I have a woman friend whom I love dearly.  Her husband is one of my best friends and she is as supportive of my family as any one could be.  That as preamble to the fact that I have a bone to pick.  Admittedly it is probably an issue of simple semantics but in any case it is something that bugs me.  It helps to know that I am an incurable teaser.  I like to play with folks and have a good time.  I think I am harmless as I have never been accused of doing harm with my teasing but, there could be those to whom I have offered offense.  I am not really too sorry about that.  You see I figure if your sense of offense is so sensitive as to be set off at a level that does not require you calling me on it your offended sensitivity meter is set too low.  Anyhoo…my friend is very attractive and I always tease her about having to fight off annoying men, like me.  She always responds with an earnest, “I am non-violent.” There in resides my annoyance.  I cannot truly suss out what that means.  Other than a niggling sense that she is castigating me for my thought processes; that smacking away annoying advances is appropriate, I can not logically accept that anyone is completely non-violent.  For instance I do not believe for a moment that my friend would fail to fight off an attacker if the target of the attack was one of my daughters. Should the simple of tactic of bopping an assailant on the noggin with a skillet keep my 13 year old from harm I am certain she would avail herself of that tactic.  I can accept that she is ANTI-violence but by saying she is NON-violent she is telling me that she would tolerate an attack on my daughter, or even her own with no physical response.  I on the other hand embrace violence as a part of life.  Not that I do violence on a regular basis or even more than very rarely.  Nonetheless, in a world like ours and in times like these, the threat of violence as an attitude and as an option is not only prudent but part of the survival of the species.  And, while I have not done anything violent in many years I am practiced at it and have done in my past things that I am certain my friend would find unthinkable, since she finds all violence unthinkable.  And, if she or her family and certainly if mine were threatened with harm that I could prevent only by a violent act, act I most certainly would.  Harboring that attitude, I am always a little lost when someone tells me that they are non-violent.  I wonder if they really believe that the lives of the innocent are truly worth staying true to their ethical choice.  I wonder if they think that the violence done to the innocent is truly no more evil than the violence done to protect the innocent.  I wonder what else of those they are not willing to protect they are equally willing to sacrifice.  Their money? Their home? Their life? I fully understand “turning the other cheek”.  I ascribe to “turning the other cheek”.  But in failing to protect others I suspect I am no less part of the process of forcefully turning their cheek than I would be if I were wielding the fist. I also understand that in fairly short order I will run out of cheeks and then it is a whole new ballgame.  What price moral certitude?