Hey, a Tussle!

Been away for a while.

Tomorrow is "Thanksgiving Eve", which in the bar business is the busiest night of the year. It is also the the night with the greatest potential for trouble. So, in that spirit, here's part 1 of my long-awaited discussion of bar fights.

Rule #1 Avoid them.
Seriously. They suck. Sounds a little simplistic, but allow me to go into a little more detail. A bar is not a boxing ring, dojo or whatever kind of place you may or may not have learned to fight.
It will be a slippery surface, likely sprinkled with broken glass and packed full of people who will not appreciate being involved and are most likely not thinking all that clearly.
This may mean you will get pushed away, punched from behind, hit with a bottle or in extreme cases hit with a chair, stabbed or shot.
It's not some sort of playground scuffle, it can be be honest to goodness life-or-death.

Rule #2 Get the hell out of the way.
If there's a bouncer, and for the purpose of this discussion we'll assume there is, he's either right in the middle of things or about to come running through the crowd. Let Him. He can't break up the fight until he can get to the actual combatants and having to pull "helpful" bystanders out of the way just slows things down. If you're not involved, get out of the damn way.

Rule #3 Don't make things worse.
This means, no shouting abuse at either party or the bouncer. Don't try and stop the bouncer with words like "I've got him, don't worry" or worse "don't touch my friend!". You don't have him and we will touch him. If we have to deal with you as well, so be it. If you had any control or good judgment you would've prevented the whole mess from starting.


Rule #4 Don't hit the bouncer
This is an important one, for many reasons. First, we're not getting paid to prove we're "tough guys". We don't want to hurt or harm anyone. (yes, there is a very important difference between those two words) 99% of the time, we'll pull the fools apart and throw some out the front door. If there's a back door, some go that way. If not, they will be held inside until the first batch goes away. This is to prevent the fight form continuing outside. It bothers the neighbors and through a quirk in the law, if the fight is within 50 yards of the bar, it can still be fined.
But, as I was saying, don't hit us. It can cause things to escalate very rapidly. While we don't get paid to be "tough guys" we also don't get paid nearly enough to allow some fool to use us as a punching bag. We also have the "home field advantage". Odds are at any given time there are around 15-25% of the patrons who will jump in to the fray at this point. Also, the bouncers will stop using "soft" techniques and begin using "hard" ones. Once we're fighting to defend ourselves a different mindset comes into play. This can mean anything from hauling back and punching someone in the nose, to a professionally applied choke hold (my favorite), to a collapsable baton, stun gun, blackjack or pepper spray.


It won't end well.



to be continued