A non-binary individual was recently forcibly removed from a local bar after using the women’s bathroom on the premises.
A bouncer entered the women’s bathroom at Dorp Bar (Dorp) in Stellenbosch on the evening of 22 October to remove Giuseppe Rajkumar Guerandi, an honours journalism* student at Stellenbosch University (SU), from a bathroom stall. This was according to Guerandi.
Guerandi told MatieMedia that they went to the women’s bathroom with Erin Walls, a fellow honours journalism student and friend.
“I identify as non-binary, and I’m deeply, deeply uncomfortable going to what are designated as ‘men’s bathrooms’,” said Guerandi. “I feel unsafe in those spaces.”
A bouncer entered the women’s bathroom at Dorp Bar in Stellenbosch on the evening of 22 October to remove Giuseppe Rajkumar Guerandi, an honours journalism student at Stellenbosch University, from a bathroom stall. Guerandi, a non-binary individual, had accompanied Erin Walls, a fellow honours journalism student and their friend, to the women’s bathroom at Dorp, as they did not feel safe using the men’s bathroom on the premises. PHOTO: Tamsin Metelerkamp
The bouncer entered the bathroom while Walls and Guerandi were in the stalls, according to Walls. “The bouncer started screaming and banging on the door and telling us to get out,” she said. When Guerandi opened the stall door, the bouncer took them by the arm and forcibly removed them from the bar, she continued.
Marcus Oosthuizen, the owner of Dorp, confirmed that he is aware this incident took place. He added that one of the steps Dorp has taken to restrict instances of gender-based violence is to divide the bathrooms on the premises according to sex, rather than gender.
“We have female and male toilets available on site,” said Oosthuizen, in email correspondence with MatieMedia. “[Guerandi] entered an area prohibited for male customers after a stern warning from our security. The individual, as a male, chose to enter and we had to remove them due to security concerns for our female customers, and the inability to adhere to our rules.”
However, Guerandi claimed that as a regular at Dorp, they have frequently used the women’s bathrooms in the past.
“That wasn’t my first time at Dorp, and it wasn’t my first time using the bathrooms at Dorp. So, every time I go to Dorp I use the girl’s bathroom and I’ve never had an issue before,” said Guerandi.
if you go to Dorp in Stellenbosch: i just got dragged out of the girls bathroom because the bouncers did not understand that my non-binary ass only has that bathroom to go to. i was treated inhumanely and violently, and you should not go to that place.
— 🏳️🌈Giuseppe Rajkumar Guerandi (@giuseppeishumxn) October 22, 2021
Giuseppe Rajkumar Guerandi, an honours journalism student at Stellenbosch University, was forcibly removed from the women’s bathroom at Dorp Bar in Stellenbosch on 22 October. As a non-binary individual, Guerandi did not feel safe using the men’s bathroom on the premises. POST: Twitter/Giuseppe Rajkumar Guerandi
In spaces where there aren’t bathrooms for non-binary people, or gender-neutral bathrooms for all, gender non-conforming people will go to the bathrooms they feel most comfortable in, said Guerandi.
“If you’re going to go out of your way to make separate bathrooms, and if there’s none for us, then I’m going to go where I feel safest…and I’m not going to stop doing that,” said Guerandi.
Email of complaint
Friends of Guerandi drafted an email of complaint about the incident, and circulated it to others so as to “bombard [Dorp’s] management with a letter of complaint so that they can’t ignore it”, according to Guerandi.
“The salient motivation behind the email was an issue of an apology, both private and public apology, on [Dorp’s] social media platforms to Erin and Giuseppe for their mistreatment in Dorp, coupled with practical measures (i.e. gender neutral bathrooms) to ensure that this never happens again,” said Lukhanyo Ngamlana, a fourth-year law student and the former speaker of Student Parliament at SU, in written correspondence with MatieMedia. Ngamlana was one of those involved in drafting the email.
Oosthuizen told MatieMedia that the safety and security of all Dorp’s customers is of the utmost importance to the establishment.
“We regret the experience [Guerandi and Walls] had at Dorp. We strongly disagree with all of the accusations regarding homophobia, queerphobia and transphobia [in the email],” said Oosthuizen. “We see the bullying tactics by emailing us 49 times (and counting) as cheap tactics.”
⃰MatieMedia is a student-run publication that is managed by students from the SU journalism department, where Guerandi and Walls are completing their degree. Guerandi is a journalist with MatieMedia, and Walls is a member of the MatieMedia editorial team.