The murmurs. The stares. I’m the sole brown face passing through Rye high street and I can feel their thoughts penetrating my skin; he’s an invader, an immigrant, a scrounger. The cobbled streets should be postcard-pretty to someone born in this country—twee, even—but to me it’s a hostile environment, and one I have to find the energy to navigate.

I tap into the reserves, raise an invisible forcefield and walk up the stoney steps. I hear the voices, softly, as I approach the old pub; I expect the conversation to stop as I open the door, for this ‘othered’ vibe to continue.

Nothing could be further from the truth—everyone in the bar greets me warmly and the landlord, Jeff Bell, even comes over to shake my hand. I eavesdrop as a grey-haired woman speaks about the disappointment she feels hearing her friends use the phrase “culture wars” without qualification. My expectations were low, as at best I was ready to overhear a rightwing diatribe. I exhale.

Six months later, I still remember that sigh of relief. It was so pronounced because, finally, I had found a small, pretty town where I could be myself and, more importantly, I didn’t have to live out this country's poisonous public discourse in my leisure time. It made me think, could a town like this, with a Tory MP that voted for Brexit, be a battleground for something less extreme?

And could a publican win over those spewing hate with progressive chat?

“It’s my house, and I’m the one curating,” Jeff tells me. “I pick the music. I pick the beers. The lighting, the decor—everything is deliberate.”

“And to some extent you have to curate the conversation at the bar—I don’t police it—but you can steer people. If someone says something beyond the pale or outside the environment you’ve created I say: ‘I don’t agree with that’,” he adds.

What I find incredible is this East Sussex pub looks traditional to the untrained eye: it has an open hearth fire that can fill the building with smoke, glasses gingerly hang from ceiling hooks and the 17th century building teeters adjacent to the battlements of the 13th century castle from which it takes its name.

But in its own way, it’s very radical. Because here every political conversation overheard at the bar will be progressive with Jeff in the midst of it, because he passionately believes that pubs have to be individual, and they should have the personality of who runs it stamped on its DNA in the same way.

Just as you should know what type of beer or cider will be served, and what vibe to expect, Jeff believes the publican should also insert themselves in the chat. Especially so when it comes to politics, and this should be done more by those who are centre left or left wing.

“In the British Empire, in South Africa, [and] obviously in America, society has always had different social spaces for different social groups,” Jeff says. “When it comes to political views, we’re sadly living in an increasingly polarised world, so pubs are going to divide.”

“Divisions in politics are getting so stark—internationally and in this country. It’s inevitable people want to go somewhere where they [don’t overhear] populist or conspiracy theories that are becoming [believed by] a section of society. I don’t want them in my house. I don’t want my customers to have to talk to them.”

***

When I’ve spoken to other landlords they tend to avoid talking about politics—especially women. Megha Khanna at the Gladstone, in Borough, South London says it’s a big no-no, and so do numerous other female publicans, such as Beth Marsh who runs the London Beer Dispensary, the nearest pub to me in South East London.

Both these venues are in left-leaning areas, and whenever I visit I hear people talking about politics in non-confrontational ways that don't make people feel uncomfortable (I’m a serial pub eavesdropper.) Still, I often see Beth and Meg linger in the background waiting like an actor in the wings for their prompt, in this case for the conversation to change to a different subject.

““We nail our colours to the mast when it comes to our politics, because we want to be an inclusive place.””

— Libby Bradshaw, The Twelve Taps

“I come from a position of supreme self-confidence because of the way society is structured,” admits Jeff, acknowledging his white male privilege. “It’s easy for me to do it and get away with it. And me sounding off about politics says a lot about me.”

There’s one exception that I’ve found so far; Libby Bradshaw runs The Twelve Taps in Whitstable, and it offers keg, cider and gin options not found elsewhere in the town (and most of Kent). But before she was a publican she worked in the House of Commons and, most surprisingly, it’s not a secret, with her customers fully aware of her former life.

“I’ve never hidden my political engagement,” she tells me. “We nail our colours to the mast when it comes to our politics, because we want to be an inclusive place. We don’t tolerate all the isms—and we’ll boot them out. And we’ve had to do that on a few occasions—not often. But our customers tend to be all on the same side—especially when it comes to Brexit.”

Libby is white like Jeff—so is race another reason why some publicans have more confidence and are more likely to be accepted when discussing politics? The Glad as I mentioned in this article is a desi pub, and Megha runs it with her brother Gaurav—they originated from India, via Zambia, Africa.

He, like his sister, also “just listens” when customers talk about politics.

But in desi pubs when the uncles are at the bar, politics is unavoidable at times, and I remember one memorable discussion when a Gujarati landlord praised Rishi Sunak (before he became PM) and his white and brown customers politely disagreed with his belief that the Tory’s rise was a rags to riches tale.

Which is why I wouldn’t assign Jeff’s gender or race as the sole reason he wants to change the discourse in pubs. It’s because he passionately cares about people and to discover more about his honourable motives we have to look at his origin story.

***

Jeff’s father, David, was a merchant seaman, a member of a working men’s club, and a Labour party activist. But Jeff admits he wasn’t a massive pub goer—he would talk politics but only about internal Labour party issues. His mother, Marion, was a teacher and they settled in South Shields, near Newcastle upon Tyne, living in a semi-detached house.

Essentially Jeff grew up in a “lower middle-class” area far removed from nearby Jarrow—“we lived in a different world,” he admits. But these community-focused towns don’t necessarily assist social mobility and Jeff excelled by going to Oxford university which then helped him land a job at a law firm.

And this role—inadvertently—helped form his adult personality, ensuring he was the type of person who questions conformity of any form. It was when he was on a work placement in Ealing, west-London, visiting tower blocks trying to force the council to take action, that he had his Damascene moment.

“A Punjabi family had an ant and cockroach infestation—two separate infestations—and their kids were getting ill,” he remembers. “They had several family members around, it was chaotic but the mum was a really good laugh—there was so much fun and lightheartedness.

“I went back to the office and these people were really rich but utterly miserable and depressed.”

Previously, a colleague had half-seriously said that Jeff would make a good landlord, so he decided to hand his notice in as he’d and try to earn a living solely from beer (he had already been blogging about his favourite drinks as Stonch for a year by this time.)

““People have a right to go for a drink without it being turned into a battleground.””

— Jeff Bell, The Ypres Castle Inn

His beer writing had earned him some kudos, but Jeff admits the best thing about it was it brought him closer to his Dad, who started venturing back into pubs to try some of the fledgling craft brands—this was around 2007-2008—his son was popularising.

As well as penning this blog, Jeff worked for an importer before buying the lease of a pub called The Gunmakers, in Clerkenwell, North London.

“I felt supported by people in the Clerkenwell beer scene,” he says. “Former colleagues [at the law firm] would hold their office drinks at the Gunmakers—which helped me settle in.”

***

I believe that pubs offer social cohesion and can bend people not exposed to certain cultures and ideas to a different viewpoint—despite my personal experience to the contrary. I worked in a racist far-right pub and narratives, such as immigration being wholly negative, were accepted by the landlords (all men) I worked under and their customers.

However, in researching my book on desi pubs, I uncovered the story of a British-Asian landlord who became best friends with someone who bullied him at school. I also learned about white customers who turned up to turf the desi owners out, but eventually stayed and had a few beers, then became locals and village drinkers who eventually admitted the new owner saved their community.

Did the desi pubs change them from being hate-filled, or was their area converting anyway and they had to be open to the new? Jeff, despite being one of the most optimistic people I’ve come across, remains unconvinced the pub today can alter our polarised discourse.

“You’re never going to convince anybody in a pub when booze is involved,” admits Jeff. “There’s nothing wrong with discussions but if it turns to hatred being voiced then that’s different.”

“People have a right to go for a drink without it being turned into a battleground. If that requires people like me to be openly clear that that’s what I want to happen and if people who are going to come to be hateful feel excluded—then good. I don’t want them to come and I don’t want to spend time with them,” he adds.

The sad part of this philosophy is that it doesn’t work everywhere, and there has to be enough of a crowd who aren’t spreading hate for a landlord to stamp out any “ism”—as Libby says—and survive as a viable business.

The problem is we as drinkers—and as humans—like to travel, to experience the thrill of the new, with pubs our gateway to a different community, but the more society polarises, the more we end up sticking to the same enclaves.

Even though we might not be able to save people who have become indoctrinated to the point that they’re filled with hate, publicans like Jeff can salve anyone affected by their prejudice and give those weary of the future somewhere to drink that’s as protective as Rye’s citadel was 800 years ago.

“It’s never been true that pubs are for everybody,” Jeff concludes, “and everybody mixes in them. It’s sad that an issue will divide people so much they can’t be in the same pub—it’s sad, but it’s also a fact of life.”