Ben Marcus Rules

(This is a reconfiguring of a similar story written by the author about Ted Cruz and Donald Trump insulting each other for lifezette.com in March of 2016)

A couple hundred years ago in a century far far away, Will Smith slapping Chris Rock upside the head for a joking insult to Jada Pinkett-Smith would have been merely a preamble to something considerably more violent: A duel, fought between Rock the Challenged and Smith the  Challenger - with matched weapons = swords or maybe pistols. Or whatever the 21st Century equivalent 

With Rock, as the Challenged, choosing the weapons.

And Smith, as The Challenger, choosing the place and time 

Because 12 score and five years ago (1777), the Irish codified in great detail the rules of engagement for affairs of honor in the Code Duello. 

Of the 25 remarkably detailed codes, Rules 10 and 11 state, in essence: If some dude insults your woman - whether privately or in print or on national TV in front of tens of millions - you are honor bound to be even more offended than if the insulter had insulted you: An affair of honor - a duel - was required, lest the insulted man lose face to his wife, his family, his peers, his reputation, his self'-worth and history.

Settling insults and scores with matched weapons such as swords or pistols is at least as old as the pre-Christian, Viking holmgang, and farther back than that to David and Goliath.

Over the centuries there have been laws passed to condemn two men going out to face each other, but it was the Fightin' Irish who codified the practice of dueling and points of honor in 1777.

Found on PBS.org but reprinted from American Duels and Hostile Encounters (1963): 

• The Code Duello, covering the practice of dueling and points of honor, was drawn up and settled at Clonmel Summer Assizes, 1777, by gentlemen-delegates of Tipperary, Galway, Sligo, Mayo and Roscommon, and prescribed for general adoption throughout Ireland. The Code was generally also followed in England and on the Continent with some slight variations. In America, the principal rules were followed, although occasionally there were some glaring deviations.

Reading this code is like untangling Shakespeare or any kind of legalese, but if you can figure it out, the Code Duello is bloodily specific on all points on achieving satisfaction. 

Rules 10 and 11 apply specifically to the affair of Chris Rock hurling a G.I. Jane joke at Jada Pinkett-Smith's bald head, inspiring Will Smith to have his wits and cool blinded by a nuclear flash of red anger and charging the stage to slap Rock upside the head, then dropping two F Bombs on a show that is meant to be classy. Elegant. Hollywood.

In front of the whole entire world. 

According to the Code Duello, Smith was not only honor bound to smack Chris Rock, he should have had a perfumed glove to challenge Rock to a duel to the death for insulting his wife:

• Rule 10. Any insult to a lady under a gentleman's care or protection to be considered as, by one degree, a greater offense than if given to the gentleman personally, and to be regulated accordingly.

• Rule 11. Offenses originating or accruing from the support of ladies' reputations, to be considered as less unjustifiable than any others of the same class, and as admitting of slighter apologies by the aggressor: this to be determined by the circumstances of the case, but always favorable to the lady.

In essence, if someone insults a gentleman’s chick, the gentleman should react with greater vengeance and more furious anger than if the insult was aimed at the gentleman.

There is presidential precedent for this sort of behavior. In the spring of 1806, 22 years before he became the seventh president of the United States, "Bloody Bloody" Andrew Jackson took grave offense when Tennessee lawyer Charles Dickinson insulted the former Miss Rachel Donelson-Robbards - a divorcee, and the love of Jackson's life.

The 39-year-old Jackson could not abide by it and he challenged Dickinson to one of the many duels Jackson was rumored to have fought.

The total number of duels Jackson fought is obscured by history, but Jackson v. Dickinson was witnessed and recorded, according to History.com:

• Jackson and Dickinson were rival horse breeders and southern plantation owners with a long-standing hatred of each other. Dickinson accused Jackson of reneging on a horse bet, calling Jackson a coward and an equivocator. Dickinson also called Rachel Jackson a bigamist. (Rachel had married Jackson not knowing her first husband had failed to finalize their divorce.) After the insult to Rachel and a statement published in the National Review in which Dickinson called Jackson a worthless scoundrel and, again, a coward, Jackson challenged Dickinson to a duel.

Dude! That was way more than a G.I Jane joke and it was on - possibly around the break of dawn.

According to Rule 16, they could have used swords or pistols, although swords were considered Old School in the early 19th Century.

• Rule 16. The challenged has the right to choose his own weapon, unless the challenger gives his honor he is no swordsman; after which, however, he can decline any second species of weapon proposed by the challenged.

Dickinson was thoroughly modern, so he chose pistols.

The where and how was determined by Rule 17:

• Rule 17. The challenged chooses his ground; the challenger chooses his distance; the seconds fix the time and terms of firing.

And that’s how it went down. On May 30, 1806, Jackson and Dickinson and their seconds met at Harrison’s Mills on the Red River in Logan, Kentucky - Dickinson’s home turf. They stood 24 paces from each other (24 x 30” = 60 feet) and fired pistols.

Jackson took a bullet to the chest which broke ribs, but he stayed standing. Some say Jackson’s first shot was a misfire, which, according to The Code meant the duel was over. 

• Rule 20. In all cases a miss-fire is equivalent to a shot, and a snap or non-cock is to be considered as a miss-fire.

But Jackson fired a second shot, which killed Dickinson and silenced any talk of bigamy - but maybe not of cowardice or code breaking 

Jackson ran for president in 1828, but the murder by dueling of another American did not affect his performance. The guy insulted Jackson’s wife and called him a coward, a scoundrel and an equivocator.

Of course he popped a cap in him. That is what a gentleman did.

Duels were fought high and low but mostly high, by the unlikely likes of the painter Manet, the writer Alexander Pushkin and Shakespeare contemporary Ben Johnson. Declaration of Independence signer Button Gwinnett was killed in a duel, and Abraham Lincoln narrowly avoided a duel when he apologized to a fellow Illinois state official he had slurred in a newspaper.

And then there's the 1804 duel so famous, Alexander Hamilton died but inspired a Got Milk? ad in 1993 and a Broadway smash in 2015.

Aaron Burr was running for Governor of New York when he challenged former Treasury Secretary Hamilton to a duel in July of 1804.
There was no woman to blame defame in this affair of honor. Hamilton and Burr just did not like each other and said so publicly and privately in the harshest language. For example, Hamilton describing Burr in a private letter as "profligate, a voluptuary in the extreme."

Voluptuary!
Them’s fightin’ words which lead to Burr and Hamilton squaring off on the morning of July 11, 1804 at a secluded and popular dueling ground in New Jersey.

According to some historians, Hamilton had no intention of shooting Burr, which would have been an affront to Rule 13:

• Rule 13. No dumb shooting or firing in the air is admissible in any case. The challenger ought not to have challenged without receiving offense; and the challenged ought, if he gave offense, to have made an apology before he came on the ground; therefore, children's play must be dishonorable on one side or the other, and is accordingly prohibited.

Whether Hamilton engaged in children’s play or he just missed, he paid the ultimate price with a bullet to the gut. Hamilton died a day later, causing shock and outrage across the country.

Think of President Trump’s Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin gunned down by Andrew Cuomo. As infamous as that. Burr was accused of murder, arrested for treason for another act, fled to Europe, then returned to America when the heat was off and stayed out of prison.

Dueling was never illegal in America, but the acceptance of it faded by the time of the Civil War.

But that was then and this is now. Chris Rock jokingly insulted Jada Pinkett-Smith on seven-second delay in front of millions around the world. Smith answered with the Bitch Slap Heard 'Round the World and it ended there physically - with apologies and explanations from all involved tailing along in the next few days.

All involved except for AMPAAS who were rumored to be appalled by the violence and the language in a show celebrating an industry descending into new depths of vulgarity and violence to match the 21st Century zeitgeist: "You can't fight in here! This is the War Room!!!"
But if now was then, that slap would have been an indelibly irreversible preamble to Rock and Smith dueling to the death.

Although Rule 15 prohibits a Challenge in the heat of the night.

• Rule 15. Challenges are never to be delivered at night, unless the party to be challenged intend leaving the place of offense before morning; for it is desirable to avoid all hot-headed proceedings.

Smith slapping Rock live and in the studio then bellowing the F word twice showed a stunning disregard for the rules, so Smith demanding satisfaction even at night in violation of Rule 16 would have been on par with the zeitgeist of that infamous night.

Rule 14 sets structures for choosing the "seconds" which was the equivalent of the modern "wingman."

• Rule 14. Seconds to be of equal rank in society with the principals they attend, inasmuch as a second may either choose or chance to become a principal, and equality is indispensable.

Going by all those rules:

Would Rock have chosen pistols or swords? Sarcasm? A dance off? Knowing what a gearhead Rock is he might have chosen Ferrari Chicken at 100 yards.
Who would have stood as their seconds? 

Arsenio Hall or Seinfeld for Chris Rock? 
Jada Pinkett-Smith herself or their son Jaden For Smith?

Denzel? Serena? Venus?

The Oscars are all about drama and here was plenty.

So if The Slap was just a preamble and if Will Smith demanded further satisfaction - on live TV - what would be a 21st Century way to settle this affair of honor?

Jeff Galbraith of Bellingham, Washington suggested: "Smith should totally duel Rock. Even if just with paintball pistols. They do make dueling sets of these, I checked."

Mason Thorpe of Austin, Texas thought combining AMPAAS with MMA would be the go: "I immediately thought of it as a phenomenal Pay Per View opportunity: 12 rounds boxing/MMA/etc, interspersed by 30 seconds of Yo Mama jokes between rounds. This is what America wants and needs."

Reid Inouye of Honolulu chimed in: "Want huge ratings for Oscars next year? They should duel it out in a bitch slap one on one event to end the awards show. The network and academy have been crying about ratings for years. They could get Super Bowl-type ratings!!"

Your thoughts?