I don’t know if your familiar with the term happy slapping like joy riding it has nothing to do with innocent pleasures.
In the UK it consist basically of slapping someone while sending the images on your mobile.
Of course it escalated.
I wish this sort of instant Karma occured more often.

As juvenile as it sounds, ROTFLMAO!

Does anybody else feel sorry for the bicyclist or the driver of the oncoming car? For all I know, they’ll both need therapy.

I think the car he hit was parked, but I could be wrong.

Personally I feel a little sorry for everyone involved in that video. The idiots in the car in particular will probably have very painful futures ahead of them, mentally and physically, especially if they don’t bother to learn from this lesson in hard knocks.

“Karmic ass-whoopin’"… heh!  all too rare and the desire to see more of it is hardly a new problem.

I watched the video several times and given the rate at which the other vehicles pass in and out of frame its safe to say that the driver was traveling at about 25-30mph. That said, the force of a 150lbs door traveling at that rate of speed colliding with the soft flesh of what appears to be a small boy could have been enough to kill him. So for the sake of argument, let’s call this little prank attempted murder. If that had been the result, possibly negligent homicide. Either way, the act is not only criminal, but potentially lethal. Why should I pity a potential murderer? Granted, intent is not present, but still. As for “Happy Slapping”, well, not only has it gotten completely out of control, as though there was an acceptable amount of random assault, but I recently read an article which presented strong evidence for a rise in sexual asaults which mimic this so-called “Happy Slapping” trend. Victims generally spoke of how the were gang-raped in a secluded, yet public, place while members of the group took photos with their cell phones or filmed the incident while laughing. Laughing? Who is capable of committing an act so intolerably cruel? What kind of perverse world do we live in where not an individual but a group of individuals finds it not only fun, but funny to gang-rape a stranger and film the incident for further enjoyment?!

As I have said before, I work in Law Enforcement so maybe my views are a bit biased, but my god. The depths of human depravity never cease to amaze me.

Neo, you’re not the only one.  It’s for precisely this reason that I’m in favor of the death penalty.  I think some people are irretrievably sociopathic and need to be put down for the good of the rest of society.  Call it a sociological illness if you like; it needs to be eradicated wherever it’s found, or it spreads.

Being sociopathic seems to be possible for a group where the individuals aren’t particularly sociopathic. Or the leader is, causing it to spread.

Instant media (like cell phone pictures posted automatically to web sites) seems to mean that the group can also be global and number in the thousands… not just the dozen or so directly involved in the crime.

I think that weakens any misgivings an individual may have because they start to feel they’re a very insignificant minority.

I thought a lot about sociopathy while staying in the hotel in Peoria last couple of days.  People were partying and whoopin’ it up in the hallways very late - sleep nearly impossible.  At 2:am one night one of the revelers went down the hallway hollering and pounding on everyone’s door including mine.  Did he imagine that anyone on the other side of the door may have a physical disability, be losing the contest between pain and sleep, be truly desperate for rest in the face of a long day coming?  Or was he unable to empathize with any other human being?

Many guests called the management, who ineffectually asked the rowdy guests to quiet down and were greeted with snorts of laughter.  The desire to confront the miscreants was tempered by the idea that, as H.G. Wells said, “it’s no favor to the right kind of wife to make her a widow.” I could not be sure that they were not armed, or would not shoot someone just for entertainment - such behavior being on the same continuum with what they were doing.

The courts call it ‘disorderly conduct’ as if it mattered little; but it is the behavioral equivalent of gang grafitti, broken windows, empty lots and burned buildings.

That video is just awful. Kids do stupid things all the time, but I don’t think the boy in the video deserved that. Hopefully all parties involved have learned something valuable from this tragedy.

What did the kid on the bicycle learn?  I’m kinda with Neo & GM on this one.

Same here. If the guy in the car tried to hit the bicyclist with the car’s door, I’d call it attempted assault at best. Tough luck if the perp suffers grievous injuries as a result of his premeditated actions.

I must say that I’m surprised by the responses.  In reviewing the video it is apparent that the perp has a very fat ass.  Most likely, he suffers from low self-esteem as a fatty.  The act in question is probably a manifestation of him acting outwardly on the inner hostility he feels towards himself.  This is likely excarbated by the competitve free for all in rough and tumble public schools, which puts too much emphasis on learning and not enough on self-esteem.

What this individual is crying out for is a little love and respect from society at large.  Really, if we only treated fatties with more respect this whole thing wouldn’t have happened.  So you see it is really our fault, yours and mine, as members of society that we failed this individual.  Never mind that he could ride his own bike to lose weight.  The very fact that he is acting out means that we need to implement a heretofore unknown government program that should have been there as a safety net for him.  Something, anything that would have helped this victim of our society.

My sincerest hope is that the medical provider realized our failure, and not only provided medical services to him at no charge, but also provided pro bono counseling services to him. To cover the costs for this they should just increase our medical charges so that we might rightfully subsidize the help that this child requires.

Shame on you all for taking joy at the pain of America’s troubled youth. 

No sympathy for the perp here. I have lived around people who are too selfish, too stupid, and too self-centered to care about the rights of the people who live around them. I hear them in movie theaters, deal with them in traffic, find them in all walks of life no matter their socio-economic strata. For much of my life I have tried to avoid them as best I can only confronting those that leave me no other alternatives. Feel sorry for a brainless idiot in the process of comitting yet another assault on society?

NOT A CHANCE!

When teenagers get together they encourage each other doing things that they will not do if they were not in a gang.
I think it was not the idea of this stupid boy but of someone else. That is what happens when you try to please someone else while in reality you are against the idea. There are things the video does not tell you.
I feel sorry for him.

Consi, that was great, but you blew it with the “fatty” comment. 

Seriously, though, there’s a different between EXPLANATION and EXCUSE.  It’s well known that groups of teenage boys (and, more often these days, teenage girls) can egg each other on into outrageous behavior.  We can and should try to take steps to address that phenomenon (for example, by teaching our children to rely less on their approval and more on their common sense and empathy), but it doesn’t mean we have to excuse the results.

One rift between conservatives and liberals seems to be that when liberals try to understand the explanations behind something, the conservatives accuse them of excusing it; the distinction is lost on them.  I say, let’s try to understand and address the root problem so that we can reduce it; AND let’s kill ‘em all and let God sort ‘em out.

I say, let’s try to understand and address the root problem so that we can reduce it; AND let’s kill ‘em all and let God sort ‘em out.

Right.  Law enforcement (and grievous karma) can only step in after the fact and deliver a much-needed slap upside the head.  Kids need parents who will not let them run around screaming in restaurants, and who will challenge them with; “If your friends told you to go jump off a cliff, would you do it?” (Always an awkward moment, but when little Jimmy gets near the metaphorical cliff, it can provide an ‘out’)

But it isn’t quite fair to say conservatives aren’t on the case of root causes.  Does anyone believe the divorce rate is not a factor in kids’ belief that only they matter?  A marriage can be dissolved but when children come along the stakes go way, way up.

I agree with Hillary that it takes a village to raise a child, (a just society, good education, safe streets, etc.) but that is secondary to parents.  Police often lament that people seem to want them to be substitute parents.

I’m reminded of what a very good friend of ours keeps saying: It’s the parent’s job to protect a teenager’s body until the mind reengages.

Consi,...you blew it with the “fatty� comment

Abundantly lipid?

As for charges, we know how the young male mind
reacts when placed in close proximity to other male minds. It’s probably the only way to achieve this level of stupid.

We know there were at least three in the car
the rear passenger, the cameraman in the rear and
the driver. All are chargeable with at least vehicular assault. the presence of a camera supports any claim of intent.