 As a man who has foregone violence, I still find it bizarre that in my former life as a nightclub bouncer I forged many of my strongest friendships with people only after I had kicked ten barrels of shite out of them. Sharing a beer with a man who sipped through broken teeth and swollen lips was a regular occurrence for those of us who trod the pavement arena. An article by International Author and BAFTA winning Screenwriter Geoff Thompson... The only thing that kept me and the other bouncers out of jail was our unwritten code of conduct which demanded 'no police involvement'. Today litigation is rife, honour is just a memory and prisons are filled with the likes of my former self.
Mr. T, the head doorman of a rival club thought he was 'bad', and having 'bagged a few' on his way up this appeared to be the general consensus. As far as I was concerned the only thing bad about Mr T was his breath. My first encounter with him was to be a bloody one. I was newly employed at a swish new Coventry night club (we had chairs, tables, all the mod cons). I was young, slight for a bouncer at 11 stone and had the audacity to be polite and respectful (honestly...). Mr T misinterpreted my demeanour for weakness. He hated me on sight. It must have been midnight when he swaggered into my club, half drunk and chugging on a bottle of cheap champagne. As soon as he saw me he decided I was 'gonna have to have some'. He was about six feet tall and fifteen stone, and radiated arrogance and violence in equal measure.
"Didn't we row once at Buster's night club?" he asked, interrupting my conversation with the cloakroom girl.
"No," I replied, taken aback, "I'm sure I'd have remembered."
"You'd have remembered you cock-sucker," he spat, "I'd have bit your fucking head off!"
 Maybe I was being overly sensitive, but at this point I felt threatened and ever-so-slightly offended. My reputation and honour were on the line. As I searched for the right reply, Mr T went into a primal attack ritual. He splayed his arms, like he was carrying carpets, his eyes bulged in their sockets and he tipped his head like a nodding-dog as he moved towards me. Adrenaline kicked into my system, reaching such a pitch that it began to weaken me. My knee caps danced an involuntary bosanova.
"Listen," I said, controlling the adrenal shake in my voice to hide the fear, "I've never met you before and you come in hear and treat me like shit for no reason. Let it go or we'll be fighting!"
This was partly an attempt to psyche him out and partly a shot at 'across the table negotiation'. But I knew he wasn't going walk away and we weren't going to have a debate. All the while I was probing for chinks in his armour - weaknesses that I might be able to exploit.
Pre-fight rules are unspoken and hard to recognise. But it's no exaggeration to say that one mistake can prove fatal. A good fighter will play the same game right back at you and allow you to see 'chinks' that aren't really there. He uses them like a chess player uses pawns to draw in an inexperienced player. This is a serious arena, and you can't take it lightly. You don't 'fuck with fate' if you have any respect at all for you own mortality; I've had friends who've found that out the hard way. Jonny's checkmate was a chair leg across the head and a brain haemorrhage that killed him deader than disco. Neil misread the signs and died at the end of a psychopath's screw driver.
"Yeah! Yeah! Fucking yeah!" replied Mr. T, dropping into single syllables that were a sure sign of imminent attack.
But before he could start on me I engaged his brain with a statement that also acted as an action trigger for my own attack.
"That's all I'm saying!" I said.
Then I hit him.
As his left hand launched the champagne bottle toward my head I unloaded a right cross that might have been fired from a cannon. It landed just high of his jaw bone, and he lurched backwards. I thought he was out cold, but he did a rapid back-pedal to try and stay upright. But his time was up. I hit him with a five-punch combination, slicing open both his eyebrows and smashing his nose into a profile changing monstrosity. As his head jarred back with the impact of each blow, drops of blood flicked through the air, spattering the clothing of bystanders who recoiled in horror.
Mr. T covered his smashed-in face and cowered. I grabbed his, blood-drenched shirt by the shoulders and shoved his face into the beer-stained carpet.
Then I stamped on him, again and again, until he lay there, motionless, like meat on a slab. I was vindicated, my honour saved - for now.
My friends rallied around and showered me with the respect that always followed the 'kill'. The more damage you did, the more respect you received.
Ironically I never wanted to fight anyone. I was frightened and used violence to hide my fear. The more fear I felt, the more faces I smashed, leaving behind a bloody trail and a karmic debt longer than your nan's nightie.
With hindsight and self-education I can see that I was wrong to think that violence was the solution to my problems. Freudian psychology informed me that my aggression was repressed anxieties made manifest, Jungism suggested that my shadow side was trying to punch its way out, my ex-wife said that I was just an aggressive bastard. I don’t know, maybe it was all of the above, what I do know is that the new-found information expanded my consciousness and confined my darker side like a speedy undertaker.
But at the time, with the information I was carrying, it was my truth. Now that truth has changed and I can walk away from confrontation with confidence.
Five years after our bloody encounter I shared a beer with Mr. T "Why did you kick off with me that night?" I asked.
"Ah, well, you know how it is," he said, "my missus had left me, my business had failed and I wanted to take it out on someone. I just chose the wrong bloke that's all."
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Philosophy and Opinion 
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