Rory Miller writes a short piece about “predictable violence”.

So what are the stupid life choices? Almost all social violence happens in four kinds of places:

• Where people get their minds altered. Drugs, alcohol, or even ecstatic drumming, things that break down the social conditioning against violence increase the likelihood of violence. Who’d a thunk it?
• Where young men gather in groups. An audience plus insecurities about status are a recipe for Monkey Dance violence.
• Where territories are in dispute. War or the edge between rival gang territory, doesn’t matter. Violence is more common and even the types of violence are similar: raids and drive-bys; spray ‘n’ pray and collateral damage.
• Where you don’t know the rules. Groups have rules and those rules will be enforced. In certain groups, they will be enforced with a look or a word. In others if you refuse to acknowledge your error, the correction may be violent.

Give the whole piece a read. It’s a fairly good analysis. I wouldn’t say it’s as cut and dry as he presents tho. For example:

Third analysis: What kind of target do I look like? Big guys who look tough are Monkey Danced on more than little guys. Win or lose with the big guy, you score points on ‘heart’. Win with the little guy and you just beat a child– no rep in that. Worse if the little guy beats you. People who are uncomfortable in their own skin (reads as weak) and labile (literally translates as ‘lippy’ but a psychology term for showing emotion) are bully targets.

There’s logic to this, certainly. But consider this story of 2 teenagers attacking a 75-year old woman as a gang initiation. And one of my favorite quotes from Greg Hamilton:

Most people are grass-eaters with their heads down on the ground. The jackals and lions know this and think of them as that. Hold your head up and walk like you are the biggest, baddest lion that walks. The jackals and lions will notice and leave you alone because they don’t want to get hurt. Don’t challenge them because they might feel they have to respond to it. All you want is their respect, not their dignity.

This isn’t to say one guy is right and the other is wrong, but more that it’s not always so cut and dry. Things can be complex and well… as much as we want to be able to predict violence, as much as we might be able to lend support to particular situations or contexts, in the end we have to admit we can’t predict it all, that sometimes shit happens. Best we can do is strive to be prepared.