Aug 18, 2012 was the second time I visited Bar 244, my friends and I thought we could give them a second chance after treating us poorly the first time we went there a couple months ago. We were a group of 12 where 10 of us got in paid cover and started ordering drinks. After a couple minutes we noticed that the birthday boy and another one of our friends did not get in because the bouncers thought they were too drunk. As a alcohol selling establishment they are within their right to refuse entry. Naturally as a group we wanted to stay together so we requested that the bouncers return our cover charge and we would be on our way, which we thought was a reasonable request given we had only stayed for 5 minutes. Almost immediately the bouncers threw the drinks from our hands and shoved us out of the club. When I tried to reason with them one bouncer told me "that's just the way it has to be" and to "just go with it". A number of bouncers surrounded us and started to use unnecessary force. We ended up leaving after having our drinks taken from us, not having the cover fee returned to us and being treated poorly/abusively. I would not recommend going to this club as they treat label patrons as thugs and have a throw out and don't ask questions policy.
As I mentioned earlier this was similar to our previous experience where one of our friends was left outside and called a "sl*t" by the owner/manager. When I confronted the manager about this he said, "she deserves it".
Our group consists of working engineers and other professional conduct ourselves in a respectful manner and are not deserving of such a treatment. If you want to have an enjoyable night out on the town then stay clear of this establishment. Toronto has many more places that will treat you with the respect you deserve.