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# ‘No Fags’ rule no burning sensation
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/no-fags-rule-no-burning-sensation/
- Published: 2007-04-01T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-24T00:20:25.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: local, Downtown, #archive-import

*By SASHA STONED De Pressed Staff Writer*

DOWNTOWN Talk about getting lost in translation.

A large contingent of homosexuals have their panties in a twist over a British pub’s efforts to comply with the city’s no smoking ordinance. Protesters with a fashionable color scheme and a knack for rhinestone-studded signs have taken to the streets to protest a new sign above the Old King’s Ugly Head tavern.

But owner Bangers Mash doesn’t see what all the fuss is about, alluding to his 20-foot-by-10 foot sign proclaiming “No Fags Allowed.”

“How can I win?” asked Mash in a thick Cockney accent. “The city bans fags and I try to uphold the spirit of the law. Whatever... you have to be a fool to think you can please all the people all the time.

“If I had my druthers, I’d have fags all over the place, the more the merrier, but this isn’t that kind of underground operation.”

By the time bystanders attempted to tell Mash that “fag” — which is slang for cigarette in the United Kingdom — actually meant something else here in the United States, the burly bar owner with a leather vest and handlebar mustache shrugged and put on his iPod, tuning in some Juice Newton.

In all fairness to the barkeep, the picketers were adhering to the city’s anti-smoking ordinance, taking drags only when they were protesting more than 25 feet from the front door of the King’s Ugly Head, never breaking from their carefully orchestrated walking circles.

“I think it’s abhorrent,” said “Fancy Shoes” Buehler. “It was bad enough when he \[Mash\] slapped me ‘cause I offered to turn the knob for him while we were heading into the bathroom at the same time.

“The guy’s really gotta assimilate... and I’d tell him that, but he’d probably take it the wrong way.”

Meanwhile, squirrels in Palisades Park were seen sacrificing sperm to the god of lonely nights, fueling fears that the cute little rodents will bring about a plague on all our houses.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 1, 2007.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/040107.pdf?ref=smdp.com)