Georgia Bar Sets Up Code Word To Help Protect Women

ACWORTH, GA — It’s a scene that plays out constantly across the United States: A group of women are out having drinks when a man comes up uninvited and doesn’t take the hint to leave. Red Top Brewhouse in Acworth, Georgia, is working to prevent that uncomfortable scene from ever happening at its venue.

The brewery has been working to make its space more comfortable and inviting for people of all genders since it first opened last August. One way it did that was placing a special code word in the women’s restroom that a woman says to a bartender when she is being harassed by another patron.

The code word was used for the first time on the weekend of April 10, according to a report from WXIA-TV.

“There was a gentleman that was being inappropriate towards a couple of middle-aged women who were sitting at the bar with me,” Jacob Crossan, a bartender at the brewery, told the station. “I could tell from the time he sat down the attention was unwanted.”

One of the women was able to tell Crossan the code word after breaking away from the man to go to the restroom. He then escorted the man away from the women and out of the brewery without incident.

Red Top Brewhouse posted about the encounter on its Facebook page, where it has garnered more than 2,000 reactions and hundreds of comments.

“Under zero circumstances is it permissible for a guest or staff member to be made to feel uncomfortable because of their gender because another's gender makes them feel entitled to do so,” the brewery wrote. “While we are proud of our staff for how this situation was handled, the fact that it happened is sad and disturbing to us all.”

Bars setting up special signals and code words for women patrons to use when they’re feeling uncomfortable is nothing new. Some bars across the world use the phrase "Angel Shot," where a woman can order a specific drink to either signal a bartender to call the police or help intervene in a situation, according to KFOR-TV.

Code words for women are also not unique to bars. In Europe some pharmacies established a code word women can tell a pharmacist to signal they’re victims of domestic violence, CNN reports.

Read more about Red Top Brewhouse’s efforts to be a safe space on WXIA’s website.