not really a tax, because it isn’t levied by any
government. It’s really just a surcharge
she applies to those of the male persuasion in order to make her point. “I do want people to think about it, because
we’ve had this (pay discrepancy) for decades and decades and we’re bringing it
to the forefront of people’s minds. I
like that it is making men stop and question their privilege a little bit.”
O’Brien
says the man-tax is only applied for one week per month, and it is unclear
whether she will enforce it if someone objects.
There are other unanswered questions.
What if a man and woman come in together? Does the man-tax apply only to what he
orders? What if the woman is picking up
the check? Is the man-tax waived? What if the man is paying the entire
check? How much of it is subject to the
man-tax? As you can see, the
complications rival the Internal Revenue Code.
O’Brien will need a tax advisor!
A
sign posted in Handsome Her advises that the man-tax O’Brien collects is
donated to Elizabeth Morgan House---a charity which supports Aboriginal women
and children. If Australian law provides
for a tax deduction for charitable donations it would seem that the customers
paying the man-tax should be entitled to take that deduction, since O’Brien is
functioning as a conduit rather than as a philanthropist.
O’Brien
did indeed provoke people, but not into “discussing unfair treatment of
women.” She says that customer response
is all favorable. “There has been
nothing but positivity from everyone, males and females.” But the comments appended to the article on
thesun.co.uk show just the opposite. They
are overwhelmingly negative toward O’Brien and her man-tax, and many predict
Handsome Her’s early demise---more on that in a moment.
Perhaps
there’s a way of evading the man-tax.
It’s likely that a metrosexual chap sporting a man bun might be viewed
as sufficiently sympathetic to feminism or even sufficiently gender-ambiguous
that O’Brien might forgive the man-tax.
Which
of course brings us to the gender dysphoric customer. Assuming a male customer who claims to be
transitioning to female, how will O’Brien rule on that one? Will she celebrate her new sister and forgive
the man-tax? Or will she suspect a
likely ruse? Dangerous ground there.
Handsome
Her will not fail---at least not because of the man-tax. O’Brien is catering (forgive the pun) to a feminista
clientele, and they are likely to be delighted with her politics and become
loyal customers. The publicity she has
gained from her goofy man-tax will spur her business.
The
vegan café would not have attracted many male customers anyway. But if she were serving up real food like cheese
steak sandwiches, T-bone steaks, and Tooheys beer, her man-tax would have killed
her business.
