AS THIS week's bikie bloodbath in Texas has again shown, Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs (OMCGs) are not merely two-wheel hobbyists who deliver toys to sick kids.
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They are criminal organisations prone to deadly thuggery, often at a moment's notice and often in public.
The shoot-out at a Waco restaurant, which left nine dead and 18 injured, highlights not only the discretion that operators of bars, restaurants and public spaces should be given in banning bikies, but also the responsibility they have in doing exactly that.
Disturbing reports have surfaced that the owners of the Twin Peaks restaurant, where the gun battle erupted, ignored police warnings not to host the bikies.
A report in the US media described the scene of the massacre: "It was billed as a friendly Sunday afternoon get-together for central Texas bikers, a chance to discuss legislation, lobbying and co-operation. It ended with bodies strewn in a strip mall parking lot." Sound familiar?
Get-togethers between OMCGs to canvass "legislation, lobbying and co-operation" have occurred on an increasingly regular basis around Australia since anti-association laws were introduced in various states.
You might think the Waco incident was a strictly gun-crazy American affair, unlikely to be replicated in Australia. Incorrect.
Australian OMCGs are no strangers to public displays of random violence. In 2009, for instance, a huge brawl broke out at Sydney Airport - one of the most monitored public spaces in the country - between the Hells Angels and bitter rivals the Comancheros. One bikie was killed after being stabbed and bashed repeatedly over the head with a metal bollard in front of dozens of travellers.
In 1997 the sergeant-at-arms of the Bandidos OMCG was shot dead along with two others at a Sydney nightclub.
Perhaps the most well known OMCG gun battle happened on Father's Day 1984 in the car park of a western Sydney tavern.
More than 500 people were at the meet and swap when the Bandidos and the Comancheros unleashed mayhem with shotguns, rifles, baseball bats, machetes, chains, iron bars, knives and knuckledusters. Six bikies and a 14-year-old girl were dead by the end of it.
The years in between have been liberally peppered with violent and often deadly OMCG incidents.
It begs the question: why do we tolerate people - and I'm talking about OMCGs, not people who happen to own a Harley - who so wilfully break society's laws?
Indeed bikies proudly flaunt the fact, describing themselves as 1 per centers - the 1 per cent who live outside the law.
Just recently some Launceston OMCG members were asked to remove their patches when eating at a local restaurant.
They apparently left in disgust and vented on social media that the treatment was discriminatory.
The incident does raises questions about how anti-discrimination laws could affect an operator's right to remove bikies.
It seems unlikely that a bikie would be protected but the law does ban people from discriminating on the basis of political activities or affiliations.
In recent years bikies have entered the political fray over anti-OMCG laws to the point that they could be covered by the Anti-Discrimination Act.
It's also illegal to discriminate on the basis of an "irrelevant" criminal record - which is just vague enough to be manipulated by a smart lawyer.
To remove any ambiguity, the government and police should provide exemptions to the Anti-Discrimination Act if they are serious about combating OMCGs.
Now I'm sure there are members of OMCGs who are decent law-abiding citizens, who run businesses, provide jobs, raise children and engage society in a positive way.
But as long as they are members of a gang that has contempt for the rule of law and society at its core, why shouldn't they face discrimination?