Anger, Contempt & Disgust Indicators of Violence & Dangerous Intent: Risk Prevention

“Among leaders of groups that committed aggressive acts, there was a significant increase in expressions of anger, contempt and disgust from 3 to 6 months prior to the group committing an act of violence. For nonviolent groups, expressions of anger, contempt and disgust decreased from 3 to 6 months prior to the group staging an act of peaceful resistance.” – Read the full article here.

Dangerous intent. It’s an interesting term, which could also referred to as dangerous demeanor, threatening behaviour – and in some examples – intimidation. When it comes to human beings causing psychological or physical harm to one another I find myself sitting in the camp of risk prevention. As a martial artist I promote awareness and a respectful wariness of those demonstrating unusual or even hostile behaviour – a preventative or protective habit – with the back up “risk management system” firmly in place that I call self defence. To illustrate what I mean, a number of years ago a good friend of mine was drunk on his first night in Bangkok and staggered down a dark alley by himself and was subsequently mugged, with thankfully only his pride being hurt. A year or so later another friend of mine who knew about the incident and that I did martial arts asked me; “What would you have done in that situation?” My simple response was; “I wouldn’t have been there,” which really meant – I would not have been drunk in an alley by myself at night in a foreign country. Avoidance of risk – mainly dangerous risk – to me is just plain common sense.

There are plenty of reasons in learning to identify emotions in others (see this page for a long list) – and from a preventative perspective of risk – I would suggest learning to identify emotions is essential. The next step is to learn to identify threatening or suspicious body language.

This is a BBC video of the alleged bomber in Bulgaria 19th July 2012;  can you spot some pre-event indicators: