Outrage over strip club's controversial Anzac Day event
A strip club has been slammed as “disrespectful” for using Anzac Day to promote its Women in Uniform event and advertising it as an “all out war of sexiness”.
The Voodoo Lounge in Perth’s nightclub precinct Northbridge offered “free entry for service men and women” and “women in uniform all night long”.
A poster on the event’s Facebook page pictured three scantily-clad women dressed in an assortment of uniform-inspired risqué outfits.
“Join us as we celebrate the men and women who served, fought and died for us to enjoy the freedoms in this great country,” the poster stated.
Organisers said those who had served in “Army, Navy, Air Force, Special Forces, Veterans, Police, Fire Department etc” were welcome to join in on the fun.
“Just see the girls at Reception. Lest We Forget!” they wrote.
Returned and Services League’s WA chief executive John McCourt told The West Australian’s Inside Cover he thought the stunt was in poor taste.
“Using Anzac Day as a platform to sell booze and naked women is hardly the standard we would stand next to,” Mr McCourt said.
Jenna Clarke at The West Australian agreed, writing: “Breasts are fantastic. But shoehorning them into a marketing campaign for Anzac Day is not only uncomfortable, it’s also disrespectful to mammaries and the military.”
Mix 94.5’s breakfast host Clairsy had a slightly different tune, telling Today Perth: “People know what they’re going to get if they’re going to the Voodoo Lounge and no one’s forcing them to go”.
“This comes up every year when people use the Anzacs in promotion, it’s often seen as disrespectful,” he said.
He added no one was forcing veterans to attend the event, which he said some could argue was “tacky”, but he said was likely “just a marketing ploy”.
Voodoo Lounge told Yahoo News Australia “self-opinionated people held themselves up as spokesman for the men and women who fought and died for their right to exercise that free speech without ever having made any sacrifices themselves”.
“If we are going to speak about appropriateness it would be more appropriate to ask the men and women who do the fighting and defending of free speech what their opinion is,” the club said.
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