Zak Asgard

The rise of the rogue bouncer

Who’s guarding the guards?

  • From Spectator Life
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Bouncers – or ‘door supervisors’ – are a pillar of the ‘British night out’. They can sneak you into an exclusive club or send your teeth skating across the pavement with their Wreck-It Ralph fists. They can take a selfie with you and call you ‘mate’ or they can hit on your sister and emasculate you on your 19th birthday. We’ve all tried to sneak past them, to argue with them, to convince them that your best friend ‘is like that normally’ and ‘definitely not throwing up in his mouth right now’. We’ve all tried to high-five them. We’ve all been scared of them. We’ve all seen them hit a posh bloke called Hugo for saying ‘My daddy can buy this place.’

But there is such a thing as the ‘bad bouncer’: the bouncer who is prone to violence, to fits of rage. This is the bouncer who is predisposed to picking you up by the armpits and launching you through the nearest available window.

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