The cost of Violence against the cost of Aggression

Scandinavia's relationship to violence is very different from the Americas'. Here, kids are brought up with female professionals who tell kids every day violence is never an answer to anything. I never heard that from any teacher to day care professional in America growing up. Very few Americans have. The consequences of this difference can be seen observing the few Scandinavian ass holes who try to exploit peoples' aversion to violence. In Chicago, their behavior is universally a prelude to a fight. There are exceptions where one party will threaten the other party with a gun or death or overwhelming size and more excessive injury. Here, acting like a complete asshole and threatening to punch someone in the nose is enough to coerce a person into giving up anything. This tactic however, stops working when aforementioned asshole and an American are the two parties involved; the asshole will make a critical miscalculation about the American's aversion to violence, a fight will follow by the American becoming known as the big dog in town. The asshole will try to avoid the American in the future, no matter what the outcome of the fight was.

This difference between cultures underlines for me the important function of standing up for one self in society and suggests to me, every child should learn to throw a punch. I think if every Scandinavian were willing to get into a fight when standing up to an asshole, few assholes would resort to threats to get their way.

But what events brought me to this conclusion?

Well. I used to work as a bartender in Tórshavn. This requires I throw people out once in a while. A few of the people I throw out put up a fight, which means I literally throw them out. One person however stands out among those who put up a fight. I couldn't eject the person and the fight ended up with us on the ground, him in a shoulder-lock and me slowing dislocating his arm. It was an easy fight and I am at a loss for explanations as to why everyone is afraid of him, and as a result of the fight, reluctant to show me any disrespect. I can only assume he never actually got in a fight with anyone and he is one of the assholes I talked about above.