<p>" The kid who threw the ball thought he could get away with the assault without consequences. The OP’s response was a natural and proportionate consequence - one punch."</p>
<p>I agree with lots in your long, thoughtful post. This, however, I don’t agree with. I don’t think that it’s a proportionate consequence to punch someone who hits one in the face with a dodgeball.</p>
<p>Cussing them out, even throwing the ball hard at their back or something similar would be IMO proportionate if one believes in retaliation (which I don’t).</p>
<p>Well, I did not read all these posts, but I read the first page. From the situation OP describes, it’s very understandable even though it may be unacceptable. Well, actually, it depends on what kind of person threw the ball, was it obviously intentional, etc. Maybe I am going to come back to this thread in order to read these interesting arguments on my spare time. I always enjoy reading this kind of threads.
And people, I don’t think we can standarize what the OP should have done or justify/unjustify OP’s action (given that we all admit that violence is wrong) especially when it’s vague what exactly happened. This argument can go on forever - perceptions, characters, and beliefs are different for each of us.</p>
<p>Northstarmom, put it in context though. This was apparently not an isolated incident. The kid who threw the ball had a history of putting his hands on the OP in a manner that had an implicit threat of, if not actual, level of violence (slapping the OP’s cheek or otherwise putting his hands in the OP’s face). This was just the last of a series of incidents and was an intentional act of some force and shock to the OP. The OP’s punch, while in anger, was modulated in force (at least based on his own description) and was a single punch not intended to cause real damage (unfortunately it did, but that’s another issue). One punch in the after math of a series of acts designed to physically invade the OP and the last of which caused pain and shock, seems pretty proportionate to me. The consequences were not, however, (a red stung face vs a broken nose) and that’s where the whole risk of harm/judgement issue comes in. And issues of reflecting with maturity about how to handle these types of situations so as to avoid unwarranted risks of harm resulting from what might otherwise be deemed an appropriate response.</p>
<p>MichaelNKat, your long post and this previous one has put things into perspective IMHO. I think that ought to put the clamor to rest about whether or not the OP’s actions were justified and where he should go from here.</p>
<p>The guy was slapping the OP around first and then threw a ball at his face. It would have only gotten worse if the OP didn’t fight back but he was obviously wrong for breaking the kids nose. Of course he is sorry that he got suspended but he shouldn’t be sorry for fighting back.</p>
<p>This has been an interesting read, and I agree, I think MichaelNKat did a nice job of addressing and integrating multiple issues at play. I think that the differing opinions voiced here have to do in part with the fact that several issues are being addressed: developmental issues, sociocultural issues, social mor</p>
<p>unbelievable honestly unbelievable and these people call themselves adults it’s people like this that are gradually causing the downfall of a once great country</p>