Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
Because the pub, David, once part of a community that served that community and provided inexpensive entertainment for ordinary people, no longer serves that community and has become an exclusive outpost for the chosen few at expensive weddings or on golfing holidays, by definition an elitist entity.
I happen to believe in proper communities, including rural ones with heart and soul. Anything wrong with that?
Guest 714- Registered: 14 Apr 2011
- Posts: 2,594
Nothing at all, but the reality is pubs are closing every day because they're not viable financially. To describe a business as hateful when all its doing is hosting weddings seems very unfair, he's not an arms dealer
Jan Higgins
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,888
Hateful is a very strong word to use about a business that is offering employment to people plus it would most likely have closed years and become a private house if it had remained as a simple back of nowhere rural pub because of the lack of footfall.
By the way my family who are staying there for a couple of days B&B are not at all wealthy, sadly your prejudices are showing.
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
the traditional pub has had its day for a multitude of reasons, the future lies with national chains with their purchasing power and micro-pubs that will hopefully flourish and fill vacant units on our high streets
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
Ah, a forum swarm gathers to sting. I knew as soon as I wrote that someone would pipe up about them or someone they know staying there. Why do so many issues on Dover Forum get reduced down to tangential points and nit picking, focussing on one word etc etc. I guess it's because we're a small town. .
We're back to getting personal again and it is not the first time that you Jan have done this.
Everyone has prejudices Jan including you. Even if you don't have to be wealthy to spend a night or two there it is still more expensive than a couple of pints tat the pub.
For heaven's sake I'm not criticising any one for using it or the people that run it, just lamenting a social trend because I care passionately about the destruction of the social fabric and don't like seeing something of value destroyed.
That's me, so prejudiced.
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
And it may be a slightly different issue, but the same principle applies to the forthcoming Wetherspoons in Deal. Dreadful development that will make Deal a less nice place. The triumph of advanced comsumer capitalism at the expense of just about everything else.
Guest 714- Registered: 14 Apr 2011
- Posts: 2,594
Andrew, its called consumer choice, you or I might not frequent Wetherspoons, for various reasons, but its a very successful business model that customers choose to spend money in.
You may be disappointed that pubs are disappearing, it was the use of "hateful" I found distasteful.
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
You have already said that David. What's wrong with caring passionately about an issue and choosing vocabulary to reflect that? I'm just being congruent. There is too much pressure to dissemble at all costs in England and it is an overvalued quality.
Sorry if you find that adjective applied to the dear old Blazing Donkey distasteful - nothing hateful about it per se. In fact I am rather fond of it.
What I am not fond of is the principle of an amenity for the community being turned into a money making machine for the benefit mainly of outsiders - offering sometimes exclusive and expensive facilities for the relatively wealthy (though I appreciate you don't have to be so well off to stay in a hotel).
Nothing personal at all.
Ross Miller
- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 17 Sep 2008
- Posts: 3,706
I think hateful is a tad harsh, but do fully appreciate where you are coming from Andrew, a combination of many things (the beer escalator, cheap as chips national chains, loss leading by supermarkets, rapacious pubcos, smoking ban etc) have squeezed the small local till many could take no more and they had to shut as they could not make ends meet.
The consumer of course has a right to choose where to drink, but if they do not support their local they cannot really complain when it is gone and all we are left with are cut price drinking sheds full of the lowest common denominator clientèle.
"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today." - James Dean
"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength,
While loving someone deeply gives you courage" - Laozi
Guest 684- Registered: 26 Feb 2009
- Posts: 635
The Blazing Donkey is still very much open and thriving, Andy. We were at a wedding there last Saturday!
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
That's right, Andy. Judging by its website though it seems it is a wedding venue, and a hotel and a restaurant, rather than a pub any more. Though I haven't visited for years.
Either way, trebles all round.
Guest 719- Registered: 11 Jul 2011
- Posts: 443
Yorkshire Born And Yorkshire Bred
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Terry Nunn
- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,316
Whatever it will be Howard they are busy converting it. Another example of get the application in and do it before it's approved.
Terry
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Jan Higgins- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,888
I expect they sounded out the Planning Dept about the possibility of approval before they even had any serious plans drawn up.
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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Guest 713- Registered: 19 Mar 2011
- Posts: 342
I thought it had applyed for planing permision to change it to a betting office.
Ross Miller- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 17 Sep 2008
- Posts: 3,706
"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today." - James Dean
"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength,
While loving someone deeply gives you courage" - Laozi
