The other night...I was returning home after having spent a nice evening in Parle.
Coffee with a friend and then dinner with relatives.
I'd also received my passport that day (finally! but that's another story and probably won't go up here. So ask if you really care...) and life was good.
On the way back, at a junction near our relatives' house...we saw a fight break out as we sat in the rickshaw.
And not just a fight...an assault...a gang thing...call it what you will...
Five or six guys came to the place in a rickshaw and just started hitting people in another group that was sitting there...minding their own business. (At least for the time being...one can assume that they hadn't been minding it earlier or maybe this situation would never have arisen...)
It disgusts me. Nauseates me. Terrifies me - when I see people engage in this sort of physical violence.
It is beyond the faculties or my reasoning and intellect to understand how and why one human can go out with an intention to physically hurt another human...
Sure...I've been angry enough at times to wish that something bad would happen to someone else. At times I've even known what that bad thing ought to be. However, I would never be able to translate that thought into action.
Call it cowardice, call it weakness - call it what you will but I cannot see myself willingly assaulting another human being. Perhaps my physique, strength (or lack thereof) or whatever ... contributes to this. No doubt.
However, I really cannot even foresee myself actively doing anything of this sort...even if I could.
The boys (for they were hardly more than that) were punching and hitting each other.
Stray bits of brick from the pavement were being thrown about!
I've seen a group of people, one with a sword, chase someone else through the premises of a college.
I've heard tell of someone actually being stabbed in broad daylight in front of other people and not a thing done about it...
In a slightly lighter vein...though no less disturbing...I've seen the parents of a girl come and assault the boy she was out with...in the lobby of a movie theater/mall...
Make no mistake - I've dealt out the odd slap/smack to people. I've even lost enough of my head to slap one of my students in the head (but that's also a different story - again...ask) but it has always been more of a reminder against silliness or something of that sort...
What sort of silliness requires such a desperate reminder??
Am I wrong? Unfit? Weak? Clueless?
Because I do not understand such violence...?
Do you?
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3 comments:
being repulsed by violence is not an act of cowardice or weakness.
and plz expound on the student slap incident :-P
in younger years i was involved in a fair share of fights because people loved to pick on the skinny brown kid. while i didn't enjoy being picked on, i loved it when they tried to fight me because for some reason, as soon as i was defending myself, i was invincible. it was a great feeling to be able to subdue an aggressor twice my size out of sheer ferocity. if a friend was being harrassed i wouldnt hesitate to get involved.
actions speak louder than words? but perhaps they don't get the same message across...
anyways, i don't think that gang violence or parents beating boyfriends is really justified at all. so yes, its sick. i hate watching fights. i hate watching the people who stand there and watch fights just for the sake of fighting. but when the cause is there, and there is a threat. go for it.
callie and i got jumped by a group of native people who were high on something one night. they threw callie on the ground and started kicking her in the ribs, and they kept pushing us down and punching us in the head. both of us were too shocked to fight back- we didn't even see them coming. it was scary, i'm not going to lie. violence is really a frightening thing. it shook us up to see what other people were capable of without any provocation. but at the same time it made us realize what we were capable of. if it happened again, i wouldn't hesitate to fight back. i would use any violence necessary to defend myself or other people. i think violence used to defend one's self can be gratifying- it makes you feel good to be able to take care of yourself. But when used aggressively, it is terrifying and sickening. i think your stories about the parents beating up the guy and the guy who was stabbed are disgusting. It is a form of cowardice to resort to violence to get a point across. i personally feel that violence is the lowest form of communication. terrorism, gang action, domestic violence, yes, all of that disgusts me. It is hard to wrap my head around what it takes to drive someone to initiate serious violence like that.
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