I only got in a couple, never organised things like the rough kids did behind the sports equipment shed but they were pretty spectacular and I'm amazed no one was hurt. Well yeah people were hurt but not that bad.

Probably the most 'entertaining' I remember about Year 10 I was in the library doing some research with this nice girl when this Schwarzenegger in a checked shirt comes around and lifts her up, he'd harassed her in the past and grabbing her off me just put me over the edge.
So I basically start throwing everything I've got at him, which considering my poor upper body strength wasn't much. He shoves me into the bottom of a library shelf and it goes full Hollywood tipping over in a shower of books with kids running like Indiana Jones as it topples. We're both underneath, I'm more shocked than hurt but he got it pretty bad. Didn't come back to school for a couple weeks, when he did he actually came up and shook hands with me, talking about how it was a good and fair fight!

Some other kids had it bad though, there were a couple of skanks got into a catfight with broken bottles and a knife, poor girl lost her eye and needed facial reconstruction.

So I guess my question is are you a lover or a fighter?

In 9th grade i witnessed a fight between two redneck junior cowboys after school with one getting into the bed of his pickup truck, picking up a 2 x 4 and hitting the other over the head with it.

I always preferred to watch the entertainment rather then get hurt providing entertainment for others

nah, only the routine and friendly rugby skirmishes.

Cheers,
Slug

Yep; a few.

Mostly fights with peeps who were twice my height.

In my school, an all-male grammar school in a poor working class areas, you fought or went under. No choice.

Things settled down in the late teens when everyone had the measure of the others, but the early years were grim.

Violence was endemic right through the school. Even the teachers used their fists on kids.

I fought. Got my ass kicked a number of times. It's what happens when you grow up in a Mexican Barrio and pretty much the only white family in it.

I learned early that when you get in a fight, you are going to get hurt, you just are trying to hurt him more than he hurts you.

I used to be scared and then I got jumped my Freshman year. I swore I wasn't going to have that happen again and I learned to go to war in a fight. Dirty, nasty, ruthless were the rules I lived by.

When I was a teacher, I didn't try to break them up, because the contract specifically forbade me from breaking up fights. I'd just call security and sit at the desk. One kid got beat pretty bad with a skateboard and I didn't do a damn thing because the idiots in the administration had fired a teacher who tried to break up a fight and as he tore the girl from the other, the girl tripped and hit her head on the desk and knocked herself out.

Yep, I've seen similar events, luckily there's still a bit of common sense down here in Australia but it's on the way out if the the powers that be have anything to do with it.

HMmm ya...

Rarely my idea.

My fondest memory was getting my 5th grade ass kicked by 8th graders that where picking on my friend on his birthday. I really got my ass kicked =( But I told those #%&*$# off so was worth it I guess.

Won a few, many more or less even. And lost some spectacularly. But never started the things. Learned I could take a punch with the other guy giving it his all and that I could take it. Fat thick head is good for something I guess.

After my step father died I kind of with drew from the child hood stuff. By high-school I must have had a fook with me sign on my forehead. So was interesting having half the football team giving me grief. thing was, and I did not realize this until later, I was bigger by about 30 pounds than most of them. So once I got that down, it was scare the living #%&*$# out of them one by one. Took about 2 I think before they buggered off and let me alone. I remember the first, I was blood raged mad, was going hurt this 9th grade punk bad. Saw nothing but abject fear in this kids eyes. realized I won. That kid never screwed with me again. Rinse and repeat. Then got into weights and the like. Then nothing for the rest of that crap high school experience.

Fights are freaken stupid. But it pays to know how and how much you can take. Its knowledge that is really needed, if you need it. You don't have it and the other guy does, your screwed. Just hope the moral compass is there.

Funny you said that. Being larger than most of the kids at school, i recall being the focal point of "small man syndrome" where these wannabes tried for notoriety.

I had to avoid as many as possible. Because of my size, I was always blamed for everything. It was #%&*$# to be honest. Back in those days, being bigger defaulted me to bully, and these little knobs mostly got away with starting it.

But on the rugby field was better. You could have a proper tonk and then have a beer after. Ahh the good old days.

Yeah, sure.


Cool!

I guess you defended her honour, then?
And that the librarian was pissed.

Ouch.

In your case. Both.

Yes, didn't exactly get a reward for it though...

And yeah, he wasn't exactly thrilled.

A couple harmless fist fights in middle school.
A nasty one in Istanbul, at midnight.

Had my first proper fight in the last year of primary school, year 7. Two other chaps there who even did the 'ROUND ONE !' thing..i was sh/tting bricks i can tell ya. After some posing and ducking and weaving and light hits and push shove type stuff he lined me up and clocked me in the side of the face good...and man did it hurt, felt like my head was going to fall off. He then stopped the fight and said ' all good ?' or something like that and i just nodded my head, we shook hands and that was that. We were mates all through High School funnily enough.

My first high school fight, i won that one by a bus trip, he picked me for no reason other than he was a an ahole and picking fights was his thing. Organised to meet at the school bus stop, i got there first and huddled onto the bus in the rush ...and watched him looking around for me as the bus drove away

Ha! It's funny you mention becoming mates, in primary school, must have been grade 2 or 3 there was this little hyperactive kid who one day decided that he'd try his best to annoy me, constantly circling around me, yelling in my face and stealing the feather I kept in my hat*
Anyway after a whole day of this I just couldn't take it anymore and punched him straight in the face as we left class, he crumpled and fell back across a bench and stopped moving. I seriously started panicking and trying to help as everyone came to see the kid face down in the dirt. It was probably the fall not the hit that did it.
It took about 5-10 minutes before he started responding.

We actually became good friends and he turned out to be an ok guy, he did piss of a lot of other people though and got his arse kicked almost daily throughout high school.

*Nine year old me thought it was cool

First day of High School in 9th grade I got into a fight with an 11th grader.

The fight lasted 2 min and he was down on the ground.

I won.

I got respect for the next 4 years except for the idiot during my sophomore year who didn't get the memo.

I talked to a girl in my Geometry class and I helped her with her math when the teacher had the entire class split into 2 and 3 to do group math work.

She took a liking to me but not that way; as friends when a boy and a girl can be when you are 15-16.

One day I went to the gym locker room to get my running shoes out of my locker.

Her boyfriend who was a 12th grader senior on the Varsity football team stopped me on my way out.

Here I was surrounded by about 6 of his fellow football jocks.

He pushed me against the lockers (my back to it) and he put one hand around my neck as if he was going to choke me.

He started saying you been messing with my gf. You been making moves on my gf.

I told him no I haven't. We were just doing math together in class when the teacher put us in groups and pairs.

I then grabbed his hand by the wrist that he had around my neck and the rest was history.

He was down for the count screaming like a baby. His friends stood there and didn't know what to do next.

Whether to give me a beating or to step aside.

I took one sudden step forward as if I was going to rush the closest one: they parted like the the Red Sea parted in front of Moses.

One of them said "Damn, he is pretty tough!"

I got more R-E-S-P-E-C-T for the rest of my High School years.

The next day in Geometry class the idiot's gf came up and apologize for her now EX-Boyfriend's behavior.

Word got around I beat up a jock who happened to be the QB of the Senior Varsity Football team.

I dated that girl on and off for the rest of my senior year and she was one of the Junior Varsity cheerleaders.

I also dated just about every girl to every other girl on the Junior Varsity and Varsity cheerleaders squad, on the girls Track and Field team, Volleyball team, Basketball team and many other girls from 9th grade to 12th grade.

Hence why in the other thread I said I wanted my children to learn to defend themselves and take martial arts classes whether they want to or not.

Of course the Principal who was also the coach of the Football team wanted to expel me and I told him if he did, I would put him on the news and reveal all his dirty secrets about him and the Football team.

He left me alone. That idiot didn't shake my hand at graduation when they called our names one by one and we went up to the podium in front of a crowd large enough for 508 graduating seniors to receive our diploma and shake his hand while a photographer took a photo of each one of us.

I still have his name. I wonder if he is still alive. He must be 70 or older if he was. I should find him.

I had similar experiences at grammar school (1971-75).My first day there I wanted to be my last.There was a certain element of thuggery that one spent all your time avoiding if possible.I certainly got a few beatings but I wasn't a fighter.Beside it was always a group onto one,you stood little chance.Hiding was my forte.

The thugs in our class would always sit at the back,all the 'timids' would sit at the front as far away as possible.If the teacher was late they would start to perform and you knew that at any second they would pick on someone.It was a terrible environment to have to endure and it took a heavy toll on my education.

Many years after leaving I would occasionally see some of them,they were completely different and I was a lot lot bigger.I felt like going over to them,punching them in the face and say 'remember me'? One of them even became a police inspector.

As for the teachers,Max you are right.Some were really nasty.Canes and slippers were standard armament for some and our woodwork teacher kept a thin piece of dowel for 'punishment' and I can tell you now,it bloody hurt like hell!

Best days of our lives? F**k off!

*Cue Johnny Cash - That's One You Owe Me*

Was freakishly tall, rake skinny, with thick glasses and really good at math and science. What do you think ?

Actually very few fights and those were short because I sucked at fighting. In my day, ( unless you were in a criminal gang) school fights ended when one guy went down, and there was NEVER any kicking or weapons used. Anyone who kicked a guy when they were down or tried to use a weapon was most likely in for a beating himself from everyone else.