Twisted Element ordered to take flag down
Posted Jun 15, 2016 10:09 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A tough situation appears to have been made tougher at Calgary’s largest gay bar, after a dispute between the tenants and landlord.
Twisted Element owner RayJean Fafard had hung a large pride flag on the front of his business, hours after a gunmen stormed a gay bar in Orlando, Florida taking aim at the members of the LGBTQ community.
49 people were killed in an incident that’s reverberated around the world, including here in Alberta’s largest city.
It’s one reason why Fafard says he was shocked to get a text message from his landlord demanding that he take the flag down or face legal action.
“I was shocked, I was completely shocked that the landlord would take a stance on this and his stance is on the wrong side of things. This could have been handled completely different, instead of texting me he could have actually called me and said hey this is your landlord Trevor, first off let me give you my condolences on how sorry I am over something that happened within your community. And then if he had an issue with the flag, he could have said politely, what are your intentions?”
Fafard says the building’s owner should have been informed before choosing to become belligerent.
He’s been extremely touched by the support the community has received in the waking of the tragedy.
“This is such an amazing thing, the support that we’re getting,” he said. “I am sorry, when this whole thing started and I draped over the flag, the flag was supposed to be aligned with Orlando to show our support, it was never meant to turn into something ugly and disgusting the way it has all week and fighting over the right to fly the flag.”
“Because this has hit the media and it’s affecting his business, a lot of this is trolling him and he’s feeling the brunt of it. His lawyer contacted me this afternoon asking if he could be a liaison between the two of us to smooth things over,” he said.
But the long-time business owner in the city’s Beltline took offence over the news release issued by Trevor Tomanik and says he’s been trying to evict Twisted Element for some time.
According to Fafard, the owner did suggest hanging the flag fly off the side of the building, but tells 660 NEWS the side can’t support it and by the time they called in the appropriate help it would be too late.
He calls it as a “backhanded compromise.”
“You don’t put a flag up three weeks after everybody is mourning.”
As it stands now, he says the flag will remain shelved.
660 NEWS did reach out to Mr. Tomanik and his business for a comment or statement, we have yet to receive any response.
