Da Techguy's (no longer backup) Blog

After watching the video of the Chris Rock Joke and Will Smith’s response I’ve several things to say.

1. When I was a kid jokes about people’s wives and mothers were considered completely off limits and any such joke would constitute “fighting words” particularly in the presence of a husband and/or son.
2. When I heard Rock’s joke I thought it was pretty tame and was unsure if it rose to the level of a smack in the face until my wife informed me of Smith’s wife’s disease that caused her to lose her hair. Given that fact I’d say such a joke about a man’s wife made publicly in his presence required a response.
3. Even without the disease it would be up to Smith and not me to decide if Rock’s words rose to the level of a punch in the face.
4. If this was not told in a public place with Smith present it would not have required a public punch in the mouth Smith could have spoken to him privately and demanded an apology, and if it didn’t’ come THEN he could whack him.
5. I very much liked the fact that Smith walked up slowly and calmly before smacking him and then slowly and calmly returned to his seat. That was exactly the right way to do it.
6. I must say I give a lot of credit to Chris Rock for his reaction he took the punch and carried on. didn’t miss a beat. He did the deed, paid the price and continued about his business.
7. Even with a tame joke if that had been a joke about my mother and my father was present the only way he wouldn’t have gotten to Rock would be because me and my brothers might have gotten to him first.
8. My wife told me that several million women across the country swooned when they saw Smith call on Rock to “keep my wife’s name out of your fucking mouth.” and even more when he threw the punch. She’s right. Woman like the idea of their man standing up for them even if they might not admit it.
9. Congresswoman Ayanna Presley of the squad tweeted out support for Smith’s actions and then deleted it. It figures. She finally tweets something I agree with and then deletes it.
10. I’ll wager Smith gets a ton of fan mail over this, but will be condemned by a the “right” people because his actions reinforce masculinity and the role of men, something our cultural betters despise.
11. Of course in fairness to our cultural betters since they can’t define “woman” they would have no idea what to do anyway.
12. Finally The folks who produce the Oscars must have been in rapture. It’s the most attention the show has gotten in decades.

This of course brought to mind a story involving my wife and my youngest son.

I taught my boys to avoid fights, I further told them than if in a situation where they might get in a fight and it’s impossible to get out of it to make sure they didn’t throw the first punch.

There was however one caveat to that rule. If the person in question was saying something about either their mother or their grandmother, they not only had permission to throw the first punch but they had standing orders, provided the person was not armed, to do so.

This exact situation arose about twenty years ago. My wife was a school nurse at the time and my son attended the school she worked at. On the playground somebody said something about his mother and he smacked him.

Of course he got into trouble and I was called in to talk to the vice principal. I told him in no uncertain terms that he was acting my standing orders and that while I understood that the school had to enforce their rules and had no objection to any discipline they had to apply to my son that my standing orders to him remained in force and he would be commended by me for his actions.

So my son got detention and principal thanked me for my time, but as I was reaching the door he said quietly to me that he hoped his son would do the same thing in the same situation.

A postscript. Nobody ever talked any smack about his mother in his presence again.