Went with a date to an open mic, people were trying their hand at stand-up for free.

The barkeep asks if I want anything to drink upon my arrival. I avoid alcohol most days, so I just ask for a water; my friend gets nothing. Takes like 4 seconds or less to fill my glass, we grab our seats. Plenty of other people are drinking real stuff, though.

Eventually halfway through the show, the bartender takes my empty glass; I ask if I could have another. They seem a little fritzy and say sure, but I'd have to pick it up all the way at the bar, if I want that. I say no thanks.

The show goes well, but a comedian says at the start of their set, looking at/around my table, "Even if you just get a water, tip your waitstaff, they are very hard workers and we need to show our appreciation!"

Is this normal for open mics, where you're pressured/asked to tip the barstaff even if you get water and/or nothing? Will not tipping affect if they continue doing open mics, or?

I chose not to tip, since four seconds of effort and a little sass when I asked for another glass is.... well, I don't know. I don't go to bars much anyway, but is that normal?

EDIT 11/5/2023: Wow, this blew up! Damn! For context reasons, I'm a chick; the establishment was a bar, not a comedy club, my date was a dude (my friend; more of a platonic hangout, but I said 'date' since I thought it polite?). Went to support a friend who was a comedian trying his hand there. I tend to avoid alcohol, it's in the first sentence of the post; calling me broke is amusing though. Didn't see non-alcoholic options, and was thirsty, alright?

I asked genuinely since I want to make sure that me not tipping didn't affect the ability to do open mics at the bar venue further, everyone else there got alcohol though. Just wanna know how it works for future reference. Also, I do apologize if I offended anyone (mostly), I avoid bars entirely and see people here complain over getting asked to tip on someone passing them a beer. Seems like its on the fence about 'screw you unpaying customer' (I can see that) and 'its just a glass of water, they didn't lose profits'.

EDIT 2: I recommend anger management and reading comprehension classes, to some of you here... Anyway, they didn't have food, and no offered non-alcoholic options. I even re-checked the menu today. But I will take into consideration asking if soda is available to still slide the venue cash as someone filling up a seat, that's a fair expectation and I thank anyone who told me of that to make me aware! I felt bad, but there weren't many options to me there. but do I tip on the soda-idk. I went to a second open mic after the first with much better options all around, which I appreciated. Also, always bringing cash to tip the comedians, but surprisingly they didn't offer that either, so I was confused on why to tip the bartender for a single glass of water they most likely forgot they even poured, over the comedians putting on a show and starting out, yknow?

I think a 'one drink/item minimum' would be cool to let people know when entering, for the naive and autistic, (like me,) people who never go to dive bars at all. And then anyone else who most likely was gonna drink anyway aren't affected. "We have a one item minimum here, but if you don't drink alcohol, we have Sprite" seems like a good resolution. Any place I've been that had that, usually made it easy all around.

But the comedians and guests had a blast, barstaff didn't have more than a 20 second interaction with me and it was fine, just a bit matter-of-factly about me grabbing the second water from the bar (I didn't wanna loudly shuffle and shamble through tables to disturb anyone for it). No, the bartender didn't wanna murder me and wasn't enraged by me asking for a second glass at all, dude forgot I existed past grabbing my glass from my table when it emptied; nor did the business owner, nor the comedians, request me thrown out Bel Air style. Chill out. And thanks for the insight, I do really appreciate it, genuinely!