Communion with Violence Date Thursday, April 25, 2024 - 10:15 AM PST Topic Rant Looking at the responses and words of this much beloved group of people, I have come to find...or at least believe that the vast majority of us are extremely nonviolent...almost pacifistic people. Sure, we can respond to our daily dose of shmeng with a sharp witty retort (amusing AND effective) or even crush someone's self esteem with but a simple withering glance. But sometimes...every so often, thats just not enough. The question I pose is this...what does it take to illicit violence from intelligent, rational people like us. Myself, I don't exactly fall into the category of rational, and my intelligence is kind of warped...so I might fall towards violent end a bit easier. But what does it take for the rest of the Shmengers? Myself...quite recently, succumbed to an outbreak of irrational white-hot reactivism. I was doing my thing on the nearby bar street...proceeding to have a good time, get drunk and pass-out with some reasonably attractive (and extremely fun) grrl I know. All was good with the world. I just happened to be a bit gothed-out...fishnets, safety pins, a couple tastefully placed symbols and counterculture icons. I was definitely standing out. Maybe thats what drew the trouble in...and if it did, then I embrace it, as long as it comes directly to me. Two military boys came up and decided to get cute...They come up, and start out on the wrong foot with the oft familiar cat-calls "Freak" "Devil-worshippers" "Fags"...you name it, these guys we're playing with every caveman insult in the book. Big freaking deal...I shot back, as did my grrl, and the rest of my pack...we caught their insults, revamped them, upgraded their effectiveness and used them with much more efficiency... We hurt their poor little feelings. So these boys do what every neanderthal does when they feel threatened... they become violent. A simple, effective animalistic response to something you don't like. Arada and Anemone help me for not understanding this, but instead of hitting the most vocal and belligerent of the group (Me of course) they decide to hit my grrl...and not with their hands, but with a pool stick. She went down rather quickly, the pool stick shattering into so many wooden shards...in that moment I reacted, kind of impulsively. I didn't know that she had been given a nifty laceration over her left front temporal region, nor did I know she had been rendered permanently blind in her left eye, due to a sudden impact related loss of her aqueous humours... If I had, I'd probably be in the brig right now instead of waiting for the MPs to come a question me. I reacted to my friends pain, and inflicted as much as I possibly could on those two. I've been military myself for awhile... raised on the streets. I may be only one-thirty nine weight wise, but I'm faster than hell and I teach the knife combat class on okinawa. I had two spiderco. flip out blades, serrated, about four inches long. It was over relatively quickly. Both of those boys are alive, but in the hospital. One with a nice line across his forehead, and up his inner thigh... the other one with a piercing laceration to both armpits (bleeds well, heals slow). In the span of maybe thirty seconds I had drawn blood, and eliminated the threat to me and my friends... I would have gone farther, I probably would have gone for the end all be all if my friends hadn't literally dragged me off into the nearby alley and forcibly cooled me off, before taking my grrl to the hospital. After I had regained my senses, I realized what a true and absolute monster I had become. Not something I take very lightly, and to this moment it still makes me kind of queasy. That night ended with my grrl being admitted to the hospital, luckily I work there so I can take care of her... It makes things a lot easier. But seriously, I'm not a homicidal maniac, I don't even get angry that often...I prefer to laugh, love and bring along everyone for the fun. But now I know what it is that can trigger a sudden and violent reaction from me... as easygoing as I am, once a true and personal friend of mine is hurt, I just kind of blank out. But what does it take for the rest of us to snap? Do any of us really just curl up and just wish it all away? Can you stand to watch someone you love be brutalized...and if you can't, if you defend them...does that make it right or wrong? Screwed up question I know...but all I've really seen lately is how much violence sucks, and how horrible it is...and yeah, I agree to a certain extent, BUT...we, as human beings, have that capability for a reason, otherwise it wouldn't be there...it's not just a meaningless evil. It's there, for a reason, so we might as well deal with it... *huff huff* Alright...so there... This article comes from Shmeng http://www.shmeng.com/ The URL for this story is: http://www.shmeng.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=295