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"Dealing With Lowlifes"

I'm all for people fighting. If it's organised between people who choose to be involved, doesn't drag in innocent people, and doesn't cause too much damage to nearby property.
Then it's virtually a sport.
If it's what a bunch of people want to do, let them kill each other for all I care.


But what about dealing with lowlife scum who go out looking to drag just anyone into a fight?

I figure most of the older members will have been there a few times - you're in a pub/club, out for a good time, and some knuckle-scraping moron, drunk beyond the capacity for intelligent thought (not that they ever had very much of it), trys to start something with you / a friend.

In the street you can usually just keep walking and nothing happens. In a club you can't.



Last night one, on a dancefloor, of the aformentioned nutsacks began eyeballing my friend.
It turned out he'd spilt / sprayed something down my friend's arm, who turns to see what's happening, and the fricking missing link is glaring and muttering at him.
We weren't looking for any trouble, my friend was obviously slightly annoyed, but would have happily settled for a mutual apology. Not going to happen with this guy.

My friend held this guy's stare. Probably not really a good idea to avoid trouble. Then ape-man started those arm gestures, towards bringing his fists up.
As the sober one (driving) I tried to diffuse the situation, went to have a friendly word with the monkey, along the lines of 'hey, don't worry about it'.
Just to seperate the two of them really, hoping he'd give up on it after the moment had passed.

His response to me was an aggressive 'you get the f*** away from me'.
I gave an accepting shrug to prevent him taking anything up with me (these idiots don't need a legitimate reason to go for you, but they do seem to need some minor cue to justify it to themselves), walked away, and fortunately that was the end of it.


So far that's always worked - hold yourself well, so that you don't look like a 'victim', be calm and don't be (or come across as) remotely aggressive, be polite, and leave as soon as possible.


But after it was over I felt pretty frustrated. Thinking about it, I don't really mind the utterly disrespectful attitude so much - I genuinely don't give a toss about his opinion of me.
It was just that shrug, saying 'fair enough - you insult me, and I'll go wonder off, like you say'.


Hmm. Is it possible to diffuse an aggressive drunk whilst retaining your dignity and some self-respect at the same time?

I too hate these lowlifes. It annoys me just how little you can do about it, what with walking away being the best solution.

I think everyone should take an IQ test, those who score high enough i.e. those who aren't morons, get issued with a taser. Strictly to be used for self-defence, obviously.

Problem is there are some real smart tw*ts out there!

Mr Snuggly wrote:
> But y'know, after a while, you just start getting sick of
> letting it all wash over you, right?


Exactly. Swallowing your pride to avoid trouble every time can get so frustrating.

These c**kfaces can say whatever they want, I don't care about their opinion. They can do whatever they want, so long as it doesn't interfere with the lives of decent people.
But when they actually affect you, when you have to compromise your self-respect in taking their crap...


Maybe I'll take some self-defence classes. I figure if they're drunk and I'm reasonably in control of myself then if they try anything, if I had a little training I should be able to take them every time.

EB, if they give me a bunch of crap, I stand up to them, they initiate violence against me and I come out on top, how would the police treat such a situation?

I know the legal angles:
If I don't go too far in protecting myself I'm fine, it's self-defence.
They're responsible for their actions when drunk.
Even blatant verbal incitement doesn't legally justify physical assault, so simply standing up for myself without initiating violence is fine.

But the manner in which the police treat something like this is of course different to how the courts do.


The thing is, I really don't want to get drawn into violence with anyone, but I'm so sick of soaking up so much crap just to avoid it.

They can be very manipulative. It is hard to swallow your pride, but if he hits you, always fight back, unless he is bigger, in which case just run....

If someone starts trying to hit you and you hit them so you can then walk away then it's self defence. If you give them a good kicking while they're on the floor, then you in trouble boy.

What if they start a fight with you, then you totally bust their arm up or something - so as to make sure you're able to walk away without them getting up and going for you again?

I love it when people walk up to me wanting a fight. Especially if it's some big headed idiot, nothing more satisfying than flooring someone like that.

English_Bloke wrote:
> If someone starts trying to hit you and you hit them so you can then
> walk away then it's self defence. If you give them a good kicking
> while they're on the floor, then you in trouble boy.

Hmmm. Where I live the townies are allowed to carry knives and bottles, where as we on the other hand (according to the police) are allowed to use no violence when being mugged.

Forest Fan wrote:
> Hmmm. Where I live the townies are allowed to carry knives and
> bottles.

I'm sure they're not allowed to carry knives. But still, it doesn't seem to stop half of these little neds carrying them around. Police should be allowed to stop anyone that looks suspicious and search them, without them being reported for harassment or whatever.

I remember someone walked up to me with a glass bottle once. The guy was half plastered though so he wasn't any trouble, I just knocked him on the back of the legs and he fell down. But if it had been a right violent person I don't know what would have happened.

The reason I got into personal fitness was because I was sure I'd end up in a fight one day. I spend four days a week basically training to fight (weights, punch bag etc) in the hope that I'll never have to use it.

I don't think I'm hard, but I know I can throw a punch, and take them. Physically I should be OK, it's just mentally I'm a bit crap at the whole fighting thing. After all, I am a middle class internet nerd. My first reaction is to always do ANYTHING to avoid a fight. I hate all the talking crap. I'd prefer them to either leave, or throw the first punch. I never have the bottle to do that myself, it's always up to them.

Hate, just HATE violent people. I could never go up and start on random people, but I see it all the time. They're like primates.

edit - Oh, and the girl I like is actually in to the hard man thing, so if anyone asks, I can tear phonebooks in half and chew glass.