Well imagine my shock! I'm not trying to make this a sexist thing because I think anyone would have a problem with this, male or female. I was once in a bar that had a 1-way glass wall so that you could see out, but no one could see in, and I still didn't like that. It's kind of a private moment you know and it was colossally stupid for them to do this in the pub.
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The pictures you can find of this aren't great, and that might be intentional because of the fact that well, if someone posted pics of me on the john I would definitely have a problem with that. This is not the kind of viral I am looking for.
The bar is called O’Hagan’s or as it is referred to as by locals "HQ" because it is the headquarters of a popular chain of pubs. The owner is someone I have never heard of before because I don't think about New Zealand very often but apparently he is a bit of a controversial character with some rather bizarre views about the world. They might be "correct" views for all we will ever know but he is apparently an enemy of the media so in my mind that might mean that he doesn't tow the line the way the government and media would prefer he does. Who knows, I'm not going to look into it.
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Here is another way of looking at this controversy though and it could be through the eyes of a genius. The toilets were never actually facing the actual toilets and nobody was going to be exposed making poo poo or anything like that. You could only ever see anyone from the shoulders up unless they were trying to make a scene and get the attention of the crowd below. So in my mind it is conceivable that the owner did this intentionally with the idea being that as soon as this controversy inevitably went viral, he would get global free advertising and then simply cover the windows up... which has already been done.
I guess you could say that I found this all to be quite funny because everyone is immediately jumping on board the outrage train and the owner might be playing the public like a fiddle. I had never heard of this place and likely never would have just like 99% of the rest of the world. Now the place will basically be known by everyone and the establishment will almost certainly see a dramatic increase in business. Not that they need it - apparently it is already one of the most popular spots in all of Auckland.
This to me looks like a very effective publicity stunt but even if it wasn't, it certainly does play into the whiney nature of our times in order to get one's name out there.
