# Ever been in a fight? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 27, 2011, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577 "2011-12-27T23:54:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2011, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/1 "2011-12-27T23:54:26Z")
What is it about this time of year? Almost a year ago today I started a thread about self-defence following a close shave with a drunk twat. I got rid of him by threatening to call the police, much to his chagrin. Just experienced another potential sticky situation. In the aforementioned thread someone recommended a book called _Meditations on Violence_, by Rory Miller who is an experienced prison guard and has seen more ugly scenarios than I have hot dinners. I’m glad it was recommended, because it potentially saved me a pasting. In it, he describes what he calls the [“Monkey Dance”](http://ymaa.com/articles/violence-dynamics); a ritualistic male precursor to a fight. In a public house I was able to recognise these signs and save myself a bit of bother - despite being in pretty good shape and knowing a fair amount of Muay Thai my drunken assailants were both plural, which is already a losing proposition, and built like brick shithouses. The Monkey Dance is as follows; 1. Eye contact and hard stares. 2. Verbal challenges. 3. Closing the distance. 4. Finger pokes and pushes. 5. Roundhouse swing with dominant hand. I twigged the pattern around the time 3 was turning into 4, remembering the advice not to play it - it plays you - and to short-circuit the pattern by acting bored. Eventually I managed to laugh off and joke away the pair before I got a roundhouse thrown at me. If I’d have cocked it up there’s no doubt that I would have played to my strengths and sprinted the hell out of dodge - call me a pussy for thinking of running away but it would be a fight I would lose. In the spirit of that book, brutally deconstructing and disabusing Hollywood fantasy and elaborate scenarios envisioned in your own head where you act the hero, tell me about your experiences. The times you got into a scrap - not a verbal altercation (although, as mentioned, this can be a prelude) but a someone attempting to pay you an extremely physical discourtesy. How’d you get into the situation and how’d it go? ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/2 "2011-12-28T00:25:43Z")
Couple of times in high school. Won one and the other was broken up by a nearby teacher before it really got started; the latter was in a boys’ room on my way to the bus. A jerk who inexplicably developed a dislike for me and his buddy happened to be in there. I don’t do any martial arts but was pretty good with my feet that day. Dude ended up bouncing off the walls a few times and finally hit the floor while his buddy just watched. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/3 "2011-12-28T00:34:16Z")
:smack: Was supposed to be “former”, not “latter”. ---
**Author:** ![Tracyfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f14d63/32.png) [@Tracyfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tracyfish)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/4 "2011-12-28T00:44:32Z")
It wasn’t quite a fight, but it could’ve gone that way. A girl in high school tried to start a fight with me at lunch. It started when I picked up a penny that was on the floor near her. Later I found out she thought I’d thrown it at her friends. When I tried to walk away, she followed me and tried to get me to punch her. When I wouldn’t take the bait, she grabbed the back of my hair and pulled hard. I went to the principal’s office with a friend of mine who recognized her. She got an in-school suspension and didn’t bother me again. I don’t think I even saw the girl again after that, or I must not have recognized her. ---
**Author:** ![UFC\_Is\_Sux](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/46a35a/32.png) [@UFC\_Is\_Sux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UFC_Is_Sux)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/5 "2011-12-28T00:45:25Z")
A baker’s dozen fights in school (a few of which I won), and 3 knockdown drag-out brawls in various watering holes around the world. Fisticuffs is too much like work for me these days - I follow Mr. Miyagi’s sage advice that “Best way to win fight is no be there.” ---
**Author:** ![Becky2844](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Becky2844](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Becky2844)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/6 "2011-12-28T00:56:05Z")
**Mr.Kobayashi** I don’t know who you are but you’re my kinda guy. And yeah, it was _kind of_ pussy to think about running away, but you’d probably already “been there” a time or two and learned that certain equations don’t work out to ones favor, even after mulling over that new math and everything. Myself—a few that I won when younger. When older, a few that I lost but not without a fight. I channeled that into martial arts for awhile, really enjoyed it and learned how to not fight, too. But I still keep one ear cocked. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/7 "2011-12-28T01:13:15Z")
Last actual fight I got into was in 9th grade. I won it. 🙂 I went to a 4 year Catholic HS. This was feed by a number of k-8 schools from different Churches in the city. So there was a bit of rivalry between kids from the different feeder schools. So this one guy decided that I would be his victim early on. Registration day actually. This went on for about 6 weeks. We had several classes together. (small school) So one day, sick of his shit I said we should just fight it out after school. He accepted but we didn’t make it to 3. No in PE he decided to push my face into the water fountain in the locker room and I just belted him. Laid him out but I was soon on top of him giving him a beating. He went home early. (he lived less than a block from school) His empty seat in sixth period English said it all. He didn’t bother me much after that. Others did but it never came to blows. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/8 "2011-12-28T01:56:02Z")
Multiple fights in school since I was a favorite target for bullying; on occasion it was pretty much the whole class against me. That’s the sort of thing that happens when the teachers wander off and leave the classroom fairly often. As an adult only once; I was attacked by two guys who just came up, punched & hit me then ran off when someone yelled at them. I’ve no idea why they attacked me. ---
**Author:** ![UFC\_Is\_Sux](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/46a35a/32.png) [@UFC\_Is\_Sux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UFC_Is_Sux)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/9 "2011-12-28T02:01:08Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > As an adult only once; I was attacked by two guys who just came up, punched & hit me then ran off when someone yelled at them. I’ve no idea why they attacked me. Google “Knockout King”, then count your lucky stars. [http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/unprovoked-attacks-heart-knockout-king-15227737#.Tvp4O\_ItrkU](http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/unprovoked-attacks-heart-knockout-king-15227737#.Tvp4O_ItrkU) ---
**Author:** ![Becky2844](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Becky2844](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Becky2844)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/10 "2011-12-28T03:22:24Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Multiple fights in school since I was a favorite target for bullying; on occasion it was pretty much the whole class against me. That’s the sort of thing that happens when the teachers wander off and leave the classroom fairly often. > > As an adult only once; I was attacked by two guys who just came up, punched & hit me then ran off when someone yelled at them. I’ve no idea why they attacked me. That’s called “getting sucker-punched.” That’s why I keep one ear cocked. ---
**Author:** ![slm2955](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c6cbf5/32.png) [@slm2955](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slm2955)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/11 "2011-12-28T03:25:43Z")
Lots of times in my younger yrs…over the dumbest things too like BOYS! ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/12 "2011-12-28T03:33:46Z")
[QUOTE=Der Trihs] As an adult only once; I was attacked by two guys who just came up, punched & hit me then ran off when someone yelled at them. I’ve no idea why they attacked me. [/QUOTE] Was it fairly recently? I’ve heard that there is some new game that teens like to play where they pick out someone and then try and beat the crap out of them or knock them out in one punch in a drive by. Could have been something like that. > [@](#): > > In it, he describes what he calls the “Monkey Dance”; a ritualistic male precursor to a fight. In a public house I was able to recognise these signs and save myself a bit of bother - despite being in pretty good shape and knowing a fair amount of Muay Thai my drunken assailants were both plural, which is already a losing proposition, and built like brick shithouses. The Monkey Dance is as follows; > > 1. Eye contact and hard stares. > 2. Verbal challenges. > 3. Closing the distance. > 4. Finger pokes and pushes. > 5. Roundhouse swing with dominant hand. That hasn’t been my experience with fights. Usually you get shouting, and pushing, followed by perhaps a flurry of really badly thrown punches and or kicks and then two guys rolling around on the ground until someone gives up. Either that or large groups of folks doing essentially the same things, though perhaps with knives or other hard objects in their hands. People, even ‘gangsta’ types are singularly bad at fighting, in my experience, and generally fall into the same patterns, even those weird souls who for reasons unknown to me LIKE to fight. As for myself, I sadly have to admit that I’ve been in my share of fights, even relatively recently in my life. I don’t like to fight, but I seem to be a magnet for guys who just want to stomp on a short, pudgy by dashingly handsome Hispanic male. Not sure why, since I’m really a nice guy. :eek: -XT ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/13 "2011-12-28T03:51:44Z")
Yes. It wasn’t fun. It hurt like hell and my face was swollen for a week. I had an interview the next day for a job I really wanted & quite obviously I was dropped from any consideration at all. I found out that courts smell like saw-dust & fear. I didn’t start it. I didn’t throw the 1st, or 2nd or possibly even the 3rd punch (it was hazy at that point). I did break his nose. And to this day, I wish I’d walked away. …even though he was a politician. ---
**Author:** ![FlyByNight512](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/82dd89/32.png) [@FlyByNight512](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlyByNight512)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/14 "2011-12-28T04:20:19Z")
Thanks for the book recommendation, I just put it on hold at the library. As a petite woman, if I get into a situation where I have to fight I’ve already lost. I put a lot of energy into not giving people a reason or opportunity to pick on me. The closest I’ve come to fighting as an adult (which admittedly was not very close) is here: [Little Shits on a Train](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=636216) ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/15 "2011-12-28T06:46:16Z")
Yes, I stepped in to stop a guy from beating on his ex-girlfriend. I ended up with like 60 stitches, he ended up spending spending some time in an ER too, and the rest of the night in jail. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/16 "2011-12-28T06:59:00Z")
Not since Junior High. Four years of Security work and I touched one person in all that time. I peeled a drunken gang member off another drunken gang member’s back because he was choking him out from behind. Then I shoved him out the door. No fight ensued other than the other eight guys punching the crap out of each other for like 30 seconds, and when I got back to them, it was over. My employer got asked to not send me back because I hadn’t just waded into them\*. Sure, one (then) 46 year old guy armed with nothing but a gun he isn’t about to draw in a crowded restaurant is going to wade into 10 drunken 20-somethings and somehow put an end to their fight _using violence!_ Yeah, sure. - A couple of weeks before that they had asked another one of our people not to come back because he did wade in swinging. Consistency was not their forte. Beyond that I’ve thrown exactly two blows at other people in 30 years, both in self defense, and both incidents stopped right there BECAUSE I showed I would fight back. The second one didn’t even land. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/17 "2011-12-28T08:07:37Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > Was it fairly recently? I’ve heard that there is some new game that teens like to play where they pick out someone and then try and beat the crap out of them or knock them out in one punch in a drive by. Could have been something like that. No, it was 10 years ago give or take a few I think. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/18 "2011-12-28T13:34:44Z")
I’ve known a couple of people who were jumped, sucker punched in the face and robbed. One of them was a very nice woman who worked at the post office where I serviced an ATM. It looked pretty nasty. She had walked out of her house and out to her car in her drive way, this guy jumped out, absolutely creamed her on the side of the face, grabbed her purse and ran. The other guy was younger. He had been walking downtown when two guys jumped out of the alley, did the same heavy punch to the side of his face, grabbed his wallet and ran. Kind of a Smash-and-Grab robbery technique, only against your face. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/19 "2011-12-28T13:54:17Z")
I haven’t been in a fight since early high school. I think the lack of alcohol in my life has a bit to do with that. 😉 I’ve posted it before (a few years ago… shit, almost 8 years ago(!)), but here’s the tale of my most successful fight… > [@](#): > > It was the sixth grade and I was your regular… well, “geek” was the word that came to mind, but “unknown” was more like it as I was as bored with the geek circles as I was with the popular kids, etc… by the time I got into high school, my apathy had increased to the point where I participated in zero extra-curricular activities, went to zero sporting events, danced at zero dances, etc. And if you think that is something, in Georgia back then, high school lasted for **five** years instead of the normal 3 or 4 - imagine going to high school for five years and not having a single thing listed by your name in the yearbook during your senior year. In short: I just didn’t want to be bothered. > > Unfortunately, in the sixth grade there was a guy by the name of… Michael, iirc. Mike was one of those insufferable bastards we all knew in school - the bully who impressed his friends with his fists and his mouth, particularly against the quiet, geeky types. Luckily I was able to avoid him for the first 2 quarters of school (um, 1.5 semesters?), but a showdown was brewing and it came in March. > > Now, I’m a lover and not a fighter ( 😉 ) but I have been in a few schoolyard scrapes before… but that was no help as Mike was a fighter, a fighter who had the sense to wait a few seconds expertly sizing up his opponent before going in for the kill.\* So when the time and date was set, I gotta tell you I was scared shiiteless. Backing down was an option; going home by a different route was too an option… after all, a few other kids had done so w/o getting beat up by Mike. Why not I? Why should I get my ass pounded? Yeah, he’ll go back to harassing me, but is that so bad? > > Yes, oh yeah, that would be a hundred times worse than an ass-beating. Regardless of what happened, I at least was going to show up - I wasn’t going to be like Brian Hambrick, who didn’t show up for his fight and became the meekest guy in school after that, the kid that even the losers picked on - a state that existed for the next 6 years and likely into college. Fvck that! > > So I got to the fight, on the corner of Midvale and Cliffchest, and Mike was already there. We took off our jackets as the other kids stood back, forming the circle, and putting up our fists, the fight started. > > Ow! Fuck! Damn, that hurt! Mike came out a little strong and a lot cocky, hitting me on the shoulder and the ear. I countered with a couple of jabs, one of which connected a bit because Mike backed off a little for a couple of seconds. The kids were yelling at the both of us of course, but I have no idea who’s (if any) side the crowd was on… usually they just want to see a good fight. > > As Mike backed off, the look in his eye made it clear all of a sudden: If this doesn’t end soon, I’m going to get seriously hurt. Hoping to get one good shot in, I looked over Mike’s shoulder as he came in, pointed behind him and yelled > > “LOOK!!!” > > Whereupon the dumb sunofabitch actually looked behind him, allowing me to land the most perfect of rights smack into his jaw - the greatest punch I have ever thrown. Sadly it wasn’t my punch that knocked him out, it was his head hitting the pavement… but he was knocked out cold: I had beaten the bully! > > Mike got up after a few minutes, groggy as all hell, and had to get one or two of his friends to help him home. Me, I just walked on home with my one friend, Chris Forsyth, talking about Star Wars and stuff. > > I was never picked on again for the rest of my school days. Oh, I had people I had issues with, and one or two more fights, but it wasn’t the same, you know? > > \*As seen through my sixth-grade eyes. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2011, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577/20 "2011-12-28T13:56:50Z")
I was once knocked out by a big Samoan, but I wouldn’t call it a fight, as I never got to take a swing. I came out of it better than my buddy though, who ran into the same man-mountain after he finished with me. Guy broke his collarbone. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-in-a-fight/607577.md?page=2)