DUELS (worth repeating) You aren’t honor bound to accept one. You’re threatened

DUELS

(worth repeating)

You aren’t honor bound to accept one. You’re threatened that if you impugn the honor of another you will apologize, or fight to prove the truth of your statement, or die by murder for doing neither.

While positioned as trial by combat, the principle is ancient: “put up or shut up.”

My position on dueling is that the court is one weapon that is available to us in such matters, and that reputation is in fact, a critical asset in one’s inventory.

The reason dueling was outlawed was that men hired substitutes (mercenaries) and it became a means of murder rather than suppression of gossip or test of truth telling.

The reason it was originally promoted, was the equivalent of ‘take it outside’. It allowed men to ‘cool off’ before getting in a fight, and hopefully allow cooler heads to prevail. Also it was quite heavily regulated, with the intention to harm not so much to kill.

Challenging a man to a duel ends a conversation very quickly since it can escalate in to a very risky life or death proposition. Also, today’s guns are very dangerous by comparison. If we can fight, use sticks and bats, use knives, use swords, use guns, or use courts, then I suspect there would be a lot more truth telling, and a lot less gossip, and a lot more civility in this world.

And those who ‘cheat’ us, would be put to death in vast numbers.