I broke up a fight this morning at my school. Well, sort of. To be honest, it was pretty much over by the time I got there.
Boy 1, to my understanding, has a bit of a temper. It sounds like he’s gotten in trouble for fighting before. But looking at the boy, and reading his disposition, one could tell that he’s quiet and soft-spoken. It seems like is sensitive, but also has a short temper, and lashes out by getting into fist fits.
Boy 2 is roughly the same size as boy 1. Boy 2 has a bit of a mouth on him. He tends to talk too much. He is what I call a button pusher, a shit stirrer. He’s the kind of guy that as a teacher, a parent or authority figure, you have said or could imagine saying to him “you have to learn to watch your mouth. One day, someone’s gonna haul off on you.”
And that’s exactly what happened. Boy 2 kept making verbal jabs at Boy 1. Boy 1 certainly didn’t de-escalate the situation by saying “say one more thing”. So Boy 2 continued…and got punched in the face a few times for it.
I’m not taking sides. Violence is never justified. But like so many other things in life , we need to get the full story.
My thoughts turn back to the events of this last weekend, and the ongoing war in the Middle East. As I said yesterday, neither side is wholly innocent in that situation. Both side have committed some pretty heinous acts over the decades; and Hamas was clearly the aggressors this past weekend. But I think it’s important in any conflict, to understand what drove both parties to the point of violence; not to lay blame, but to understand how we got here.
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