IamA Bouncer/Head Doorman with proof, AMA!

What do you do if you spot a fake ID?

Edit: There have been many people commenting on this answer in this thread and it seems to be one of the most popular as well as one of the most controversial, let me stress again that if you didn't read it in the bio originally I DO NOT LIVE OR WORK WITHIN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. There has been great discussion and a lot of people referencing laws/practices in their state and asking me about my opinion, all of which I cannot comment on, as it is not the case where I live and work

Original answer: Put it in my pocket and wait for one of the small groups of police who roam around town on a Friday/Saturday night.

Not sure what the law is like around the world but as someone who was technically a potential victim of fraud we are allowed, as citizens, to seize the ID as evidence so long as we hand it over to the police ASAP, but people kicking up a fuss about the law is never normally an issue. It might turn into an argument but not a lot of people are going to report you to the police for stealing their brother's ID when they were trying to use it illegally.

I imagine most people bug out when you do this, and I can't imagine you're allowed to detain them... Do the cops ever follow up on these people or do they just destroy the I'd?

Most people admit the ID isn't them when you push them, if they're using a fake, chances are they're a 16 or 17 year old kid and when they have a rather large man very angrily staring them down they crack under even the most minor questioning pretty quickly, which is understandable.They're usually apologetic, promise they won't try come in again and ask for the ID back or their older brother/sister will freak out but it's kind of an unspoken rule that Doorman look out for each other so you take it off them anyway just incase they fool the next guy down the street.

If the cops are there when the underage kid is then they will ticket him/her, I think it's around $160 USD (roughly), so most people just GTFO once you mention cops. I give the cops the ID and I assume they take it back to the station to go in a box somewhere, I wouldn't be able to tell you what they do with them tbh.

EDIT: Typos

Couldn't a bouncer just hold onto your ID to prevent you from going into a club just to be an asshole?

I guess so, but i've never heard of anything like that happening, it would reflect pretty terribly on the business especially in the age of social media.

I would never really feel the need to do that, if I don't want you to come in then I can just not let you in, why go through all the trouble/potential shitstorm?

As a bartender, I've seen some Suspect IDs. What would you do if the person insists that it is their ID and doesn't go away until you give it to them?

There have been times when someone refuses to give up even when it's clearly not them, so I say that there are plenty of cops roaming around the few blocks in the city where most of the bars are, if you want to go fetch some of them I'll happily hand them the ID and let them sort it out, but if I think you're lying all I'll do is take your ID, if they think you're lying it's $160USD fine (roughly, not sure of exchange rate) so they normally just leave and save themselves the time and the money.

Okay, so Asians (I'm Asian) are notable for looking younger than their actual age: Have you ever asked for an Asian person's ID and was surprised when you saw their birth date?

Yes actually, as much as I don't like to enfore stereotypes this one is pretty widely held, but i've been surprised by many people of all races looking far younger than they really are.

The most notable was when I thought a guy must have been around 23-24 so I asked for ID (we are told <25 and you should ask for ID just incase) and he was 41. Apparently he gets it all the time.

When you deny someone at the door for being to intoxicated, and ask them to walk it off and come back later. Are you really going to let them in later? Or is it just hoping that they won't come back. Additionally, do you let the other guys know at the other door via radio that the drunk guy is coming there way and to not let him in?

I would not let them back in and so I don't do the whole "go away and come back" thing and yes, we always would let the other Doorman know if someone had been barred for the night.

The reason I don't tell people to walk it off is because if you go away for an hour, even if you come back more sober, you have two drinks in the next hour and you're probably back to where you were, it's just creating more of a headache for me later, I would rather tell you to leave at the door before you come in, than have to go inside later and tell you to leave when you're already in there.

So I'm not going to let you in anyway, if I tell you to come back and you don't then that's fine but I have told people in the past and they have come back and when I tell them I'm not going to let them in after all, boy do they get upset, far more upset than if I had just told them in the first place because now they've wasted an hour of their Saturday night.

I find it best to just avoid it all together and just straight up deny them.

Edit: spelling

Ever have people offer you "favors" to let them in?

All the time, but I'll tell you what a wise old Doorman once told me: if she's the type of girl who'll do all of that just to be let into a bar, you don't want to shake her hand, let alone let her near your cock.

It's a funny saying, a little too much with the virgin/whore dichotomy for my inner feminist, but funny all the same.

Never thought I'd hear a doorman say that last sentence.

We come from all walks of life my friend. Just cause I'm a big guy who needs to pay his bills doesn't mean I can't be a feminist.

Hell, some of the shit I've seen men do with both female customers and my female staff have enforced my feminist beliefs.

Edit: thank you for the gold friends

As another large male feminist, damn straight.

As a short, female feminist, I'd like to jump high-five both of you.

We can pick you up so you don't have to jump. But only if you say it's ok.

lol'd

I moonlight as a doorman, I'm also a nurse and an emt and currently working on my bachelor's degree. It's kind of offensive when people have that "Wait, you're not stupid?" moment.

I know, I only work as a Doorman part time while I finish my degree, double major Journalism/Marketing on track for upperclass honors.

Not to brag, but people don't tend to believe that Doormen can't think. One of the Doormen who works nearby is honestly one of the smartest people I know, but because he's big and works on the door, people think he's an oaf.

Why are people who fall asleep -a natural reaction to alcohol- so often treated so harshly? In many clubs I have seen people violently thrown out for simply falling asleep, given no chance to leave calmly.

Edit: I guess it's probably partly due to living in a small UK town with only 2 nightclubs, owned by the same people so they feel they can do what they want :/

I can't speak to this as I have never violently kicked someone out for sleeping, but if you are sleeping it's obvious why you have to go. You'd be much happier in bed that hunched over my bar with your face in a puddle of spilled beer.

Yes, but I've never seen them gently woken up and asked to leave, only literally thrown out, once even face first into the floor.

Well then I'm not sure what to tell you honestly, not that I doubt what you're saying but as much as you have never seen someone removed quietly I have never done or seen anyone removed anything but quietly for sleeping.

Have you ever seen a fight break out down the street and did you do anything about it?

All the time, fights are more common on the street than in the bars.

We don't normally like to step in too much, most fights sort themselves out without either party getting too banged up, just a couple bloody noses and some hurt egos. A lot of Doormen have the opinion that if it isn't in my bar, it's not my problem, we're hired by the business owner to keep the peace inside, we're not police officers.

That being said, I have stopped a couple fights when they either 1) involve someone I know/someone who frequents my bar, 2) one party is getting seriously banged up and it's not being stopped or 3) more than once a couple has left the bar to have an argument and one has hit the other, I would be lying if I said it wasn't normally the guy hitting the girl but you see a lot of the other way around too. But those are less about being a Doorman and more about my personal attitudes just as a person.

Someone who frequents my bar.

That is awesome because it's somewhere between How dare you touch my child! and Step off! They help make up a quarter of my paycheck!

You're alright.

There have been many times when there has been someone in my face ready to go and then a group of regulars have stood up and told them to fuck off. Once, one of our regulars who later became a good friend told someone that they were lucky I had a badge on and couldn't hit them, but he didn't have such issues and that if he didn't piss off, it wasn't me that he would have to worry about.

If you take care of them, they will take care of you. Peace, love and brotherhood, my friends.

Have you ever helped out a guy that looked like he had no business being in a club?

Sure! We actually have a guy who is 60+ years old, retired and likes to come into the nightclubs at night and dance, do shots and have an all round great time. He says just cause he's retired doesn't mean he has to sit at home and do nothing, he has free time, he has the money and he says likes clubbing because it makes him feel young again. He has a lot of lewd old stories and tales from his youth in the 60's and 70's which you wouldn't expect from such a sweet looking old guy.

Needless to say he's very popular and we love having him! :)

Have you ever been injured in the job and, if so, what would you call your worst one?

I've had the odd scrape but really nothing serious, I work in a country which (I am told) is extremely tame compared to many places (like the UK or most of Europe, so I hear) due to new regulations a few years back which have made it safer to be a Doorman and harder to get quite so drunk and violent as a customer, so I haven't had anything major apart from a black eye or two.

I have heard stories of the old days though and some older doorman have showed me their scars and shared their battle stories which are pretty intense.

EDIT: Typos

New Zealand?

Yeah New Zealand. Churr.

Do you have any/much self defence training? If so, how many different ways do you think you could kick my ass?

Little bit of boxing and I currently train recreationally at an MMA gym, I also play Rugby which I guess is the stereotype that all Doormen are just washed up American Football/Rugby players but make of that what you will.

There's not that many ways I would kick your ass, they teach us never to strike the person unless you have to, one wrong blow or falling the wrong way someone can crack their head on the pavement and never wake up, I know it sounds silly but it's no joke really. If you were to come at me, I would probably just do my best to not get hit, maybe throw some counter punches but my first order of business would be to tackle you and get on top of you on the ground for two reasons 1) it's safer and more reliable than trying to out-box you for both you and me and 2) I don't care how tough some drunk college student thinks he is, chances are he can't beat me up if he's on his back.

Why do bouncers outside of New York State all seem to hate my New York State drivers license? Every single time I've presented it outside of New York I've been asked for a second form of ID. This was really irritating going to college in Pennsylvania.

Don't work in the US so I wouldn't know, but here we need an ID issued in this country or your passport, we get a lot of people with overseas drivers licenses who we have to deny entry, but it's the law down here unfortunately.

What is the maximum occupancy of your club? How many doormen do you run on a busy night? What is the weirdest/craziest situation you have dealt with?

Maximum occupancy I honestly don't know. In my country your occupancy is determined by the size, accessibility location of your fire exits, the belief being that your occupancy should be the max number of people you can get out of the bar safely should there be a fire, I have been told by the duty managers who work behind the bar that our maximum occupancy is far higher than we could ever fit in the bar at one time anyway because our building has excellent fire exits, so I set the max just at the point where it's comfortable to be inside without feeling like you're trapped in a sardine can.

At the club I work at now we only have a team of 2, before I worked there I was 2IC at a bar with 6, I've also worked solo. It really depends on the size of the venue and also the layout of the venue (the bar where there were 6 staff is really not too much bigger than the venue with 2, but because of the layout it is impossible to run the former bar without staff, while the latter bar's layout lets one guard look after both the door and the outside smoker's area, while the other just roams around inside.

Weirdest situation I'm not sure, I have a funny story from just a couple night ago though. Had a complaint from a customer someone had locked the bathroom and wasn't coming out which normally means drugs or a couple fucking, our toilet doors are openable from the ouside with a key for safety reasons incase someone is passed out etc, so after knocking several times and eventually opening the door, there was a man in his mid 20's, pants around his ankles with his (rather large) hairy cock hanging out, slumped forward on the toilet with his head hanging down, not passed out but simply having a nice little nap. I had the pleasure of waking him up and telling him to get dressed. He was rather embarrassed.

What is your favorite question /unique way to find out someone is using someone else's ID?

Example: what's your zodiac sign? What year did you graduate high school?

Normally you can tell if it's not them by just looking at the photo, I'll ask them if they have any other form of ID or maybe a couple credit cards/bank cards with the same name on them and if they don't then i'll just deny them entry.

If it's a blatant enough difference I will keep the ID and give it to the police who roam around the central city at night, but if there's enough doubt that it might be them i'll simply tell them no and not to come back to my bar until they have an ID that looks like them or something else to back it up, i know it sounds kinda harsh but when the fines are the kind of money that they are (in my country fines for serving someone under 18 are up to about $8000 USD) it's just too big of a risk.

Are you guys really know how to fight?

Yes and no.

Most Doormen tend to be on the larger side and most of the time you wouldn't do the work if you didn't know how to defend yourself at leadt a little bit. I personally am 6'3 and the son of a former boxing coach but am by no means a great fighter and would never claim to be.

That being said, there are plenty of tough-as-nails Doormen out there that you don't want to mess with, far tougher than I am.

We have a saying where I'm from which is that you don't mess with a Doorman over the age of 40. This is the kind of job that you work when you're young and stupid (like myself), anyone who's stuck around long enough to be that age and still working the doors has probably kicked more ass in his life than you could believe.

Also, if I could give one word of advice re: fighting doormen, I would say it's a categorically horrible idea because all the doormen are friends with each other. I work on the main street and so there are a dozen bars all right by each other and if any Doorman gets in trouble there'll be 5 more beside him before you know it, and while you may think you can take on 1 Doorman and win (and you might be right) you'll never take on 6.

Lol this is so awesome. The line I loved the most was the old door mans over 40. Gives me a great idea for another Arnold shwatNdhsgenzhder movie.

He is, the 40 year old bouncer.

I happen to work next to an Irish pub which has a private secutiry staff of 4 guys who are all immigrant Polynesians, all over 6ft and well over 220lbs, all career Doormen with combined experience of more than half a century who all happen to be super nice guys, until they're not, if you know what I mean.

I literally pray for the poor souls that start fights in that bar. God knows I never would.

I used to dj at a club and had a guy start being hostile to me outside the club because my brother had apparently been in an altercation with his brother and father and came out victorious.. He didn't know I was working there and the bouncers instantly jumped in, then his mates jumped in and the clubs next door their bouncers came to defend them.. Very unified profession whether you're working that door or not.

It's kind of unspoken that you always protect another Doorman, there are people I have never said a word to in my life who have backed me up in fights simply because we are both doormen.

I think it's because we understand what it's like

I bounced for 1 year back when I was younger. It was really dull work most of the time, but I did get stabbed in the ribs with an ice pick one night.

What is the worst you have been injured dealing with people that got out of hand?

Nothing like that, my god.

You are more of a man than me my friend.

I was a cocky muscle head is what I was. I could have handled the situation so much better & probably avoided the headache it caused.

I often say it, you can avoid far more fights with your head than with your fists. Hope you're all recovered now bro.

what's the best advice you could give about appearing confident?

When I first started working I learned it was very important for a Doorman to appear confident, even when I wasn't, so honestly, I faked it. Then after about 6 months on the job I realised I wasn't faking it anymore.

Give it time and experience my friend, that's all it takes.

How safe is my daughter in your club? Do you check people leaving to see if they got drugged?

Any time there is a girl leaving who is super drunk or super out of it, you always make sure she is leaving with the people she came in with, likewise if you are kicking a girl out for being srunk you are always a lot more sensitive than when kicking out a male. There is no grabbing her, no pushing, you don't even make contact with her if at all possible and you make far more allowances, letting her talk to her friends, making sure she knows how to get home, making sure someone is with her, so I can honestly say that I do my best, it's not the type of thing I'm about to turn a blind eye to.

However, one time a girl was getting kicked out for being super drunk and falling asleep at the bar and a guy was with her, claiming to be her boyfriend but I remembered he came in at completely a different time and didn't sit with her group of friends (they were at a table right next to me and myself and a couple others were chatting, so I knew I didn't recognize him) and so after telling her friends they said they had no clue who he was and he bolted down the street.

It's the only time anything like that has happened to me, but in the interest of full disclosure it did happen. Make of that what you will I guess.

Not OP but another bouncer. Check people LEAVING to see if they got drugged? Surely you jest? Everybody got drugged! I can't see if it's voluntary or involuntary intoxication, how am I supposed to make that distinction exactly? Only if people come to me and say that (they think) they've been "roofied" can I make that assesment.

I want to piggy back off this. I bounced for a year in college and you're not really able to tell if people are drugged since most people are getting absolutely shit faced. However, the bouncers I worked with would always pay attention to situations in which people left. If there was a shifty dude basically carrying a chick out, one of us would ask if they were okay and needed a cab or anything. I only ever saw 1 woman roofied and after me and another bouncer inquired about her the dude ended up leaving her on a bench outside and "going to get his car." Guy never came back. Not sure what other clubs are like but being a good bouncer is about being observant.

"being a good bouncer is about being observant". I agree completely.

as do I.

I thought you'd be bigger. Are you nice until it's time to stop being nice?

I've had it said by older, more "rough and tough" Doormen that I'm nice long after I should have stopped being nice, but it's not really in my nature.

Despite what many stereotypes and films/TV might have you think, Doormen don't necessarily enjoy hitting people, we're just as varied as any other profession.

Edit: Didn't realise that was from Roadhouse, never seen that movie.

Do you have different protocol about how to deal with belligerent females than dealing with belligerent males?

Of course, a belligerant male you can potentially defend yourself if there is cause to expect he's going to do you harm, with a woman there is absolutely no wiggle room for that (not that I would want there to be).

I would do exactly the same verbally in the removal but I might give the girl extra time to tell her freidns where she was going, how she was getting home etc. you just need to be a lot more sensitive physically, for obvious reasons.

What is the thought behind "you need to leave right now, no you can't tell your friends you're being kicked out so that they know where you are."?

Don't get me wrong, Ive been nicely asked to leave every bar I've ever been to. Usually just too drunk, time to go to bed. I have though while playing DD come to find out an hour into looking for our mate that he got booted and wasn't allowed to tell anyone. That seems like such a stupid idea.

InB4: getting that drunk is bad idea.

It's not really that I don't want you to talk to your friends, it's just that every time you try to kick out a drunk there is always something you need to do which is of paramount importance before you leave my bar.

I tell you to leave and immediately you whine about how you need to use the bathroom, you want to finish every last drop of your drink but you don't want to drink fast, you need to talk to your friends, you want a glass of water, you need this you need that and 90% of the time it's all either untrue or just irrelevant to your current situation, so maybe it's not that they don't want you to talk to your friends, but that they don't want you sticking around any longer than you have to and don't want to deal with what are usually unfounded demands.

But idk, that's just me personally.

Just like bedtime for my kids!

I am willing to bet it is almost exactly like bedtime for your kids. I have long held the belief that drunk people revert back to children.

If you're a good, stern but fair parent, you might just be a very very good Doorman.

How did you go about getting the job? Was it something you wanted to do?

I actually got a job with the security company in order to do work for concerts and gigs, working the barrier at shows. I still do the odd shift of this work, and have gotten to see the Arctic Monkeys, Ellie Goulding, Ed Sheeran and Nitro Circus Live among others and comedy gigs like Billy Connelly and Steve-O, but the concerts were just too few and far between to make a proper wage, so they offered me some doors shifts and nearly a year and a half later here I am.

It wasn't really something I wanted to do at first, honestly I didn't think I was cut out for it, but you get the hang of it eventually and the nerves go away to the point where now I don't have any problems with it. It's not a job i'll do forever, but while I'm finishing my degree at university it pays my rent, which I'm thankful for.

At all the concerts I have seen, the security staff who stand in front of the audience are always standing with their backs to the stage....is it an unbreakable rule that you should never take a peek behind you from time to time to see what's happening on stage?

Not unbreakable, you can share the odd glance, but you have to watch the crowd, that's what you're there to do.

That being said, that's why I like being around the edges of the stage, cause then you can easily watch both.

How do you get assigned to that edge spot? Do the most senior guys get assigned there while the most junior ones are front and center?

Usually it's senior guys who are smart enough to nab the side spot, but there have been other times when since I am one of only a couple more senior guys they have needed me in the middle as that's where most of the "action" is, but I'm not typically concert staff these days so I'm by no means an irreplaceable guy so I can normally nab a good spot if I'm lucky :)

There are definitely people who frequently visit the club, becoming a familiar face. Have you treated the frequents better than strangers?

Of course! Certain regulars who become friends of the establishment can skip the line and bring in their friends and will always get a handshake and a greeting from me.

Does it happen for these "certain regulars" to do something that forces you to ask them to leave? How often?

If they do, do these people value the mutual respect (as expressed by handshakes and greeting) and apologize later? (e.g. the next day or during their next visit)

Normally they know me and respect me enough to know that if I am telling them they might have had too much to drink tonight that they will understand and leave without any hassle. I think it's because they realise it doesn't matter if their night gets cut a bit short because they're welcome here any night, so they can just sleep it off and come back tomorrow if they want to.

but normally they're just good people regardless, you don't get to be best friends with all my bar staff and myself if you're a prick, because of our jobs we can pick them out reasonably fast and can tell what their motives are and so they never really make it to that level of familiarity if that makes any sense

Has there been a time where a punter was pretty much asking to have his/her face smashed in but you couldn't oblige because professionalism? What were they doing?

It's not "pretty much" asking, many people do ask, explicity and repeatedly.

They know that to be a professional I can't just go around beating people up and they know that I could get in serious trouble if I throw the first punch, so they will kick up a fuss when I deny them, start calling me every name under the sun and then staring me down and daring me to hit them.

But you don't feed the trolls my friend, you don't feed the trolls.

Do you think a woman bouncer has a better chance of calming an angry male patron than another male?

Sure, one of the best bouncers I ever worked with was a woman.

Her name was Lisa and she was a real no nonsense sort of lady, one night I was downstairs on the door with her and a guy was being removed by one of the other Doormen and wasn't going quietly, once he got out he was pacing in front of the door screaming for the Doorman that removed him to come outside. I went just inside the door to tell him to go back upstairs to avoid the conflict so we could calm him down and Lisa told me to go inside as well, I looked at her kind of puzzled but she told me to get inside for my safety.

Her exact words were "Don't try to protect me honey, if you come out he'll hit you, I don't care how angry he is, he's not about to hit me. Watch." and true to her word, she gave him some no-nonsense treatment, he ended up apologizing to her and leaving quietly.

God that woman was a badass, it's a shame she stopped bouncing.

Thanks for doing this; it's pretty cool. Bouncers get a bad rap from people I know for doing basic parts of their job (e.g. carding) and it has always confused me. Anyways, what's the most dangerous situation you've seen so far?

On the other end of that, what's your favorite part of the job?

Most dangerous was probably once night when I first turned up to work about 20 minutes early and a group of guys (about 8 or 9) had come in early and proceeded to get drunk and rowdy. I normally start work at 10pm long before many people come out at night in my city and with the only two people working being women under 5'6 they were extremely nervous about them being there before I was.

I had no back up because the other guard didn't start til later so when I asked them to leave they got belligerant and one of them put his hand on my shoulder in a friendly way before slapping me across the face. He was a lot smaller than me (about 5'9, 160lbs) so I had grabbed him on instinct and already pushed him back a couple feet with the intention of getting him out of the bar before I felt about 10 hands on my chest pushing back at me and I looked up and saw all his friends encircling me and while I was head and shoulders above them, i'm not about to be a hero and take on that many guys so for a second I was certain I was moments away from taking a serious beating. Luckily three Doormen from next door came rushing over as we were outside in the smoking area and they saw the whole thing, plus a couple of his friends were trying to play peacemaker to the other 6 and nothing came of it but boy did I shit bricks for a second there.

My favourite part of the job is definitely the social aspect. It kinda sucks sometimes giving up every friday and saturday night to the job but you meet a lot of people. Because of the nature of hospitality work, you work really weird hours and have a crazy sleep schedule so all the hospo workers from all different bars all hang out with each other, like one big family, lucky for me I work with really cool bar staff and can honestly say I've even made legitimate friendships with some of our regulars, who I now go to the gym with and hang out with outside of work hours.

Is Roadhouse the greatest movie or the greatest movie of all time?

Never actually seen it, google tells me it's a Swayze movie about a bouncer. Will have to check it out!

How much does it take to bribe a bouncer to take a fake, generally? I'm 21 but I was always curious what the price of that was.

The fine if I served them would be $8000 USD if they were caught, so somewhere in the neighbourhood of 8 grand should do it.

Damn thats cheap. Not only is it a fine but you'd lose your job if your management cared. I wouldn't take anything less than $25k

Might as well make it 100k while we're at it.

I'm not here to fuck spiders.

I'm not here to fuck spiders

What an amazing phrase. ...what does it mean?

It loosely translates to "I'm/we're not here to fuck around"

An example would be if you were at a bar with your friends on your day off watching some sports and you go get a round of beers and your friend says "I don't know, I don't really want to get drunk" and you hit him with the spiders line, almost as if to say

"We're at a bar at 8pm on a Friday night watching the big game, if you didn't want to get drunk what did you come here to do? Fuck spiders?"

As a former bouncer at a music venue, we would always get perks like free drinks after 11pm and get to hang out after, sometimes with the band, to party. Do you get any perks where you work?

Yeah for sure, I'll get a free beer at the end of every shift which I sit and drink with my bar staff and we'll have a bit of a laugh and a chat after everyone else has left.

I once on short notice filled in for someone and worked the live show for Nitro Circus and then, just by coincidence, they had their after party at my bar a little later where I was working for the rest of the night, so I ended up chatting to them all night long while they drank at their private party, they even put a sign outside which said "Private, except for hot chicks" and would come over and let in all the girls they thought were attractive, since it was their party I wasn't going to tell them no.

What's the most common trick people try to pull to get inside? Sweet talking, distractions, that kind of thing...

My bar has a fecned off outdoor smoking area out front where you can sit with your drinks so jumping the fence is common once you've been denied.

You'll often get one of their friends who are already inside coming up to you and starting a conversation out of the blue, only to look up and see that their friend is in the middle of jumping the fence and that's why they're trying to distract you. It really is easy to tell when they're trying to slip something by you once you've dont this job for a while.

Which self-defence equipment would you recommend to a male/ female?

Your attitude.

Of course there are unprovoked assaults/muggings every day but in terms of my experience with bar fights and street fights on a friday night, it could have all been avoided if people knew how to control their egos.

I once spoke to someone who said anyone could be a bouncer if you have the right attitude and confident demeanor. I'm a 5"6, relatively well built woman but still pretty smal. Do you think a smaller women (like myself) would be capable of doing your job to a good standard? Why, why not?

Hell yeah!!

I answered another question in this thread regarding female door staff which I'm too lazy to find but TL;DR of that answer fuck yeah girl power.

What was the grossest incident you had to deal with?

Shit and vomit on a nightly basis.

Anyone who has ever seen a nightclub bathroom will know what I mean, but the thing about alcohol and certain party drugs is that not everyone makes it to the bathroom. Hell, sometimes you think you're in the bathroom but really you're just pissing on the Doorman's shoes.

Trust me, I know. Sigh.

Ever went to your job hoping you'd get into a situation where you'd get good reason to beat the shit out of someone?

I've never gone to work looking for a fight and I would never, and have never thrown the first punch while working. Everything you do as a Doorman in that regard has to be in self defense.

But I'd be lying if I said there weren't times when I very much wanted the opportunity to defend myself against certain customers.

Well i posted on that page and was disappointed so let me try again.

What point of force is to much. How do you know where the line is in terms of physical Violence. After seeing the video where the bouncers actually turned a situation from bad to worse.... how do you avoid this ? I can think of all kinds of scenarios that could play out that would potentially make a bad situation worse because of securities reaction.

I think anyone, whether they are a bouncer or not, can tell when too much violence is too much.

When I started, we were told the amount of force you use is "the minimum amount required to overcome their resistance" which basically means, however far they go, you can go one step further, but no more than that, within reason of course.

So if I am telling you to leave, you tell me to go fuck myself, I'll tell you that if you don't I'm well within my rights to remove you with force. That process will start with a hand on your chest, slowly guiding you to the exit, if you resist I'll push harder, if you resist more I'll get an underhook and march you out, you resist further i'll drag you out, you punch me i may punch you back, but I'd rather tackle you to the ground similar to how a police officer makes a routine arrest.

It's just a matter of common sense imo, that's one of the reasons I don't drink on the job, if my common sense is uninhibited and I err on the side of caution, I find i almost always make the right call.

How tall are you and how much do you weigh?

I'm about 6'3, but I wear black dress shoes at work so the heel makes me look about 6'4. I weigh about 280lbs which I'm not about to pretend is all muscle, I'm pretty much just your classic Rugby/Football player who used to be a lot fitter but now probably has a few too many beers for his own good hahahaha

Do you really mean it when you say my shoes are the wrong colour? or are u just politely saying, go away drunk ass?

Dress standards in my country are not as strict as I hear they are in others, but yes, sometimes if you are drunk and I think you might argue I will instead deny you on something completely unrelated.

You can stand around and try to debate with me if you're drunk or not, but you can't debate whether or not you're wearing sneakers. We don't allow sneakers.