Bus driver uppercuts woman

[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.

 

[Lucane]

SHORYUKEN!

I feel kinda bad for this, but it's the firs thing that came to mind.

No real opinion either way on the matter violence is violence :/ she was being a total tool though.

Damnit. I was thinking the same exact thing when I saw the thread title.

I'm sorry but I gotta ask...
What is your avatar from. It's so ... disturbingly wonderful looking.

 

[Uhura]

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.

That was a response to a hypothetical situation proposed by another forum member. I'm not coming up with 'what ifs' just for the fun of it.

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 forcible remove erratic passengers before.

That doesn't in any way justify what happened. I think it's understandable that he lashed out, but there is really no reason to bring his work history into this discussion unless you actually want to use it to justify his actions. (Also, why are you bringing up hypothetical situations the driver may or may not have faced during his career?)

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.

No, I'm saying that what he did was excessive but understandable. I've mostly had beef here with people who praise his actions. What he did is done and no one can change that. What I find distasteful and kinda depressing is the amount of people here who think it's perfectly ok (and even funny) to hit someone on the head without any warning. Their reaction clearly shows that they have no idea how serious consequences that kind of attack may have.

It's possible to feel compassion for the guy and still think that what he did was excessive and that he is damn lucky nothing worse happened. That's why I linked those articles about the people who have died from just one punch to the head. You know, because I feel like we shouldn't be "loling" and cheering on real life violence. It's not a joke. The guy lost his job. It wasn't a joke to him.

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.

Just like you don't know what kind of career he has had and what kind of situations he has faced. Just like you don't know if people would have reacted differently if he had punched a 25 year old guy or if he would have gotten in trouble if he had just thrown the girl out of the bus. You see, if you want to imply that other people are being pretentious with their hypothetical points, you may not want to make them yourself.

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

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.

Just like you don't know what kind of career he has had and what kind of situations he has faced. Just like you don't know if people would have reacted differently if he had punched a 25 year old guy or if he would have gotten in trouble if he had just thrown the girl out of the bus. You see, if you want to imply that other people are being pretentious with their hypothetical points, you may not want to make them yourself.

There's a difference between my points and yours. With me I'm taking general probability into account considering the past 22 years of the driver's career up to this point. Chances of him having had to deal with erratic behaviour at least once in his 22 year career is pretty high. I'm not even going to go to the extent of researching where he was driving and the crime rates. That's an assumption that makes sense. I think we can all agree that bus drivers in generally populated urban areas get treated like crap by random assholes from time to time.

You're hypothetical points come off as trying to say that what you predict what would happen in what every situation you throw up is set in stone. There's no way to tell if the person who assaulted the bus driver would have backed down had the cops been called. You're predicting reactions to scenarios you set up. That's my beef.

And arguing hypothetical points with more hypothetical points is generally a waste of time as it diverts from what happened in general.

I get that you're not a fan of people praising what the driver did. But you're original post on this thread has garnered arguments for a reason.

He clearly uses excessive force in handling the situation. She could have sustained serious injuries from that punch and I think it's pretty sad that so many people here seem to think that the driver's actions were somehow justified and reasonable.

I honestly don't think that he was at all concerned with the amount of force that he used when he struck her. People in physical altercations don't carry that in their head at the moment in time. I know I didn't when I was in fights in the past. He wasn't thinking clearly, obviously. He just reacted. Her getting hit was a result. Thankfully he had enough of a grip on his bearings to toss hear off the bus instead of going for punch number 2.

I even agree and have said that his actions were not justifiable, but to say that they were unreasonable is a bit portentous. Especially when considering the factors presented in the video itself. We can even take away the chances of violence and insanity that can occur in a bus driver's career completely. There is a reason he struck her. Not a great reason, but a human reason. He got sick of her egging him on and could not take another moment of it.

That's why I can look at the video and say, "I can see why he did that." Not saying I'd ever punch a women, but then again, I've never been put in a situation like that so I can never say never. I know people shouldn't be praising him for the punch, but to be honest given how things went down there was really no other way it could have happened unfortunately. People do things without thinking all the time. We live in a society where being a flawed person at certain points makes you a monster to some. Not saying you're calling him a monster, but to sit there and lecture others for merely being entertained in a situation where no one was put in the hospital is a bit much. Had he killed/seriously injured her, very few of the people on this thread praising the driver would be doing so, and anyone that did would most likely be verbally told to leave.


Look, we cheered Little Zangeif after he put a bully in crutches. We as a society told him he did nothing wrong. The bus driver reacted in the same way. He lost his job.

I found this incident interesting because the whole situation was stupid. And in the end they both learned something. He'll try not to slug people who piss him off, and she'll bring money to the bus stop and won't start a fight with the driver.
I can't speak for everyone but the majority of us who were entertained by this are not horrible people who live to see this stuff happen. To shame everyone who laughed at this is understandable, but my beef was with your use of hypothetical situations to argue hypotheticals.


That's like kicking water uphill, it's just come back all day.

 

[Dogstile]

Christ, he should get a raise for that punch alone. That was jaw dropping.

 

[Uhura]

You're hypothetical points come off as trying to say that what you predict what would happen in what every situation you throw up is set in stone. There's no way to tell if the person who assaulted the bus driver would have backed down had the cops been called. You're predicting reactions to scenarios you set up. That's my beef.

It's not that far fetched to think that a person would try to escape when threatened with cops. It's not like criminals or people who have just assaulted someone usually just wait around for the law enforcement to arrive if they have any chance to escape. And again, I did not start that string of "what ifs. I was responding to another poster.

I was also mostly referring to this part, where you predict what would happen if the "victim" wasn't a girl:

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.

Sounds pretty hypothetical to me.

I can't speak for everyone but the majority of us who were entertained by this are not horrible people who live to see this stuff happen. To shame everyone who laughed at this is understandable, but my beef was with your use of hypothetical situations to argue hypotheticals.
That's like kicking water uphill, it's just come back all day.

I didn't mean to imply that the people who were amused by the incident are somehow horrible people. I get why people think that she had it coming. I just found the cheering pretty depressing.

Even then, it would require much more force for her to fall on the ground and die. A harder surface like concrete and have a MUCH higher velocity towards that floor.

The bus driver couldn't throw her hard enough to the floor that it would kill her.

Besides, a Satellite could fall on any one of us at any time, but does that mean we get to criticize NASA for the non existent satellite to COULD fall on us? No, because that is a stupid argument.

Really? How is saying that you shouldn't punch someone in the head because you might seriously hurt them in any way comparable to your example? Jesus...

 

[AgDr_ODST]

she was raising hell and distracting the bus driver while he was trying to do his job, and even through the 'conductor' blocking the view partial it looks like she spit on him and then pushed him...this action could have caused the driver to lose control and everyone would be condemning the young lady...but because the driver was smart and stopped the bus that didn't happen. I'd say he was well within his right to 'push back' even if he did so in excess

 

[Caverat]

Unless she attacked him when the camera cut to the side, I don't really see a justification for his punch. If she hit him, then yes, fair game. I just didn't see it in the video. Not touching the gender thing, as it isn't an issue with this. If you strike someone you deserve to be hit back regardless of gender on either side.

Edit: watched it again, had actually watched the mortal combat remix first, she clearly strikes him first. Justifiable punch.

 

[Uhura]

snip

Yeah, this "discussion" is completely pointless. I'm saying that people shouldn't punch others in the head (or anywhere else) because the consequences could be very serious. For some reason this point of view seems to annoy you.

 

[Prosis]

snip

Yeah, this "discussion" is completely pointless. I'm saying that people shouldn't punch others in the head (or anywhere else) because the consequences could be very serious. For some reason this point of view seems to annoy you.

So at what point is a person allowed to defend themself? And how are you allowed to defend yourself?
Is that really the state of America? That you have to be concerned with the health of a person who assaults you?
Were you ever beat up in highschool? Did you make sure not to bruise them too badly when you were defending yourself?

She hit him. She grabbed him by the neck, and spat on him. Tell me, was he supposed to wait until he had a concussion in order to retaliate? At what point would it have been "ok" for him to protect himself?

You realize this is why crime like this exists, right? Because people can act without fear of retaliation. The strong bully the weak, for the weak believe they don't have the right to fight back, or that its "dishonorable" to defend themselves.

I agree that fighting, punching, should only be last resort. But she had been relentless for several minutes, and she had already knocked his cell phone out of his hand. He could not run, nor retreat anywhere, nor call the police. And no one on the bus was helping. He was cornered, and out of options.

 

[Uhura]

snip

Of course the driver had the right to defend himself. In my opinion the uppercut was an overreaction, but feel free to disagree. I haven't advocated pressing charges against the driver or punishing him in any way.

Because you make it seem that if anyone takes a punch ever, they immediately die. The human body isn't that weak.

Your point of view is sensationalist at best. Whats worse is that when someone brings science and physics into the discussion, you backtrack.

There was no condition in that fight that could have killed her outside her own stupidity of messing with someone driving a vehicle. She had a scuffle with a normal bus driver, she didn't get into a fight with Bane on a god damn rooftop.

No, I haven't. I have over and over again said that hitting someone in the head may also seriously hurt them. You have latched on the 'one punch can kill a person' argument because it's easier to argue against it. So great, you argue against one point I have made and ignore the rest.

Then you try to legitimize your viewpoints by using "science and physics", which doesn't work because you ignore all the different variables in the situation. The different variables we can't actually count. Do you really think your analysis of the situation is in any way scientifically sound? It's based on a grainy youtube video and you act like you have done some legitimate scientific research.