How/Why do fights start?

[LexTalinis]

This is my personal opinion, so you can take it or leave it. I believe that about 80% of all fights are totally avoidable, 90% never need to become violent. It is my belief that pride causes most fights.

I have talked myself out of a couple of fights, just by saying, "look buddy, you win, it's not that important to me."

I have nothing to prove, but a lot of people seem that they have to prove thier worth in a fight. IMO the best self defense is not alowing it to come to blows.

 

[sgtmac_46]

This is my personal opinion, so you can take it or leave it. I believe that about 80% of all fights are totally avoidable, 90% never need to become violent. It is my belief that pride causes most fights.

I have talked myself out of a couple of fights, just by saying, "look buddy, you win, it's not that important to me."

I have nothing to prove, but a lot of people seem that they have to prove thier worth in a fight. IMO the best self defense is not alowing it to come to blows.

Let me lend a little bit of technical insight to your accurate folk wisdom. When people get angry, their forebrain shuts down and the mid-brain takes over. The mid-brain is the brain of a mammal, and since communication skills are controlled by the forebrain, the ability to communicate effectively shuts down. That's why angry people usually don't seem rational...because they aren't. They are allowing the mammilian brain do the thinking, and when it becomes angry, it only knows "Smash".

The trick is to get the forebrain thinking again. Here's a trick I do as a cop. Don't just give in. Do something ABSURD. I usually ask very non-sensical, bizarre questions. I once asked a guy how many pancakes it took to get to the moon. You can see the weird expression on their face as they try to sort out what you've just said to them. Then they start trying to use the forebrain to sort out what you've just said, and the mid-brain relinquishes control. Absurdity will defuse a conflict. The more bizarre and absurd the better. Sing for someone who's mad, tell them a joke. Do something so bizarre and out of the normal that they'll be confused or even laugh. I once heard a guy in a bar end a fight because he told the guy who was threatening him that he was a bleeder and a screamer. I heard another guy challenge his would be attacker to a tap dancing contest instead.

 

[Cruentus]

Let me lend a little bit of technical insight to your accurate folk wisdom. When people get angry, their forebrain shuts down and the mid-brain takes over. The mid-brain is the brain of a mammal, and since communication skills are controlled by the forebrain, the ability to communicate effectively shuts down. That's why angry people usually don't seem rational...because they aren't. They are allowing the mammilian brain do the thinking, and when it becomes angry, it only knows "Smash".

The trick is to get the forebrain thinking again. Here's a trick I do as a cop. Don't just give in. Do something ABSURD. I usually ask very non-sensical, bizarre questions. I once asked a guy how many pancakes it took to get to the moon. You can see the weird expression on their face as they try to sort out what you've just said to them. Then they start trying to use the forebrain to sort out what you've just said, and the mid-brain relinquishes control. Absurdity will defuse a conflict. The more bizarre and absurd the better. Sing for someone who's mad, tell them a joke. Do something so bizarre and out of the normal that they'll be confused or even laugh. I once heard a guy in a bar end a fight because he told the guy who was threatening him that he was a bleeder and a screamer. I heard another guy challenge his would be attacker to a tap dancing contest instead.

Makes sense. I have diffused quite a few fights this way...

 

[47MartialMan]

Same here. Once, I had people ready for fighting stop by me doing a "Kermit the Frog" impersonation.

Couples going through separation often have fights that their new aquainrences get involved.