Provoked Fighting #3

[johnnywright]

Fighting in school in a very important issue. Teenagers will often resort to violence after being insulted, or someone steals their girlfriend, etc. However, a larger questions is that whether the person who fights back should be punished. If someone is punched, are they allowed to punch back? If someone is teased constantly, should they fight?
A fist fight is often a teenager’s first response to a problem with another teen. For boys, it isn’t considered ‘manly’ to back away from a fight. While girls aren’t as likely to get into a physical fight, they often turn to verbal abuse to get back at someone they dislike. Also, many teenagers consider watching fights to be a form of entertainment, which increases the pressure on the participants to fight, or be called a variety of names for a long time.
If a fight starts, often both teenagers will be punished. But wouldn’t it make more sense if whoever threw the first punch should receive the suspension? After all, the second person may have wanted to fight back, but he was still defending himself. While he should still be given a detention or something, the instigator should take most of the blame. Fighting is a poor way to settle a disagreement, but it is unfortunately the most common way for a teenager to defend their pride.

[kgillette]

Your a good writer Johnny. I agree with you about having the person who threw the first punch have more punishment. But i think that the person that is defending themselves should not have detention at all. The victim is defending themselves right? So thats not really fighting.

[janefarrell]

Johnny, that was really well done! i agree. think about all fights you've known about. Someone starts it cause their thinking their so tough by throwing the first punch, and the victim throwing one back. Is the victim guilty. i don't think so.

[patmig48]

Johnny, I agree with your ruling on a punishment for fighting in schools. The student who throws the first punch should be the one who suffers the largest punishment. If the other student was just defending himself he shouldn't be punished either. I clearly recollect a fight in Shore Regional where one student decided not to fight back to save himself from being punished. He suffered a black eye and a few bruises, the other student was only suspended for a few days. If he were to fight back he could have saved himself from the beating. I agree with you when you wrote that girls don't normally get into physical predicaments, but girls can be very vicious with words. That is why girls should suffer the same punishment as a physical fight, they are both hurting a person either physically or mentally.

[erane35]

I agree with everything you said Johnny. It should be the person who caused the fight from the start to be the that gets in the most trouble. It is very true tht girls tend to fight verbally instead of physically, and guys are the opposite. Simply becasue this is how our culture is. Either way you fight you should still pay the same toll in punishment. In the end a fight is a fight nomatter how it is fought.

[gabrielleboyer]

I deffinitly agree with you when you said that the person who threw the first punch should get the most punishment. Unless the person who threw the first punch was provoked by someone else. In that case they should both receive some sort of punishment. Also, I think you're right when you say that getting into a fight is the most common way for teenagers to deffend their pride.