It never ceases to amaze me just how naive people can be. One would think that after witnessing an event play out hundreds of times that the outcome would be somewhat predictable. I’m referring to the good old line of trash talk that goes something like this, you’re scared, you won’t do anything, hit me, hit me, I dare you to hit me!

I see the logic here from a couple of different viewpoints. First and foremost, I would venture to say that the person hollering out these orders is probably scared and doing their best to avoid a physical altercation. This would be an instance where the idea is that the louder you yell and the more often you curse then the more intimidating you will appear, thus de-escalating the situation or at least causing enough ruckus to have those nearby intervene.

Another reason to employ this tactic, and more than likely the one that occurs less often, is that the person genuinely wants to engage in some good old fashioned fisticuffs but does not want to be the one to initiate action. I suppose the line of thinking is that by begging to be hit, then actually being hit, the aggressor could then claim that he was acting in self-defense if need be later on down the line.

Below we witness what happens when a much bigger man proceeds to tell the target of his anger as well as anyone else that will listen, that the man standing before him is scared and is unwilling to do anything to him, especially hit him in the face. Well; he gets what he asks for so check out below what happens next…

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Jacob C. Stevens is a lifelong athlete and cerebral martial arts enthusiast who is also skilled in the art of linguistic manipulation, his published work, Afterthoughts and Handgrenades, can be found here…