"Bounce This!"

There is only one profession with more alleged power than the President of the United states and that is a bouncer at a club. These Neanderthals, without any concept of life outside the front door of the club have somehow gotten the impression that they are the most powerful people in the universe. In their world the order of power goes...

1) Bouncer
2) Owner of club
3) DJ playing at the club
4) Bartender at club
5) Barback at club
6) Bathroom attendant at club
7) Janitor at club
8) Alley cat outside of club
9) Mouse in alley cats mouth outside of club
10) God

Standing in a line at a club waiting for a bouncer to get into some lame club is probably my least favorite place in the world. Yet I continue to do it and have no choice but to bend over and take it. (Figure of speech, I'm not actually bending over and taking anything for those literal readers out there...)

There is always one guy in your group that feels it necessary to let the bouncer know they are missing out on his business, like it will make any sort of difference in the bouncer's life. He could care less about the $12 in your pocket you intend to spend on drinks and then stiff the bartender for a tip. There aren't any customer service satisfaction surveys going out to the patrons of the bar asking them to rate their experience or anything so customer service and retaining business or R.O.I. (rate on investment) is not exactly a top priority of the bouncer. He'd just assume kick your ass then to let you into the club.

I have been in lines waiting to get into some bar that I never wanted to go to in the first place, but yet I stand and wait like a buffoon. Then just when I think I might get in, six of the bouncer's lame guy friends pop up to the front of the bar, embrace the bouncer like they are childhood blood brothers, sometimes exchanging butt slaps and the most nonsensical handshakes, and in they go. Once they are through the bouncer regains his tough guy attitude and proceeds to tell us with a straight face that the bar is at capacity. Then of course there is some impatient girl or stupid guy (probably the same one in your group who threatens to not give his business) that will ask why those guys got in when the bar is at capacity thus further pissing off the bouncer and reducing the chances of anyone getting in. Usually the response will be either no response - a complete ignorance of the question or "Oh they were in before." (That's why when they came up they embraced like they hadn't seen each other since the fourth grade). But yet you continue to wait like a moron again bending over and taking it for another twenty minutes or whenever this prehistoric, primitive gate bar keeper lets you enter his realm...

A few weeks ago I made a special trip home to change into formal clothes to get into a bar only to have a bouncer that looked like Fabio to tell me I was too casual. Too casual? I was in dress shoes and a dress shirt. What was the guy expecting a three piece suit?

Once inside, you are still not home free as bouncers also have complete Nazi-like reign over you inside as well. Any wrong move at their ignorant discretion and they'll throw you out of the joint. And the best part about it? Laws created by our forefathers, and enforced by the highest power in America somehow don't apply inside bars and clubs. For some reason bouncers have complete authority to beat the living daylights out of any poor chap at no other discretion other than their own!

I always found it funny how bouncers would throw people out of a bar for being too drunk, when it is their bartenders that keep serving the sloshes! They should know the equation by now-serving too much alcohol to one person will most likely result in some sort of irrational behavior. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out. The whole premise of the bar business is to serve alcohol. So they serve people alcohol then are surprised when they act like drunken lunatics and then have to throw them out? What did they expect Mary Poppins to all of a sudden show up? It is kind of like leading a six-year old into a candy store, offering them an unlimited supply of sour patch kids and then getting upset at them when they are bouncing like maniacs off the walls.

At a club in a certain San Francisco suburb I finally got my revenge on the ignoramus bouncer community. After ignoring demands from a bouncer on the dance floor because I was dancing in the wrong section apparently, I was manhandled out of the bar like Paris Hilton on a Friday night in a random Hollywood bedroom. I don't even think my feet were touching the ground as this pugnacious brute lifted me and literally threw me out of the club. I felt like Jazz on "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air," being tossed out of the Banks household as I went flying out the front door right in front of the bouncers in the front. If I was a football, the bouncer would have been Peyton Manning and the sidewalk Marvin Harrison as I went at least for a chains moving first down. I knew better to fight back since there would be an army of IQ-less bouncers ready to pounce and beat me to a bloody massacre pulp had I done so. Usually they find it necessary to have seven bouncers over three-hundred pounds wail on a one guy fewer than two-hundred pounds so I knew I would be outmatched. I waited outside for about five minutes, and then casually asked the front door bouncer what time the club closed. He nonchalantly said 2am and then asked for my ID. I sheepishly handed it to him, he checked it out and back into the club I went. I was astonished that this guy's short-term memory lasted about five minutes. He had just seen me heatedly been tossed out of the club, like a crab fisherman tossing an undersized catch back into the ocean, and now this idiot was letting me right back in with no questions asked. Once inside I had to keep a low profile to avoid the first bouncer who would truly squash me if noticed.

Steve 1
Bouncers 74

I did have one experience of kindness from a bouncer and it literally changed my whole outlook on life. (Yes I know most of my revelations on life come from times spent at bars...) While entering a bar in Hilton head, South Carolina a bouncer actually apologized to me for checking my ID. "Sir I'm sorry I've got to check your ID," he said, as I still remember clear as day. I literally felt like crying due to his kindness...