Why just the pub? Why for instance aren’t views expressed in say restaurants, cafes or in railway carriages equally worthy of a put down? It’s a vivid demonstration of the ambivalent attitude of the Chattering Classes towards the pub; on the one hand they celebrate it as the very quintessence of Englishness whilst on the other they dismiss it as the incubator of mad and bad ideas. It’s just like the way government is always telling us how important the pub is to the nation whilst in practice going on throttling it with more and more legislation and higher and higher taxation.
A pub is a space with few restrictions on what you can talk about so inevitably what to some of us must be weird ideas will get aired. For an institution that’s about sociability, often with strangers, this is essential. Indeed it’s a place where those who are naturally reserved can let their guard down a bit.
It’s certainly the place where I, as a fairly reserved person, have had the most intellectually stimulating encounters in my career. Whether it be South Africa, Romania, the Czech Republic or the UK the pub has provided me with the forum for some mind-changing discussions in the most socially therapeutic environments you can imagine.
I guess that this is why the “philosophy of the public bar” is so derided by some, because the bar’s a space that allows the free movement of ideas between ordinary Joes, like you and me, a place where our minds could take off in a way they never could elsewhere. To them this is truly threatening.
They will probably be feeling even more threatened by the rise of the Philosophy in Pubs movement. Founded some 10 years ago in Liverpool this has gone from strength to strength holding get togethers of like-minded folk in pubs from the Wirral to Brighton discussing an incredible range of subjects.
Those taking part are certainly taking the pejorative out of the meaning of “public bar philosophy” and they deserve our support.
- Tony Jennings, CEO, Budweiser Budvar UK