When is it reasonable to punch someone?

[Todd4State]

The Jeffrey Simmons incident got me thinking. When is it reasonable to punch someone? I'm not saying that what he did was "right"- but when you talk about someone's family in a demeaning way I can understand.

If I went up to someone and called them a p**** and they punched me, I wouldn't be surprised.

And what if someone is cheating on someone's wife? I would consider that grounds for being punched.

I think as a society we look too much at the action and not enough at the cause of the action.

Thoughts?

[starkvegasdawg]

I haven't seen the video and only skimmed the reports, but it sounded as though she was in an active fight with her sister after disparaging his dead nephews. To me, it sounds like he was protecting his sister and sticking up for his family. Now it's easy to say that maybe he should have only punched her one time to end things, but in the heat of the moment that is nearly impossible to do. I remember reading an article from police that say when they are investigating a home invasion where the perpetrator was shot one thing they look at is the number of shots fired. They said in almost every legit self defense scenario there are multiple shots fired due to the adrenaline and fear of the homeowner. Basically, them acting out of instinct rather than anything else. Article went on to state that when the person is shot only one time they are more suspicious of this being maybe not quite as it seems because the homeowner is more in control of their emotions and in charge of the scene. Not that this is the case 100% of the time. Certainly not. But it is something that will draw a little more scrutiny.

Back to your question...I think the threshold for breaking someone's nose is pretty low. Certainly, your cheating spouse qualifies. Just getting called a name...to me that is not enough, but I'm not saying everybody should adhere to that. Like you, I wouldn't be surprised if someone took a swing at me.

[Mjoelner34]

If I went up to someone and called them a p**** and they punched me, I wouldn't be surprised. I'd go 6th grade on you and say "You are what you eat."

And what if someone is cheating on someone's wife? I would consider that grounds for being punched. I wouldn't punch, I'd shoot. Then, maybe follow that with a middle of the night house burning after I had an iron-clad alibi set up.




The thing is, everybody has different breaking points. My low end breaking point tends to deal with pain more than anger. I can't recall the last time I got mad enough that I wanted to hit someone but, the fear of hitting someone kept me from going to PT after knee surgery. If a Playboy model would have stressed my knee after I said stop and caused additional pain, I would have caved her face in without hesitation or regret. I can think about and rationalize anger but I react to pain and its generally when people just react without thinking that violence happens. BTW, walking 2 miles everyday at work and making multiple trips up and down 2 flights of stairs to my office did just fine taking the place of PT.

[BeastMan]

I think you're 100% right Todd. There is a point where someone getting punched should not be a surprise. I'm definitely not condoning senseless violence but society has turned antigagonistic and then as soon as they get handled physically, they run to the police press charges. This isn't politically correct but there are a ton of people out there that need their ass whopped to learn some damn respect for others.

[State82]

Z
there are a ton of people out there that need their ass whopped to learn some damn respect for others.

You got that right no doubt.

[Johnson85]

I think reasonable is the wrong lens to look at things from, but instead you should look at what standard results in a society we would all want to live in.

It'd be better in any individual case for a person to refrain from responding to anything other than a physical threat with violence. That said, the threat of an ass whooping is a civilizing influence, and it's civilizing on men and women.

Is the world a better or worse place because people, even girls, have to account for the fact that making a disparaging remark about a person's recently dead relative might result in an ass whooping (I have no clue if that's what happened here, but just using what other people have said as an example). I'd say in general the world is a better place because of that. On the other hand, the world is also generally a better place if strong people are discouraged from beating up weak people. I think for the given example, it's right to condemn and punish the strong person who beat up the weak person, but that the punishment should not be so harsh that nobody ever gives an ass whooping to somebody that makes disparaging comments about recently deceased persons to the deceased person's relatives.

[Political Hack]

I view violence as a potential form of conflict resolution. Nations use it. State and local governments use it. Sports make money off of it. For some reason it's frowned upon immediately if you beat someone up. I've been in lots of fights I felt justified in. Fortunately never been in trouble for any of them despite a few of them being pretty bad.

[greenbean]

If those gals would have been fixin' sammiches for the menfolk, none of this would have happened.