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View Full Version : Grey areas of self harm.


munchausen
March 6th, 2010, 11:16 AM
A couple of years ago I was having a particularly bad night and there was a gang of guys about my age at the time doing the usual gang stuff, you know shouting abuse at passers by, throwing stones at cars that kind of thing. I wandered by on the other side of the road and one of them shouted something at me, I think it was about my hair or something but like I said I was really ticked off so instead of doing what common sense would have dictated and continuing on my not so merry way I crossed the road and headed straight for them. Now I'll just say I was over-confident I'd just got my first black belt and I was by no means small for my age, as I headed over a few of the guys ran for it saying I was mental or something so they were down to four. One of them started walking towards me and put his hand behind his back so before he had a chance to pull his knife I kicked him in the solar-plexus and he crumbled, (obviously no-one's getting up after that.) I don't remember much of the rest of it but I ended up down to one guy who had pulled a knife from somewhere, most people who practice martial arts will tell you after months of sparring with people when you get into a fight with someone untrained they seem like they're moving in slo-mo so he threw the knife out, I'd have easily been able to grab his arm before it connected but I just plain didn't want to. Instead I threw out my right hand onto the tip of the blade. That hurt like hell, it must have been a good quality knife because it went straight in one side out of the other. So basically it wasn't an accident. (as for the guy I hit him on the bridge of the nose after "grabbing" the knife and he was out of the fight.) After that I've been getting into fights constantly knowing that I will get hurt as opposed to I might get hurt. It's not been too bad for the area I live in, some streets have been completely cleared of gangs at night and other people are sticking up for themselves too and it's very rare to hear that anyone has been attacked. So I was wondering seeing as I go out with the expressed intent of being hurt in some way or another would that count as self harm? So far IRL people seem at about a 60/40 divide in favor of it not being self harm.
This started because I came across an article saying, "Behaviours that usually fall outside the boundaries of self-harm may indeed represent self-harm if performed with explicit intent to cause tissue damage." So I was wondering what you guys think on the subject. Also if you need an opinion on anything you think may be a grey area of self harm then you could post them here.

BeautifulDisaster
March 6th, 2010, 12:18 PM
Self harm is where you do something to harm yourself intentionally.

munchausen
March 6th, 2010, 12:25 PM
Self harm is where you do something to harm yourself intentionally.

I suppose that's one vote for yes, although I suppose I should make it clear that I don't instigate fights I just wait for them to come to me. That probably doesn't change anything.

georgiamay
March 6th, 2010, 12:50 PM
yeah it seems like self-harm, just one that no one really knows about.

if you do it because you want to get yourself hurt, then yes, it is self-harm, because that is what self-harm actually is; doing something specically to hurt yourself.

CaptainObvious
March 6th, 2010, 12:50 PM
I think you answered this question yourself. Yes, it's self-harm like any other.

CuriousDestruction
March 6th, 2010, 02:18 PM
hmmmm, although your story makes it sound complex, it's still self-harm. like throwing yourself into a fire. that's still injuring yourself on purposely. i encourage you not to get into fights. cuz one of those days someone will pull a gun and the bullet, while untrained, won't go "slow-mo."

munchausen
March 6th, 2010, 06:43 PM
i encourage you not to get into fights. cuz one of those days someone will pull a gun and the bullet, while untrained, won't go "slow-mo."

I'm aware of that. Not to sound insensitive because I understand where you're coming from but I just don't care.

screamtobeheard
March 6th, 2010, 10:47 PM
I agree. It's self harm.

Asylum
March 7th, 2010, 12:23 AM
i agree with everyone else its self harm.

Lemonlover934
March 7th, 2010, 02:34 PM
I'd say yes, enjoying dangerous situations is not self harm but when you alter those situations to get hurt i would say it is self harm x

Fiction
March 23rd, 2010, 12:30 PM
Yupp self harm :/ I hope your hand gets better soon :S xx

Scarface
March 23rd, 2010, 12:37 PM
Antagonizing fights and getting cocky will get you into a serious amount of trouble to be quite honest. I got into a lot of fight in school myself, but i got into so much trouble and got really hurt. I believe it's self harm just don't do it anymore. Get a punching bag or a stress ball something you can take your anger out on because doing so on people comes with consequences.