Hypothetical Scenario: Asshole Bouncers

[workinwifdakids]

Good grief, Doc, they finally let you out?

[Rusty Ray]

As a former bouncer myself (Tell the ladies at 'Legends' that 'Mash' says 'hi'), we always tried to handle things with the least amount of disruption as possible. I think you do have a case if they unnecessarily laid hands on you. There is no special training or license to be a bouncer in Texas. You are acting at the discretion of the owner. If you tell someone to leave and they do not, then they are trespassing. If you tell someone to leave and they do, then the bouncer has no more legal options.

As a 'Former Bouncee', I can say with hand on heart that nearly all the cases where I have been ejected from bars and clubs were 100% justified. I was being an asshole and the 'Eviction Technician' was in his rights to dump my ass.

But to answer the question posed: I would never fight a bouncer on his own turf, he has the home advantage, he has back-up/mutual support pacts with other bar staff, and he has the assumption of the law being on his side. In my time in the US, I noticed that an awful lot of bouncers were local PD. Same goes for knife or gun fighting a bouncer. You will only end up in a jail cell.

Just so long as you don't fear for your life.......

Cheers - Rusty

[skb12172]

All good advice. Besides the movie, the other event that inspired this thread was a write-up in the local fishwrap, regarding an incident at a local strip club. A lawyer was "forcibly ejected," and sued the club PLUS the bouncer. The club settled. The bouncer insisted on a trial and lost. The judgment against him was, I believe, $1500. I don't think there were criminal charges pressed against anyone. If there was, it wasn't mentioned in the article.

Unless it's someone's bachelor party, I'm never in a club or strip bar. This was more curiosity than anything else. Thanks for your input.

[TheIrishman]

Every now and then, one of these guys will get cute with a lawyer or off-duty cop and get sued. Almost always, the bouncers lose.

Actually in my experience the bouncer rarely loses. As has been mentioned you generally have it coming. More places are installing CCTV to cover such eventualities, and lower insurance premiums. The bar up the road from me had an intoxicated(slightly, not $#!+ faced) off duty officer from one of the more "urban" towns in the area start a problem over a pool game. The owner told him to leave, and being an "urban" only one he refused. After pulling his badge and exclaiming "you don't wanna F with me" 2 locals in the bar laughed, withdrew their own and reminded him that this aint his town.

What I'm wondering about is how you might go about appropriately defending yourself against one of these mooks.

DON'T! I realize there are prick bouncers, typically identifiable by lack of a neck and "juice jaw". If they start a fight with you get out of dodge. If told to leave, do so. If you are in the right or wrong, refusing to leave is trespass, starting a problem over it can be criminal trespass. Also as mentioned he will likely have other bouncers or regulars behind him. As Ron White said "I don't know how many it would take to kick my ass, but I knew how many they were going to use and that's a good bit of information to have".

Let's say he orders you out of the club. Besides your compliance, he continues to push you, lay hands on you, etc.

The compliance is the rub. If you are not making a scene, arguing or refusing generally there should not be a problem. If however you simply turn around to try and argue your case, most bouncers will construe that as refusal. At that point they are legally allowed to remove you. In ten years I never "threw" someone out, I have however forced them from the property. A large part of it is self preservation as there are many times the offending party is not alone and not proving control of the situation ends badly for the bouncer.

Maybe he even cuffs you around a bit. There might even be several, all wanting to show what a badass they are. What should you do? How should you cover your actions, afterwards?

As I said, LEAVE. You're not going to win the fight without deadly force and the witnesses will not know what happened until a commotion starts and all the police will hear is about the jackass starting a fight with the bouncer(s).
I was a bar-back at a real "biker bar" where several female friends worked. The crowd was very self-regulating as far as trouble in the bar went, most were locals and regulars. If two regulars got into an argument that looked like it would turn south, the bartender could almost always end it with a few words. If an outsider started a problem it quickly ended with the sound of bar stools sliding and 6-12 large bikers standing up. I rarely had to argue with someone to leave as the sight of said bikers behind me made them realize that I was doing them a favor. I'll remove you from the premises or they wont let you leave. On the rare occasions someone refused to leave, the bikers were more a show of force than anything else. Unless I was in big trouble they generally kept out of it. On an occasion a few "gangstas" started problems they failed to realize the bikers they were just playing pool with were on my side in the end.
I've been pepper sprayed, hit with bottles/cues/stools and on a slow night had to fight my way out of a 4 on 1 beating(it was bike week so I had no backup). In the end my job was not to protect the bar, the customers or the money. I was there to make sure nothing happened to the bartenders. I had to keep the offending party occupied long enough for her to call the P.D. if need be.

[Ben Rumson]

I was involved with some front row shenanigans at a Motorhead concert at a D.C. night club/bar. It was the Bayou actually in Georgetown under the K street bridge. Great place to see a show but it's closed now. The bouncer tapped me on the shoulder, I turned and showed him my hands out. He motioned to come with him so we went outside..

I told him why I felt the need to knock somebody back a few feet and he said OK sounds good, You can go back in just don't go back up front. I said thanks, went in, grabbed a beer and finished the show from the back.

No need to get cocky. Jail isn't my thing.

[Ben Rumson]

My only other experience with a bouncer was a bachelor party in D.C . We did the gentleman's club circuit. One of the idiots I was with got drunk in the wrong place and yacked all over the bathroom. The place was one of the rougher places with bouncers who are not very understanding. I didn't realize what was going on until a huge ginormous pissed off bouncer started screaming about some dude yacking all over his bathroom.

I saw my friend/idiot with a bit of vomit spittle on his chin, offered the bouncer $20.00 for clean up and got the idiot out of there very quickly. Best $20.00 I ever spent and the idiot never paid me back. Next time I'll let him get his ass kicked.

[Vonz90]

I am a quiet guy and have never had problems with bouncers (not that I ever go to bars anymore). But I have two friends who have back in the day:

One was at Boat School, a couple of friends of mine from the rugby team {clarification, I was not on the rugby team, one of my roomates was and thus I had several friends on the team} were drinking when one was kicked out for something or another (probably justified) - however the bouncer in question decided to start slapping around the guy once he got him outside. One of his buds who followed him out then proceeded to lay out the bouncer with a beer bottle in the back of his head, and they both goth out of there in a hurry.

The other case was in Norfolk when my roomate was kicked out for being a loud mouthed Italian guy from Chicago (which he is, but he is harmless). He happily agreed to leave, but they insisted that he leave by the back door, which he thought was them wanting to take an opportunity to smack him around so he said no, which then escalated into a fight with several bouncers for which he received the bad end. Kind of a bummer as it more or less ended his naval career.

[mekender]

Every now and then, one of these guys will get cute with a lawyer or off-duty cop and get sued. Almost always, the bouncers lose.

Actually in my experience the bouncer rarely loses. As has been mentioned you generally have it coming. More places are installing CCTV to cover such eventualities, and lower insurance premiums. The bar up the road from me had an intoxicated(slightly, not $#!+ faced) off duty officer from one of the more "urban" towns in the area start a problem over a pool game. The owner told him to leave, and being an "urban" only one he refused. After pulling his badge and exclaiming "you don't wanna F with me" 2 locals in the bar laughed, withdrew their own and reminded him that this aint his town.

What I'm wondering about is how you might go about appropriately defending yourself against one of these mooks.

DON'T! I realize there are prick bouncers, typically identifiable by lack of a neck and "juice jaw". If they start a fight with you get out of dodge. If told to leave, do so. If you are in the right or wrong, refusing to leave is trespass, starting a problem over it can be criminal trespass. Also as mentioned he will likely have other bouncers or regulars behind him. As Ron White said "I don't know how many it would take to kick my ass, but I knew how many they were going to use and that's a good bit of information to have".

Let's say he orders you out of the club. Besides your compliance, he continues to push you, lay hands on you, etc.

The compliance is the rub. If you are not making a scene, arguing or refusing generally there should not be a problem. If however you simply turn around to try and argue your case, most bouncers will construe that as refusal. At that point they are legally allowed to remove you. In ten years I never "threw" someone out, I have however forced them from the property. A large part of it is self preservation as there are many times the offending party is not alone and not proving control of the situation ends badly for the bouncer.

Maybe he even cuffs you around a bit. There might even be several, all wanting to show what a badass they are. What should you do? How should you cover your actions, afterwards?

As I said, LEAVE. You're not going to win the fight without deadly force and the witnesses will not know what happened until a commotion starts and all the police will hear is about the jackass starting a fight with the bouncer(s).
I was a bar-back at a real "biker bar" where several female friends worked. The crowd was very self-regulating as far as trouble in the bar went, most were locals and regulars. If two regulars got into an argument that looked like it would turn south, the bartender could almost always end it with a few words. If an outsider started a problem it quickly ended with the sound of bar stools sliding and 6-12 large bikers standing up. I rarely had to argue with someone to leave as the sight of said bikers behind me made them realize that I was doing them a favor. I'll remove you from the premises or they wont let you leave. On the rare occasions someone refused to leave, the bikers were more a show of force than anything else. Unless I was in big trouble they generally kept out of it. On an occasion a few "gangstas" started problems they failed to realize the bikers they were just playing pool with were on my side in the end.
I've been pepper sprayed, hit with bottles/cues/stools and on a slow night had to fight my way out of a 4 on 1 beating(it was bike week so I had no backup). In the end my job was not to protect the bar, the customers or the money. I was there to make sure nothing happened to the bartenders. I had to keep the offending party occupied long enough for her to call the P.D. if need be.

That is a GREAT summary. I bounced in several places and what you have to understand is that a LOT of bouncers like to fight... At least most of the ones I worked with did. They love knocking heads, slamming people on to the floor and generally getting paid to get rowdy.

What most people never realize is that when you fight a bouncer, you fight the whole staff. I used to joke that people might get off one swing before my backup was there, you damn sure wouldn't get to beat my ass before they got there. I was one of the small guys too, at 5'9 245lbs, I was literally dwarfed by most of my buddies.

Truthfully, adults were never really much of a problem. Every so often we would get someone that wanted to prove they were a bad ass, that never ended well. Also Hip Hop night could get interesting, especially if our cognac supplies ran out.

The absolute worst was the teen night club I worked at. This place was for kids under 18 and was located smack in the middle of the worst neighborhood in Orlando. Now, I dont know how many of you have seen a freshman high school football game lately but some of those boys can get downright huge. These little shits would come in 6 deep, all taunting one of their group telling them "yea man, you can take him! just go stick him in the nose"... Thankfully their subtlety skills were usually very lacking and you could see it coming miles away. I can tell you right now, I will fight a 14 year old just the sames as I would a 25 year old if they take a swing. The thing is, these kids just dont care. There are no real consequences to their actions. They dont have to worry about going to jail, they dont get a criminal record and they are simply buck ass wild... Plus it was better than even chances they were on something when they decided to get froggy and jump.

[Evyl Robot]

I've never had an issue with bouncers here. I actually had the interchange of, "Hey, ____! I didn't know you were working here. How's everything going?"

Now, I did have an interesting experience in Europe. I was club hopping with some friends, and we were walking from club to club. The gentlemen were just behind the ladies, of course. On our way through the door to one place, as soon as the girls breached the door step, two mammoth bouncers intercepted us guys and didn't understand 'excuse me' in any language. It was frustrating at the time, but strikes me as pretty funny now.

[Jericho941]

So far my only experience with bouncers has been discovering that apparently, in the UK, if you are huge and American you will be searched before you can come in.