Stopping Salman From Getting Stabbed

"Eugene? Get over there...and make sure everything is OK." Right.

Former bouncers are always asked to bounce. (Photo by Annapaola Martin)

Aristotle talks about the nine types of virtues: wisdom; prudence; justice; fortitude; courage; liberality; magnificence; magnanimity; temperance. The church later winnowed them down to seven to match the seven deadly sins because, of course they did. And as we contemplate the free floating emptiness of “virtue” as a desired quality that no one can quite name — wasn’t Adolf Hitler a law-abiding, teetotaling, vegetarian who aggressively opposed animal cruelty? — I find myself honing in one of the more curious, read: dangerous, ones. That being, courage.

“There are two types of people,” says sports agent extraordinaire Sal Russo, referencing the virtues of Italian shipmaster Francesco Schettino who crashed his cruise ship Costa Concordia in 2012 while showing off for a woman not his wife, capsizing it, then fleeing the sinking ship while leaving 32 passengers and crew to die.

“The kinds that rush into burning buildings to rescue people,” and then pausing as though stating that water is wet and ice is cold, “and those that will express a heartfelt hope that the people rushing into the building to rescue people will be OK.”

With our thoughts and prayers it’s quite clear that most of us fall in the latter category, me included, so imagine my surprise when during one of the my historical bouts as a bouncer I get the word from my boss at the time.

“Clean?” Which is what he called me, on account of my shaved head. “That guy on the dance floor’s got a knife. Go take it away from him.”

“So, who’s covering the Salman Rushdie talk?” I could feel myself managing that magic trick where though you haven’t moved and can still be seen, you will yourself to be unseen.

They used to have us sitting in lifeguard chairs, fitting given that the club was called Paradise Beach. I was The Bouncer With the Perpetually Aggrieved Demeanor and getting out of my chair, whether it’s for dinner or knives, already put me on edge. But without hesitation I scrambled down the side ladder of the lifeguard chair and started snaking my away across the dance floor.

The song playing was “You’re Making It Hard for Me” and if memory serves correctly it’s about a guy getting an erection on the dance floor while “dancing real close.” I step up to the guy, so close that are bodies are touching, and more importantly I can feel if he makes a move to a pocketed knife or joined his hands to open one, assuming it wasn’t a dagger or some variation of a switchblade.

“Can I talk to you for a minute?” I breathe into his ear all the while being aware that any sudden motion of his will require me to, with extreme prejudice, make sure it is not me who dies.

He nods and we walk to the back section out of view of the public.

“I need to check your pockets.” I am keyed up. Not nervous or scared. Just a giant nerve and dialed in to any deviations from “sure. Go ahead.”

I pat him down, my hands blind and my eyes boring into his since if this is a man I have to kill I want him to know I will if I have to and I want to be the first to know if he’s going to make me have to.

He is completely docile. I don’t lard it up with that weird cop quasi-alpha male posturing in hope that I frighten him into compliance. I just need to go home alive and I am sure his mother wants that too.

I let him walk off and I make my way back to the chair. My boss comes over to me, a smile playing on his face.

“He have anything?”

I tell him no and he nods before it dawns on me that he may never have had anything. My guess? This was a test and it was a test I had passed. A test of what? Some sort of Aristotelian virtue? Mental note was made: I’m not a cat’s-paw for any Last Temptations of Eugene S. Robinson. Fuck that.

“So, who’s covering the Salman Rushdie talk?” I could feel myself managing that magic trick where though you haven’t moved and can still be seen, you will yourself to be unseen. The occasion was a 2018 festival in New York’s Central Park, well after his Satanic Verses had generated a worldwide Islamic bounty on his head for blasphemy. There had been a public claim made that security would be heightened during his talk but once a bouncer, always a bouncer, and I could see that very much of nothing unusual had been done security-wise.

“Eugene? Why don’t you head over?” I worked for a tyrant and while the question marks were there, there were really no questions marks involved as he wasn’t really asking a question. He was making an assignment since it was widely known that I had been a bouncer. Known and thus calculated that if shit were to jump off, I could have been useful/helpful.

Me dead benefits no one that I care about and does, in fact, actually hurt them. And therefore I don’t actually hurt people I care about.

But since becoming a father, my willingness to step into the breach, had winnowed down to zero. It’s not so much cowardice as it is aggressive self-interest. Me dead benefits no one that I care about and does, in fact, actually hurt them. And therefore I don’t actually hurt people I care about.

So standing as far back in the room as I physically can I watch and listen to Rushdie who is as witty and urbane as all get out. I know sincerity is everything and once you got that faked you got it made, in this instance though I believe him. More than that, after an hour, I really like him. So hearing that he was stabbed in the face and the neck a few days ago both took me back and saddened me.

I could feel in Central Park that it was felt, generally, that 1988, when his Satanic Verses had come out, was a long time ago and the fatwa against him for writing it was a historical curiosity. I could also feel, keenly, something attributed to Netanyahu: “given the history of my people on this planet if I am given the choice between overreacting and underreacting, I will always choose the former.”

Likewise, Schettino style, it seems to me the first order of the day is that I end it alive, if possible. Rushdie, as witty and urbane as he was, needed to add to his collection of virtues, paranoia. Is there any other attitude/characteristic worth bringing to bear when someone, anyone, carries with them the possibility of ending your life and a desire to do so?

In any case my days as bouncer had ended unceremoniously enough. Or maybe, ceremoniously, enough. Breaking up a fight I had been waylaid by three men. We subdued them but in the scuffle my jaw was injured and when I asked the club to spring for x-rays I was told to “go chew some gum.”

Which set up the circumstance of the next’s night’s activities perfectly: breaking up a fight between five guys I merely attacked them all, windmilling in a melee attack that had convinced the club that I was a liability for them.

I, however, had never felt more free, just, courageous, magnificent and, well, virtuous. Salman, as you’re mending (and I will send this to you since I think our post-talk chat makes this make sense), I will suggest that you take this core truth as your truth next time it comes time to return to the stage.

Thus expressed…my heartfelt hope? That you will be OK out there. I know I will.