Bus driver uppercuts woman

[neverarine]

was the bus moving when she hit him? becuase then the driver can be seen as defending the innocent passangers from an idoit trying to crash the bus,,,,

 

[Uhura]

The difference being that in all three of those incidents they died because of the combined force of the punch and slamming their head into the ground, and judging by the way she fell, that doesn't seem like her head could have. Infact, the whole purpose of the uppercut is to incapacitate someone by dealing shock damage, so the chance of being killed by one is minimal.

Hell, if you want to stick to the idiotic "but she could die" argument, she assaulted a bus driver, while he was driving which could have caused him to crash and kill everyone on the bus.

The bus driver doesn't have psychic abilities. He didn't know if she'll hit her head on the ground or not when he punched her. My argument isn't just that 'she could have died' but that she also could have sustained other non-lethal but serious injuries. There is nothing idiotic about trying to get people understand that violent acts can lead to very serious consequences and that therefore you shouldn't punch, hit or kick anyone unless it's absolutely necessary.

This also isn't a competition. The girl was being an asshole and she endangered the other passengers by distracting the driver. That doesn't give the driver the right to react to the situation with excessive force.

 

[Boris Goodenough]

The bus driver doesn't have psychic abilities. He didn't know if she'll hit her head on the ground or not when he punched her. My argument isn't just that 'she could have died' but that she also could have sustained other non-lethal but serious injuries. There is nothing idiotic about trying to get people understand that violent acts can lead to very serious consequences and that therefore you shouldn't punch, hit or kick anyone unless it's absolutely necessary.

This also isn't a competition. The girl was being an asshole and she endangered the other passengers by distracting the driver. That doesn't give the driver the right to react to the situation with excessive force.

What should he have done instead?

 

[Uhura]

was the bus moving when she hit him? becuase then the driver can be seen as defending the innocent passangers from an idoit trying to crash the bus,,,,

http://www.worldstarhiphop.com/videos/video.php?v=wshhzCVM2oOs7f35xwUa

The pushing/punch occurs around the 3 minute mark in the video. The bus wasn't moving at the time.

 

[TeletubbiesGolfGun]

The difference being that in all three of those incidents they died because of the combined force of the punch and slamming their head into the ground, and judging by the way she fell, that doesn't seem like her head could have. Infact, the whole purpose of the uppercut is to incapacitate someone by dealing shock damage, so the chance of being killed by one is minimal.

Hell, if you want to stick to the idiotic "but she could die" argument, she assaulted a bus driver, while he was driving which could have caused him to crash and kill everyone on the bus.

The bus driver doesn't have psychic abilities. He didn't know if she'll hit her head on the ground or not when he punched her. My argument isn't just that 'she could have died' but that she also could have sustained other non-lethal but serious injuries. There is nothing idiotic about trying to get people understand that violent acts can lead to very serious consequences and that therefore you shouldn't punch, hit or kick anyone unless it's absolutely necessary.

This also isn't a competition. The girl was being an asshole and she endangered the other passengers by distracting the driver. That doesn't give the driver the right to react to the situation with excessive force.

you keep dealing with "could have" type scenario's, CLEARLY if you watch the video (hell there are multiple versions) she takes one solid uppercut, he attempts to toss her out, she tries to get back on for more, he grabs her and tries to toss her out but she wasn't budging so he tossed her down instead.

clearly, if he was using "excessive force", she wouldn't be getting back up for more, and he would've kept beating her senseless.

he did one swift shock punch and tried to immediately toss her out the bus, there was nothing excessive about that. and don't give me that "but could have" crap, we are dealing with what ACTUALLY happened.

if you still think it wasn't excessive, i'll imply you to randomly get choked and spit on, and see how you react

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

was the bus moving when she hit him? becuase then the driver can be seen as defending the innocent passangers from an idoit trying to crash the bus,,,,

http://www.worldstarhiphop.com/videos/video.php?v=wshhzCVM2oOs7f35xwUa

The pushing/punch occurs around the 3 minute mark in the video. The bus wasn't moving at the time.

Being yelled at vehemently while driving was danger enough. People get fined for driving while on a cell phone these days for a reason. She was distracting him viciously. I don't know about you but I'd say the average person would have a hard time concentrating on driving while someone takes backseat driving to the level of making threats of assault.

 

[kahyonhowanen]

The difference being that in all three of those incidents they died because of the combined force of the punch and slamming their head into the ground, and judging by the way she fell, that doesn't seem like her head could have. Infact, the whole purpose of the uppercut is to incapacitate someone by dealing shock damage, so the chance of being killed by one is minimal.

Hell, if you want to stick to the idiotic "but she could die" argument, she assaulted a bus driver, while he was driving which could have caused him to crash and kill everyone on the bus.

The bus driver doesn't have psychic abilities. He didn't know if she'll hit her head on the ground or not when he punched her. My argument isn't just that 'she could have died' but that she also could have sustained other non-lethal but serious injuries. There is nothing idiotic about trying to get people understand that violent acts can lead to very serious consequences and that therefore you shouldn't punch, hit or kick anyone unless it's absolutely necessary.

This also isn't a competition. The girl was being an asshole and she endangered the other passengers by distracting the driver. That doesn't give the driver the right to react to the situation with excessive force.

Yes because you know, he totally could have handled it some other way right? We can see from the video that if he told her to get off, she would not listen, so that's out. If he called the police he would have had to stop the bus and depending on their location at the time and the dispatcher who receives the call that could take 10-20 minutes, not counting anytime the police will need to question everyone on the bus. This of course could cause many people to be late to where they were trying to get to, inconveniencing everyone, so that's out. He could keep driving, but I think it's obvious why that's out. Can you think of any more, cause nothing else comes to mind at the moment.

Also, please tell me how that was excessive force, he punched her once, enough to incapacitate her, and threw her off the bus. It's considered excessive if he had continued to hit her after he incapacitated her. That was in no way excessive.

 

[munx13]

Even if that was a man, the punching part shouldn't have happened. That was just too much.


I cant say I feel sorry for her though.

 

[Yan007]

The difference being that in all three of those incidents they died because of the combined force of the punch and slamming their head into the ground, and judging by the way she fell, that doesn't seem like her head could have. Infact, the whole purpose of the uppercut is to incapacitate someone by dealing shock damage, so the chance of being killed by one is minimal.

Hell, if you want to stick to the idiotic "but she could die" argument, she assaulted a bus driver, while he was driving which could have caused him to crash and kill everyone on the bus.

The bus driver doesn't have psychic abilities. He didn't know if she'll hit her head on the ground or not when he punched her. My argument isn't just that 'she could have died' but that she also could have sustained other non-lethal but serious injuries. There is nothing idiotic about trying to get people understand that violent acts can lead to very serious consequences and that therefore you shouldn't punch, hit or kick anyone unless it's absolutely necessary.

This also isn't a competition. The girl was being an asshole and she endangered the other passengers by distracting the driver. That doesn't give the driver the right to react to the situation with excessive force.

Boohoo. As far as I'm concerned when any adult is pushing or threatening another adult, they should simply expect a beatdown and any possible injury that may occur. The driver is not a psychic? What about the girl? What if instead of uppercutting her he took out a knife and gutted her because he is not a psychic but a psycho waiting to snap?

I don't know what it is with people, especially women sometimes, but fucking around with other people and expecting to walk away is extremely stupid. The real world is dangerous, all the time. I punched my share of people pushing/hitting and threatening me. I even punched my younger sister once pretty hard when we were teens and she never ever tried her queentitude on me and other people as far as I am aware. May have saved her life as she could have tried her antics on a psycho who would then fix her problem for good.

I'm not saying hitting others is good. As a matter of fact holding back is great, for you, but I don't expect nothing to happen if I try to fuck with someone.

 

[Uhura]

What should he have done instead?

I'd say that in a situation like that it's best to stop the bus as soon as someone starts to behave aggressively towards you or other passengers. That way you can make sure that you won't crash the bus if the situation escalates. Then it would be best to call the cops and try to calm down the situation verbally. Violence should be the last option and bus drivers shouldn't be expected to physically handle possibly dangerous passengers. That's not their job and it's unfair to put that expectation on them.

 

[Driekan]

What should he have done instead?

I'd say that in a situation like that it's best to stop the bus as soon as someone starts to behave aggressively towards you or other passengers. That way you can make sure that you won't crash the bus if the situation escalates. Then it would be best to call the cops and try to calm down the situation verbally. Violence should be the last option and bus drivers shouldn't be expected to physically handle possibly dangerous passengers. That's not their job and it's unfair to put that expectation on them.

So you would have parked the bus, slowly, calmly and safely, and then just sat there and taken the punches, the spitting, the grabbing and the verbal abuse?

Is this a picture of you?

http://www.startrek.com/legacy_media/images/200307/spock01/320x240.jpg

I don't think anyone is arguing about what the ideal, superhuman thing to do in this situation is. It's pretty obvious, and it's two things:
- Don't harass the driver in the first place
- Don't react in anger

But we're human. And hating that poor dude for being human strikes me as wrong.

 

[Uhura]

you keep dealing with "could have" type scenario's, CLEARLY if you watch the video (hell there are multiple versions) she takes one solid uppercut, he attempts to toss her out, she tries to get back on for more, he grabs her and tries to toss her out but she wasn't budging so he tossed her down instead.

clearly, if he was using "excessive force", she wouldn't be getting back up for more, and he would've kept beating her senseless.

he did one swift shock punch and tried to immediately toss her out the bus, there was nothing excessive about that. and don't give me that "but could have" crap, we are dealing with what ACTUALLY happened.

if you still think it wasn't excessive, i'll imply you to randomly get choked and spit on, and see how you react

I'm dealing with 'could haves' since no one can predict the consequences of their violent acts with absolute certainty. That's why people are generally advised to try solve possibly threatening situations with non-violent methods. Even people in law enforcement are advised to try to defuse threatening situations verbally if possible. I really am glad that she didn't seem to get seriously hurt, because it would have been pretty awful if the driver had been thrown in jail for something like that. It seems like the girl had been tormenting him for a while and he just lost his temper.

 

[TeletubbiesGolfGun]

you keep dealing with "could have" type scenario's, CLEARLY if you watch the video (hell there are multiple versions) she takes one solid uppercut, he attempts to toss her out, she tries to get back on for more, he grabs her and tries to toss her out but she wasn't budging so he tossed her down instead.

clearly, if he was using "excessive force", she wouldn't be getting back up for more, and he would've kept beating her senseless.

he did one swift shock punch and tried to immediately toss her out the bus, there was nothing excessive about that. and don't give me that "but could have" crap, we are dealing with what ACTUALLY happened.

if you still think it wasn't excessive, i'll imply you to randomly get choked and spit on, and see how you react

I'm dealing with 'could haves' since no one can predict the consequences of their violent acts with absolute certainty. That's why people are generally advised to try solve possibly threatening situations with non-violent methods. Even people in law enforcement are advised to try to defuse threatening situations verbally if possible. I really am glad that she didn't seem to get seriously hurt, because it would have been pretty awful if the driver had been thrown in jail for something like that. It seems like the girl had been tormenting him for a while and he just lost his temper.

exactly, and if you are dealing with "could haves" then you have to conduct ALL the could haves, as she could have caused an accident, she could have caused damage to him for grabbing him by the throat, she could have distracted him enough to hit someone in the road by harassing him for minutes at a time.

i think most people here would agree, if she was permanently damaged or he kept beating her, then yes, that would've been awful and taken too far, but at that point in time, especially with her spitting on him and grabbing him at the throat, she signed and dotted her name on that uppercut. you don't just put your hands on/spit on someone and not expect retaliation.

 

[Uhura]

Being yelled at vehemently while driving was danger enough. People get fined for driving while on a cell phone these days for a reason. She was distracting him viciously. I don't know about you but I'd say the average person would have a hard time concentrating on driving while someone takes backseat driving to the level of making threats of assault.

Yeah, that's why it would have been a good idea to stop the bus sooner. The situation clearly wasn't safe anymore.

Yes because you know, he totally could have handled it some other way right? We can see from the video that if he told her to get off, she would not listen, so that's out. If he called the police he would have had to stop the bus and depending on their location at the time and the dispatcher who receives the call that could take 10-20 minutes, not counting anytime the police will need to question everyone on the bus. This of course could cause many people to be late to where they were trying to get to, inconveniencing everyone, so that's out. He could keep driving, but I think it's obvious why that's out. Can you think of any more, cause nothing else comes to mind at the moment.

Also, please tell me how that was excessive force, he punched her once, enough to incapacitate her, and threw her off the bus. It's considered excessive if he had continued to hit her after he incapacitated her. That was in no way excessive.

I disagree with your assessment that stopping the bus and waiting for the police to arrive would have been out of the question. The safety of the driver, the passengers and other people driving in that neighborhood is the priority. Being late half an hour is a small price to pay for that safety.

He punched her in the head without a warning. If you can't see the possible dangers in that, then I don't know what else to say...

 

[kahyonhowanen]

Being yelled at vehemently while driving was danger enough. People get fined for driving while on a cell phone these days for a reason. She was distracting him viciously. I don't know about you but I'd say the average person would have a hard time concentrating on driving while someone takes backseat driving to the level of making threats of assault.

Yeah, that's why it would have been a good idea to stop the bus sooner. The situation clearly wasn't safe anymore.

Yes because you know, he totally could have handled it some other way right? We can see from the video that if he told her to get off, she would not listen, so that's out. If he called the police he would have had to stop the bus and depending on their location at the time and the dispatcher who receives the call that could take 10-20 minutes, not counting anytime the police will need to question everyone on the bus. This of course could cause many people to be late to where they were trying to get to, inconveniencing everyone, so that's out. He could keep driving, but I think it's obvious why that's out. Can you think of any more, cause nothing else comes to mind at the moment.

Also, please tell me how that was excessive force, he punched her once, enough to incapacitate her, and threw her off the bus. It's considered excessive if he had continued to hit her after he incapacitated her. That was in no way excessive.

I disagree with your assessment that stopping the bus and waiting for the police to arrive would have been out of the question. The safety of the driver, the passengers and other people driving in that neighborhood is the priority. Being late half an hour is a small price to pay for that safety.

He punched her in the head without a warning. If you can't see the possible dangers in that, then I don't know what else to say...

Consider this though, what the fuck are the chances that she would just sit there and wait for the cops. Attempting to call the cops while she berated and attacked him would most likely only cause her to attempt to hurt him more. She punched him without warning. If you seriously think that everyone would be safer with her in the bus angry for 30 minutes then I don't know what else to say...

 

[Uhura]

Boohoo. As far as I'm concerned when any adult is pushing or threatening another adult, they should simply expect a beatdown and any possible injury that may occur.

Good luck with that. I hope you never kill anyone.

So you would have parked the bus, slowly, calmly and safely, and then just sat there and taken the punches, the spitting, the grabbing and the verbal abuse?

Is this a picture of you?

http://www.startrek.com/legacy_media/images/200307/spock01/320x240.jpg

I don't think anyone is arguing about what the ideal, superhuman thing to do in this situation is. It's pretty obvious, and it's two things:
- Don't harass the driver in the first place
- Don't react in anger

But we're human. And hating that poor dude for being human strikes me as wrong.

Yeah, stopping a moving vehicle when someone is distracting you is the recommended course of action I believe. If she continued to physically assault him, he obviously would have had the right to try to restrain her and defend himself. Within reason. I'm not 'hating on the poor dude'. He was in a shitty situation and the way he decided to deal with it led to even shittier situation because he got fired.

I originally posted in this thread because I thought it was pretty depressing how many people were amused by this incident. Not many of them seemed to give a shit about the driver or the safety of the passengers. They were just happy to see an epic uppercut and the following Mortal Kombat versions of the video.

 

[Uhura]

exactly, and if you are dealing with "could haves" then you have to conduct ALL the could haves, as she could have caused an accident, she could have caused damage to him for grabbing him by the throat, she could have distracted him enough to hit someone in the road by harassing him for minutes at a time.

i think most people here would agree, if she was permanently damaged or he kept beating her, then yes, that would've been awful and taken too far, but at that point in time, especially with her spitting on him and grabbing him at the throat, she signed and dotted her name on that uppercut. you don't just put your hands on/spit on someone and not expect retaliation.

I haven't at any point tried to defend her actions. What she did was stupid and dangerous. The reason why I don't address the possible consequences of her actions is that no one in this thread has cheered her on. Everyone seems to be aware of the possible consequences of her actions. Many, however, have cheered on the guy and I feel like they probably haven't given that much thought on how badly the situation could have turned out for him.

Consider this though, what the fuck are the chances that she would just sit there and wait for the cops. Attempting to call the cops while she berated and attacked him would most likely only cause her to attempt to hurt him more. She punched him without warning. If you seriously think that everyone would be safer with her in the bus angry for 30 minutes then I don't know what else to say...

Are you sure she would have stayed in the bus if he had threatened to call the cops? You don't think she might have tried to escape? Even if that plan hadn't worked it would have been wise to even try it. Stop the bus and call the cops and see if she leaves or calms down. I don't understand why this suggestion seems to be so controversial.

 

[AlexWinter]

I lol'd at reading the title.

Woopsie!

No there will be no violence people!

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

Are you sure she would have stayed in the bus if he had threatened to call the cops? You don't think she might have tried to escape? Even if that plan hadn't worked it would have been wise to even try it. Stop the bus and call the cops and see if she leaves or calms down. I don't understand why this suggestion seems to be so controversial.

You`re point is too hypothetical to argue against effectively. By the same way that you say, "call the cops and see if she calms down" I could throw in, "what if she doesn't calm down?, what if she pulled out a gun or knife, what if she hit him to a point where he lost control of the bus?"

You can't keep arguing this by throwing what ifs, what he should've dones, and hypothetical reactions that you have no way of predicting as points. It just becomes an everlasting debate where you keep pulling out more possible outcomes that did not happen.

I'm not here cheering for the driver either, but to say that what he did was excessive ignore a a bunch of things that me and you don't know about him. To be honest, being a bus driver is a shitty job. The driver had that job for over 22 years. This more than likely isn't the first time someone has:

a)tried to get on the bus with no money

b)threatened him with violence

c) assaulted him while he was driving

d)treated him like crap simply because he's a public servant

22 years of that is more than most of us can handle. He quite honestly may have had enough. He was 59 years old and to our knowledge has no history of uppercutting passengers before. He may have had to forcibly remove erratic passengers before.

You're saying what he did was excessive. I'm saying what he did was understandable looking at him as one human being to another. I'm not justifying what he did, but I refuse to hold him up to some standard of a paragon human being that would have calmly dealt with this situation. He got angry and finally unleashed on someone. But he hit her once. He didn't stomp her guts out. Then threw her off the bus. That's what happened. And I can guarantee we would not be having this debate if he had slugged a 25 year old man in the exact same manner. Hell, with the mainstream media and PC attitude that we have in Canada/The States, him simply throwing her off the bus would have been seen as bad due to him being a bigger man. There was next to no way he could win this by himself and look good. Now if one of the passengers had called the cops and let the driver know that, then to be honest, you'd have a point with waiting for police. The fact of the matter is that him calmly restraining her after he spits on and grabs his throat to go for a punch, while he's driving a bus, is severely unrealistic.


And please, no more hypothetical points. Its kind of portentous no offense, as it implies that you know the situation better than those involved to such a point that you knew better. You don't, and won't. It also assumes that any person can carry a calm attitude while getting yelled at, spit on, and assaulted while a job that requires keeping dozens of people safe. Unrealistic. He paid the price for what he did with his job. If he were in a rational situation at all, he'd still be driving that bus to this day, but what happened to him isn't a sexism issue, a race issue, or an excessive violence issue. It was an issue between 2 people that got shown to the world. Both did something wrong, but its way easier to sympathize with the driver on this one. He had the class to not press charges after all of this. The police saw the tape and arrested the erratic person right away. They didn't see what he did as excessive force. They saw it as what most of us did. A guy who was pissed off had had enough. Charging him for that would have been an issue.

 

[Driekan]

-Snip-

I have nothing else to say, other than to offer as close to 100% agreement as I could possibly offer to anyone in this discussion.

Nailed. Good job.