Glittergate

So, the video from the guy who was filming the two who assaulted Andrew Bolt has turned up on the net.   Fairfax has it here.

In my previous post, I questioned whether Bolt had gone too far in (so he said) kicking one of the assailants in the groin, while he was down.

The funny thing is, unless there was yet more fighting than appears in this video, and I don't think there is, I can't see that a clear kick happened at all - or at least, not as Bolt described it.   (The young looking Fairfax journalist writing it up is completely on Bolt's side, by the way, saying "He fights back fiercely, kicking and punching his two assailants in the face and groin before they give up and start to walk away."  But I can't see clear evidence of a kick, or not of a kick as Bolt claimed.)

Let's revisit how Bolt himself described it:

I hit the head of one so hard that my knuckles are still tender, and when he was down, legs sprawled apart, I kicked.

Post that footage, moron.

Um, unless my eyes deceive, there is no one " ... down, legs sprawled apart".

He keeps talking about the kick, too.  Here is how he first put it:

Luckily the cameras do not capture me kicking one between the legs. I cannot have my children see me acting like a thug.

(I said it was an insincere, boastful, apology.)

Here's my take on the matter, after seeing this second video:

* It does make Bolt's reaction to swing out and fight them perfectly understandable (not that I ever questioned that);

* It actually shows Bolt stumbling in a way that the previous video didn't show - his performance as a street fighter does not look quite as good as his words suggest.  (Not that he didn't, in a general sense, do well enough);

* I think he's greatly exaggerating the kicking part of his fight, because that plays well to his fan club. (Really, who can avoid the feeling that Bolt secretly thinks this is the best PR he has received in a decade?)

So I reckon he's OK on the disproportionate response to provocation - if he hadn't exaggerated what he had done, I wouldn't have even raised it.

Update:  Again, just to make it clear I make no excuses for the idiot assailants - the three involved ought to face charges.  Even if it's a fine that their family pays for them, they deserve a conviction for assault on their record.

Update 2:  it's still being said on many sites that the stuff sprayed at Bolt was shaving cream, but it sure doesn't look like that on the videos, and it's supposed to have involved glitter and dye.   Last I looked, shaving cream comes only in non-dying white, and without glitter.  You can, however, get glittery hair colour spray, mainly used by kids.   I would suspect that that is more likely what was used, which is a stupid thing to be spraying towards someone's face.

Update 3:  It's not just me.  Despite every single Catallaxy commenter probably having watched the Bolt videos ten times, I see only one asking the same question I have - where's the groin kick on someone down?

And that, I expect, is about where their inquirying minds will leave it.