Many of you have probably seen this. It’s a realistic representation of how ugly situations sometimes arise in real life, so I think it presents an interesting scenario for discussion about dealing with aggression. In my view, Louie should never said anything to the kids to begin with; it should have been easy to anticipate that doing so would provoke an aggressive response in that situation. But I’m curious as to others’ opinions. Also, assuming you did say something to the kids, how would you have handled things once the particularly aggressive kid came to Louie’s table? Was it too late then to avoid either an all-out fight or complete submission? Could it have been diffused without violence and also without losing your dignity
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He probably shouldn’t have said anything. Even if he could handle the one kid, he was still outnumbered. I don’t see how any grown man isn’t prepared to deal with violence on some level anyway. I just assume shit will always go sideways.
“Don’t let your mouth write a check your butt can’t cash.”
-Every dad in history
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The first step is to not look like Louis CK.
If I’m with someone else, I’m 100% in de-escalation mode every time, all the time. There’ve been a few instances in which I’ve had to put up with more than I would have if I’d been alone, but since most of the people in my life, as the saying goes, can’t scrap a lick, it’s the smartest policy.
On my own, I’m still inclined to de-escalate. But probably not 100% of the time.
No disagreement there. You can’t get hurt or killed in an altercation you aren’t involved in. What I was getting at is if there may have been a way to de-escalate this without losing one’s dignity. This clip doesn’t show it, but after the punks leave, the woman states that she has lost interest in Louie because he humiliated himself in the way he backed down. So are Louie’s only two choices here (1) grab something and start frantically smashing heads as best he can and hope for the best or (2) debase himself and lose his self-respect and the interest of the woman he’s with? This just seems like a sort of paradigmatic situation, which is probably why Louie used it for this episode.
Was that really what Louie was doing here? Maybe it wouldn’t be a prudent move, but it seems to me that asking a group of loud customers to keep it down is quite a bit different from the sort of trash talking your quote speaks to.
Despite the fictional punks acting like punks, Louis initiated the confrontation by choice.
Even if you’re politely asking “Can you please keep it down fellas?” do you have anything up your sleeve to answer a retort of “Or what?”
If not, I’d suggest leaving it alone and picking another battle. I gravitated to this mindset even more when I started carrying concealed. Learn to let the actions of strangers slide and mind your own business. Bad situations will fail to materialize.
In this case, any bar or restaurant I frequent would already be taking care of customers like that. If they tolerate it I would leave and not come back.
Above all, I’d hate to explain to a judge, my family and my job why I needed to fight some punk teenagers in a diner.
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