Check with Dev first

Watch what you say in public. Actually, to be safe, watch what you say, period.

A performer says he was ‘shocked’ to hear an alleged transphobic conversation at the hotel hosting Manchester Pride’s media accreditation suite.

Dev Mistry was staying at the Malmaison Hotel in the city centre on Friday (August 25) for Pride weekend, where he was performing burlesque. The 30-year-old says he was having a coffee while wearing headphones in the hotel lobby when he overheard the alleged conversation.

“I picked something up and I took my headphones out to confirm that I could understand what I heard over the music,” Dev told the Manchester Evening News.

As one does. It’s a public duty to monitor other people’s conversations.

“It was [a staff member] talking to others about trans people. It was not necessarily malicious but it was that ‘men are men’ and ‘women are women’ and there’s no in between.”

Well we can’t have that. People saying that women are women! In public! Would you believe it?!

“It felt like a one sided conversation with the others. It was in the coffee shop, that’s shocking.”

In the coffee shop is shocking? I don’t quite follow.

Dev says he complained to a receptionist, and the individual who allegedly made the comments spoke to him. Dev went on: “[They] said I misheard the conversation and apologised for any offence.”

But don’t you worry, Dev wasn’t letting it go that easily. Not Dev!

“They said it was about everything changing and they/them. It felt like an apology to get out of jail scot-free.

“It made me uncomfortable having that conversation. Even if I got it out of context then it should not be in public.”

Since then, Dev says he contacted the hotel’s head office. They said the hotel has ‘launched an HR investigation’ and ‘agreed they needed more formal training around LGBTQ+ issues.’

What a disgusting little morality play.

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