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London club Dstrkt responds to allegations of racism
By Andy Malt | Published on Friday 2 October 2015
London club Dstrkt has denied accusations that it operates a racist door policy, following a protest earlier this week. The action was arranged after a group of women claimed to have been barred from entering the venue on Saturday due to the colour of their skin, and also for not being thin enough.
Protest organiser Lin Mei posted screengrabs of text messages reportedly from a promoter at the club, telling her that two of her friends would not be granted entry because they were “too dark” and were not attractive enough.
In a statement yesterday, the club said: “Dstrkt restaurant and club has launched a thorough investigation into this alleged event and found that at no stage did any of the Dstrkt staff say to the women they were not to be allowed in on any the basis of their skin colour or size. Comments made by external promoters to the women or in general have nothing to do with Dstrkt and aren’t deemed acceptable”.
However, various people within the music community, including Tinchy Stryder, Stormzy, Radio 1’s Dev and 1Xtra’s Sarah-Jane Crawford, have come forward in support of the protest. They have said that this sort of door policy is actually commonplace in clubs and are glad it is finally being highlighted.
“I’ve been told I can’t come into certain clubs before even though my face was on the flyer”, said Dev on Twitter.
Crawford added: “Glad some of these nightclubs are getting exposed for their undercover racism which has been going on for a years in the West End”.
