New Jersey gay bar fires trivia host for giving ‘Cornell 7 Inches’ best team name at trivia night
A trivia team used a name mocking allegations of sexual assault at Cornell University during a trivia night at a New Jersey gay bar.. (Envato, Stock)
The owners of a gay bar in Jersey City, New Jersey, have issued a public apology after a trivia team used a name mocking allegations of sexual assault at Cornell University during a trivia night.
Pint’s founder, Wolf Sterling, and co-owner Tommy DeMaio addressed the incident in a video posted online on Thursday (8 October), saying they had fired the trivia host responsible for awarding the team’s name as the night’s best.
As the Hoboken Daily Voice reports, the controversy began after patrons reported on social media that a team at Pint’s trivia night had called itself “Cornell 7 Inches”, a crude sexual reference to the “Cornell Seven”, a popular name used to refer to the seven students accused by a woman of drugging and sexually assaulting her at a Chi Phi fraternity house in October 2024.
One Reddit user who attended the event said the name had left them shocked, particularly because women were present. They also criticised the host for announcing that the name was “a little uncomfortable” before selecting it as the best team name.
In the apology video, Sterling called the name “truly offensive”, saying it “violates both how we want to treat our community and the standards we have for our business”.
He said the host had selected the name for the award without the owners’ knowledge and had been promptly fired. The bar also pledged to donate all proceeds from that night’s trivia event to sexual violence prevention programmes.
Pint later clarified in the now-deleted comments on their video, saying that the team name had not been chosen by a vote, as some posts suggested, but had been selected by the trivia host, as Them reports.
“We want to thank the community members that brought this to our attention,” Sterling said in the video. He added that the bar’s goal was to provide “a safe and welcoming space for everyone” and encouraged anyone who felt uncomfortable or mistreated to contact the owners so they could address the issue.
Some commenters condemned the joke as an unacceptable trivialisation of sexual violence, while others argued that the backlash against the bar should be distinguished from the actions of the host.
The venue, now known as Pint, first opened in 1911. Sterling bought the business in 2009, after which it began operating as a gay bar.
The Cornell Seven case
The name refers to allegations made by a woman who says she was drugged and sexually assaulted by seven men at a Chi Phi fraternity house at Cornell in October 2024. The allegations have drawn renewed attention after she filed a federal lawsuit against Cornell University and the fraternity in September 2026.
Details included in the lawsuit, including images that appear to show text messages exchanged by fraternity members during the alleged assault, have fuelled wider discussion about sexual violence and accountability on college campuses. The allegations remain allegations, and the lawsuit is part of the ongoing legal process.
In late September, a prosecutor also announced that the criminal investigation into the allegations would be re-examined, with evidence expected to be presented to a grand jury.
Many celebrities have recently spoken on the Cornell allegations including Hudson Williams, who campaigned for the arrests of the seven fraternity members who are named in the civil lawsuit and Matthew Lillard, who used the moment to voice support for trans and queer kids and to criticise what he called “cancelling”, saying: “My first instinct is to go to speaking about queer kids and queer rights and trans kids and this idea that I reposted something recently that there are more rapists from that university than there are trans athletes in the world competing in other sports,” before adding: “And I think that’s really relevant.”
Florence Pugh also accused Instagram of ‘censoring’ her Cornell Seven posts.
If you’ve been affected by this story, Rape Crisis England & Wales offers free, confidential support to survivors of sexual violence via its 24/7 Rape and Sexual Abuse Support Line on 0808 500 2222 or through online chat.
For US readers, RAINN’s National Sexual Assault Hotline provides free, confidential support 24/7 by calling 800-656-4673, texting HOPE to 64673, or using online chat.
