I'm always interested to see how people handle conflict or strife on a personal level. At work, our office is mostly staffed with non-confrontational people. And I do mean NON confrontational. The level of stress and anger has to reach such a fever pitch before someone will ever actually say anything, it's unreal. The notable exceptions, of course, are the plant manager (who is a Chilean former Secret Service agent, interred for two years in a concentration camp when Pinochet was overthrown), and me. Honestly, I function very well in an environment where there is confrontation. I seem to have a higher tolerance for it than others. Also, and this is probably to my detriment, I look for a certain amount of argument in the guys I'm attracted to. If you can't debate and at least call it a draw with me in an argument, kiss it goodbye. I'm not interested in someone who's afraid to stand up to me. Focus: Are you confrontational? How do you handle conflict? Alt Focus: Best fight you've ever been in.
Yeah, the guy with the cat sandwich avatar is about to become a tough guy, sure. I'm pretty non confrontational in general, but I have my limits, just like everyone. If I can say "fuck it, this doesn't actually affect me," I avoid confrontation; by no means am I ever eager to argue or fight. However, if someone is directly fucking me over, or doing something that I think is legitimately shitty, I bring it up. I didn't use to, and it would always bother me after; I've found that if I bring something up with somebody and we work through it (however that ends up going) I feel much better immediately after. In terms of physical confrontation? Fuck that noise. I think I would do fine in a fight against some other random dude; I'm pretty athletic, was always good at contact sports, etc. But first of all, if the other dude actually trained in any kind of combat, I would be fucked. Even if he didn't though, lots of people who win fights walk away with a black eye, broken nose, broken hand, or whatever. That's just not worth it to me. I'm a handsome musician, I can't be having any of that.
I have no problem with confrontation, I am usually the one people turn to if something needs to be said, but everyone else is too chickenshit to voice it. I tend to be smooth if not funny about it, so things aren't usually too tense. I don't start physical fights, but I sure will finish them. Two pretty serious altercations I was in, I don't remember. I seemed to black out, and require restraint to stop. I avoid those situations.
I've been in my fair share, no need to get into details but I'll throw this one up from an old thread.
The most memorable fight I have ever been involved in was back when I was around 16. I have been in a few fights in my life, both alone and in groups but this stands out because of how serious it seemed at the time, but how lame it all is in reality. Me and a bunch of other guys from the neighbourhood used to meet up on the push bikes every day after school and ride around smoking weed, writing graffiti everywhere, looking for girls and just generally getting into trouble. There was another bunch of kids that lived in the neighbourhood over the main road and we used to clash whenever we saw each other because we were stupid young kids and thought we were tough guys defending our territory or something. Things started to heat up between the two groups when one of our guys slept with one of their girlfriends. It started a chain reaction where one of them stole one of our guys pushbikes, we gatecrashed one of their parties, someone did a lawn dig on one of our guys grass and to retaliate we went into their neighbourhood and tagged up the front of the deli they used to hang out at. This was a huge insult to them so we knew there was going to be a punch-up, it was just a matter of when and where. A few days after tagging up the deli, we were all riding across to the service station to get some drinks or whatever and the other group was waiting in the carpark. We rode up, dropped the bikes and started yelling at each other which ended up turning into a pretty big brawl, probably 30 or so kids going for it in the carpark of the local shops. All in all it would have been pretty even, no one could have claimed a “win” and everyone ended up with bumps and bruises to varying degrees. I ended up with a split lip and some sore ribs but gave out some good shots as well. The fight stopped when a bunch of older guys pulled up in their cars and everyone got out of there before they flogged us. Looking back, I’m not proud of terrorising the neighbourhood or vandalising property but I had some great fun and I have a whole heap of memories like this one looking back. Luckily for us, knifes and weapons weren’t really used back then and everyone could walk away. Kids these days haha.
I've only recently become somewhat confrontational, and it's made life a lot easier in some ways, at least opposed to letting people walk all over me. Someone still needs to push me for a while before I snap, but when I actually fight back it tends to work in my favor simply out of shock since I'm generally reserved and all of a sudden there I am being all feisty. The main thing that works against me is that I cry out every emotion, so if I get too worked up I just end up crying and that sort of ruins being intimidating. But if I can keep to a 1-4 minute smackdown, it's fine. The best fight I've ever had was with my dad over my sixteenth birthday cake. His girlfriend was baking it for me, and I asked for a chocolate buttercream cake. I don't remember exactly what the argument was over, but I think he was claiming that there was no such thing as a chocolate buttercream cake, and it evolved into this: Me: No, you're stupid. Chocolate buttercream cakes exist. Dad: No, you're stupid. Me: No, YOU'RE stupid. Dad: No, YOU'RE stupid. Me: No, YOU'RE STUPID. Dad: No, YOU'RE STUPID. Me: NO YOU'RE STUPID. Dad: NO YOU'RE STUPID. Me: NO YOU ARE THE ONE WHO IS STUPID. It was the best. I also enjoyed my one typically drunk college girl fight, where I went to a Halloween party, and that thing happened where as soon as I walked in the room some girl dressed as a slutty cop decided she didn't like me, and spent the rest of the party shoving past me and snickering to her friends etc. Many drinks later, she did whatever it was that she did, I asked her what the fuck her problem was, she told me, and I smacked her. Completely out of character, and my friends thought it was hilarious.
In my group, I was known as the "Guy Who Reasons With The Police" although I've been involved in one way or the other more than a few dozen dust-ups over the last 15 years all some out-of-control shit that never should have happened. That's the way all fights ALWAYS start. Something that could have been prevented. If kind or humble words can prevent fists, that's the first weapon I reach for each time. Some people regard talking your way out of things as chickenshit, but that is the opinion of a wannabe, insecure fuck. Fights suck, every single one of them.
I'm vocally confrontational and big enough that for the most part people don't tend to escalate arguments to physical level with me. Which is good - because my wrists are so fucked that I'd probably be sobbing like a little girl for a week if I did actually throw a punch. I did competitive martial arts and thought I was badass at the time, but that shit was a long time ago. The best 'fight' I've ever seen, hands down was in a gay bar years ago. A very drunk and very high drag queen was hitting on a fairly feminine twink who wasn't interested. He turned the drag queen down twice and she kept pushing and he was ignoring her. So she got pissed and threatened to claw his fucking eyes out, and dragged her nails down his face, just below his eye leaving red welts down his face. He twisted from the hip and delivered the most spectacular back hand I've ever seen. The drag queen he hit was taller than him and heavier, but drunk off her ass and in high heels. It was like cartoon violence as she tried to avoid the shot but wasn't fast enough. She was completely off her feet and horizontal. It felt like there was hang time before she landed. The guy who laid her out just turned back to his beer like it was nothing while the rest of the crowd was looking at each other with 'did that shit just happen?' expressions. The bouncers heard the crash as she landed and came to break up the fight, but just found an unconscious drag queen with her balls hanging out. The collective agreement was that she was drunk and fell. Fuck her for being a bitch. There was a line of people buying the guy drinks after that.
My best fight that I witnessed? It probably decribes why I value my friends so highly, despite the fact that they are in a sense, animals. On my night off we were at the bar that I worked at drinking in a booth with my friends which included my roommate El Nino, an impulsive Gold Glove-level boxer who looks like a CK Model and when he turned ten years old decided to stop being afraid of ANYTHING on this earth and sticking with that philosophy. I went to the bar to get drinks, and me being of average height a pair of drunk juice monkeys decided to hassle me, and one threw a handful of straws on me. They didn't know I worked there and obviously were looking for an excuse to punch somebody out. Naturally I can't stir up trouble in the bar I work at, but El Nino has other ideas. He's already seen what happened, he's on his way with that 10,000 mile stare buried in his dead eyes and decides he's going to break the ice: EL NINO: (with sarcasm) What happened? Did somebody throw straws at you? ME: (relenting) Yeah... EL NINO: Who was it? (shoving a finger in the one guy's face) THESE FUCKING NERDS RIGHT HERE!?!?! They took one step at him, he threw two right crosses, and two meatheads hit the floor out fucking cold on top of each other like wet pasta noodles slipping out of your hand. When he hit these guys, it was like somebody slamming a ripe watermelon on the pavement. SMACK SMACK. Don't let the bed bugs bite. Blinked, and you would have missed it. El Nino is skilled at hands, but not damage control: MANAGER: (to me, finding the two knocked out guys) Umm, dude, What in the flying FUCK just happened here? EL NINO: These guys are really loaded and just passed out on each other ME: Really? Terrible. Even I have to call Shenanigans on that one. MANAGER: Leave. NOW.
I don't do physical confrontation. I was at the beach over the summer and somehow the group I was with got on the topic of MMA nicknames that we would use if we ever were in the Octogon. Someones was "Endless Pleasure", another persons was "Gingervitus", and mine was "Still Running." The joke was that I would set up a get away route and once the opponent got in the ring I would take off, flee, hop into a waiting car, get to an airport, and get the first ticket I could to Greenland. It doesn't get much less confrontational than that. I was always pretty small up until senior year of high school (I grew 8 inches between the end of junior year, and the end of senior year), which I attribute to my lack of aggression. I'm also extremely skinny and have never been able to throw around weight in sports and whatnot, so I learned to avoid contact. I have been in a fight though, despite what my above post may have lead to you believe. In 9th grade I played varsity soccer, and before one of our away games the team was hanging around in front of the school waiting for the bus. There was this loaded douche that was on the team that no one liked, and while waiting my friend Bean grabbed one of his new cleats to check them out. This smarmy little snot grabbed it out of his hand while lightly slapping Bean in the face. Bean was a pretty big dude, thick and stout, and he was livid. When the kid realized what he'd done, he handed the shoe back and let him check it out, but when he did Bean took it and tossed it to me. We tossed it back and forth a few times taunting the kid, threatening to get the cleat wet (he loved those fucking cleats), typical high school shit. Of course out of me and Bean, the kid decides to go after me. I dodge him for a bit, but then I realize that he was legitimately angry and was coming after me like a spider monkey. We basically just grappled a bit, but he was bigger than me so I knew I had to get out quickly. He started throwing punches, so I just hopped on his back and put him in a surprisingly solid headlock. He struggled and tried to throw me off, but I wasn't letting go (I was like 5'3'' and this kid was like 5'7'', but he weighed a lot more) and after a bit the team had surrounded us as I was headlocking this kid on the curb. I kept asking him if he had had enough yet, because I really didn't want to fight and was more just defending myself. Finally he said he gave up, so I let him out. Wrong move. I had stepped back and was turning to get outside the circle when I felt a crack to the side of the face. I got sucker-punched. Hard. I saw stars...planets...galaxies... you name it. I dropped to one knee and turned around and saw this kid standing there looking at me with this expression on his face like "oh shit." I was woozy and had just suffered the mildest of concussions, but I saw fucking red. My sympathetic nervous system screamed overrode my flight response, screaming "FIGHT THIS MOTHER FUCKER!" And before I knew it, my foot had swiftly connected with his balls. He went down hard and the entirely team just hushed up and didn't know what to do. Now, I know this was a pussy move, and I still think it is hilarious that this was my first response. To this day I have never felt a man deserved a nutkick more than this kid, and honestly, if I went back, I'd do it the same way. It should be a law, if you get suckerpunched, you get one solid shot at the pussy-who-hit-you's balls. So when the coach arrived with the bus he found one kid with a nasty bruise and cut on my cheekbone with bloody paper towels, and another kid laying on the ground still recovering from the nutsmash he brought on himself. (Now that I write this out, it sounds like I was bullying this kid to begin with, so I guess I deserved it.)
It wasn't so much a "fight" that started this, but it ended up like something out of a movie. Many years back, I was out at a nightclub with a bunch of friends from work. This particular club was well known for being packed wall to wall and it was impossible to take half a step anywhere without bumping into someone. One of the secretaries had brought her boyfriend along. He was a bit of a guido before guidos were known as such, and they'd always had a fiery relationship. I was standing near the bar, about ten feet away from them, when I saw him saying something into her ear. She turned around and bitch slapped him across the face so hard you could hear it over the music. Within a couple of seconds, three or four security gorillas came wading through the crowd - bowling people out of the road. This must have caused many spilled drinks and hurt feelings because it started several pushing matches which rapidly degenerated into outright fights... as much as you can when hemmed in together. It took a while to thread our way out of the place without getting caught in a headlock by the security, who were grabbing everyone they could lay a hand on. When we managed to get out, there were the two lovebirds making up - rather obviously and noisily. I have no idea how they managed to get out.
Focus: Are you confrontational? How do you handle conflict? I'm not confrontational at all and I'm good at defusing things before they get out of hand. I compete in Muay Thai/BJJ (and hopefully, soon MMA) so I'm not afraid to deal with conflict when it comes down to it. That being said, fighting is rarely necessary and I don't get involved in fights over stupid bullshit because I think it's petty. I handle conflict by being decisive. If I'm in a situation where things have a potential to get violent, I immediately size things up to see if I should either (a) stay calm and defuse the situation (the right call 99% of the time) or (b) defend myself/someone I care about. However, I rarely get tested or provoked by people, even working as a bouncer. I don't look like an intimidating dude by any means (people who saw me during the Toronto meet-up can attest to this) but I am a big, tall guy so I think that gives me an advantage that other people don't.
I'm not very confrontational at all. I don't know if I'm just being a pushover or if I'm just chill (I feel like I'm being chill, but I could just be a pushover.) but I don't get into too many fights. As a kid, though... The best fight I ever had was over leaf piles. It was 3rd grade and I was having a leaf pile competition with this girl in my class (I went to catholic school, our playground was a parking lot. Don't judge me.) Anyway, this bitch starts kicking my leaf pile so that her's would be bigger. I don't know at what point the fight started, but it ended with me with my hands around her neck, hanging off her back, using her neck to hold myself up. Just as a side note, that girl went on to drop out of high school our freshman year, get pregnant at least three times, steal a car, crash that car with her kids in it, and get arrested for auto theft and reckless endangerment of a minor all before her 21st birthday.
In general I'd say I rather avoid confrontation, to a point where I wouldn't say if something bothered me about other people's behavior. I'm trying to change that, and I'm seeing slow progress, because it's something that I don't really like about myself. On the physical side? Never been in a real fight, but it was close a few times. I'm not really that eager to be in a fight, so I usually try to calm things down, being relatively tall and athletic helps a lot. I have no idea how I'd handle myself in a real fight, I do combat sports, but it's something completely different to fight with someone when he wears boxing gloves and you know that he doesn't want to seriously hurt you. If someone really hit me, even if I block it, I don't know how I'd react, maybe I'd remember what I know about fighting. But it's also entirely possible that I'd be too stunned in the first moment that I don't react at all.
The last five years or so, I've been a pretty confrontational dude, both verbally and physically, and I've been in my fair share of fights, shoving matches, yelling contests, staredowns, et cetera (thankfully, I still managed to preserve my dignity in all such encounters and have yet to remove my shirt or shout "HOLD ME BACK, BROS!"). Part of the reason for this is, I assume, the fact that London is infested by vile toolbags, particularly of the chinstrap-toting, diamond-studded, shaved-eyebrow, think-they're-black-guys-from-Detroit variety. I mean, you go out to a bar or club and there is literally no avoiding these people (middle-eastern guys seem especially prone to this malady, for some reason) and at some point, it is almost guaranteed that one of them WILL shove, eyeball, or otherwise harass you in some way shape or form. I have no idea if these guys actually think they're as hard as their deluded fantasies suggest, or if they're just afraid that all the lies they've told their friends about "jackin' mothafuckas up" will finally be revealed as the bullshit they are, but my God do they get on my nerves. Hence the inevitable escalation. The other reason is what I like to think of as the "RPG Paradox", that is that precisely BECAUSE I'm big, tall, and not especially friendly-looking, people will sometimes get aggressive with me for no good reason, rather than bowing down because they're physically outmatched. Other big dudes will probably be familiar with this as well. Maybe they think that if they defeat the boss he'll drop more gold and better loot or something. I dunno. Alt. Focus: This isn't necessarily the best fight I've ever been in or witnessed, but it was definitely the oddest, and to this day a lot of people still don't believe it actually happened. Mostly because it happened ON A GODDAMNED PLANE. About a year ago, I set out to fly home for Christmas. I should note that I'm not a fan of airline travel at the best of times, because the wonder of being able to soar above the clouds, devouring miles at unimaginable speeds for what is, after all, a relatively low price compared to what you get is entirely lost when you factor in screaming children, unending lines of sweaty, unwashed twats with bags the size of coffins, cuntish airport security employees, and having to contort my 6'5'' frame into a seat meant to accommodate a small child. However, this year I was especially cagey because we'd just gotten a light dusting of snow at Heathrow Airport, which despite being the busiest airport in Europe (if not the world, even?) is unable to cope with more than a half-inch of powder without going into utter meltdown and shutting down for days at a time for literally NO GODDAMNED REASON. Given that the previous year I'd had to take three cabs, three express trains, an overnight sleeper train and a fucking ferry just to get home in time for Christmas because the airport couldn't unfuck itself in less than three days, I wasn't that optimistic. I managed to board the plane without incident, in and of itself a good sign, and I was actually beginning to get my hopes up until, right after we'd finished boarding, the captain made an announcement: due to the weather conditions we'd have to wait in a queue until one of the two (count'em, TWO) de-icers available got round to defrosting our plane (quite why a plane that routinely flies up where it's -40C needs de-icing when it's -2C, I really couldn't say). Meanwhile, it was snowing again, so there was a very real possibility we'd all be made to disembark. Heathrow Airport is a fucking cocktease. FOUR MOTHERFUCKING HOURS LATER, my rage was now at a slow simmer, particularly as I'd been unable to get an emergency exit seat and I couldn't feel my knees any more. Every half hour or so, the Captain would compound our misery by giving us a status update over the intercom system. However, this time, it was pretty much impossible to hear because of one guy, who we'll call The Douche, who was complaining loudly that it was all bullshit, that everything sucked, et cetera. Perfectly laudable sentiments in and of themselves, but I was rather hoping that the captain had more important shit to say. A nice old lady must've felt the same way because she very politely asked the Douche if he could please be quiet while the captain made his announcement. He responded to this perfectly reasonable request by flying into a complete tantrum, screaming "FUCK YOU BITCH, I CAN YELL AS LOUD AS I FUCKING WANT, YOU CUNT!" I'll admit I'd have taken anything as an excuse to fly into a righteous fury at that point, but calling what was pretty much the textbook definition of "nice little old lady" a cunt just makes you a shitty human being. I got up and told him to sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up. And just like that, somehow, it was on. The Douche got in my face, as in touching-foreheads my face, and proceeded to spout all the usual confrontational bullshit ("you wanna go, you wanna do this, I'm right here", etc.) my response was something along the lines of "Dude, we're on a plane", at which point he headbutted me. I had time to think something along the lines of "HOLY SHIT IS THIS HAPPENING THIS IS A FUCKING PLANE", and then instinct took over and I butted him back, hard. He went stumbling backwards, grabbed hold of a seat, pulled himself back up and managed to land a decent haymaker on my lip (he had rings on too, the prick) before seven or eight other passengers dived in and wrestled us apart. We were forced to opposite ends of the plane, him screaming bloody murder and me somewhat bemused, and about ten minutes later the most fucking frightening police unit I've ever seen (SO18 Airport Security, the UK's version of SWAT) boarded the plane in full body armour, bristling with MP5s and shotguns. Their sergeant was a broken-nosed, mohawked mountain who looked like Brock Lesnar's meaner brother. Frankly I was expecting to get shot right then and there, but - Rule Britannia! - he pulled out a notebook instead of a gun and asked if he could kindly take the gentleman's statement, please. Long story short, the nice old lady, most of the airplane staff, and all the passengers defended me, and not only was I not charged, I was even allowed to stay on the plane. The Douche, who decided that consistency was better than wisdom and acted like a cunt to the cops as well, was handcuffed and taken off the plane. I got a standing ovation, free wine from the stewardesses for the whole flight (the plane took off soon afterwards), and this somewhat surreal story.