The fourth and final way of handling conflict occurs when verbal assaults escalate into actual physical violence inflicted on each other. Resorting to violence, people create more pain and distance than the original issue could possibly have caused.

People lose control and plates or glasses fly through the air like projectiles. Feet kick holes through sheetrock. People lash out at each other with fists and fingernails. It’s never a pretty sight!

An example of this conflict style happened in Waukesha, Wisconsin to newlyweds, Mr. and Mrs. Snider. The problems started when their wedding was over and they were trying to decide where they should go to celebrate. They couldn’t agree and, since they had been drinking since early afternoon, the bride got mad and swung at her husband—gashing his head open with her wedding ring. The police were eventually called because someone in the bar thought the groom had been stabbed. When the bride met the police, she was belligerent and was arrested for disorderly conduct. They later found the groom wandering along a nearby street in search of a hospital. The police took him to see his wife at the jail. But, shortly after being released, the lovebirds began arguing again and this time he hit her in the face. He was arrested for domestic battery and since she started kicking the police officers for interrupting their ‘honeymoon,’ she was arrested a second time for disorderly conduct. They spent their wedding night in separate cells and were released the next morning. It’s not hard to imagine how long their marriage lasted!

[Next week I will begin looking at some proper responses to conflict.]