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Some men got made to feel unwelcome at a Last Dinner Party gig? Now you know how the rest of us feel

The discrimination some solo male gig-goers experienced this weekend was undeserved. But these encounters remain dismally normal for women and minorities

Equally, the public interest in the story – reported by the Guardian, the Independent, the Mirror, Metro, NME, the BBC, Sky News and more, and widely discussed online – feels entirely disproportionate to the incident. Policing gigs is fraught with difficulty – not only in managing what is going on in dark, packed rooms of any size, but also in preserving the free atmosphere that should be a core part of any live music experience. Much as I can imagine that it could be stressful going to a gig alone as a 50-year-old man who might be easily stereotyped, I hope that he understands the necessary state of high alert that women and minority fans experience at most live music events and does his best to mitigate anyone’s need to feel that way.

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