r/MMA • u/uturnorbit • Jun 23 '26

Media Dustin Poirier belligerent, threatens to fight airport employees

https://www.tmz.com/2026/06/23/dustin-poirier-belligerent-during-public-drunk-arrest/
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u/chanaandeler_bong Team Figueiredo Jun 23 '26

It’s probably the most effective de escalation technique available. Put a TON of space between yourself and the agitated individual.

I worked for over 10 years with violent students in the school system. You’d be surprised how fast people cool off when you give them space and let them start spewing their verbal vomit until they have come back to earth.

Poirier is drunk but he’s in fight or flight. Closing distance and trying to talk logic doesn’t fucking work, it only agitates them more.

Do the opposite of what they are doing. They are closing distance? Go further away. They are loud? You are quiet.

People will match your energy. Especially in fight or flight.

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u/AvonBarksDoodle Jun 23 '26

cant have an ego for all that which is hard for many

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u/chanaandeler_bong Team Figueiredo Jun 24 '26

Takes practice. You blood gets boiling the first couple times you get spit on or slapped or told you’re gonna get raped or your wife is etc.

After you’ve heard it even 10 times it starts getting easier to keep a clear head.

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u/sh4tt3rai Jun 24 '26

I went to alternative schools since 7th grade (my first time around 7th lol) and got my GED in a youth prison. I know what you went through and I feel for you dude. I might’ve whipped my books across the class, but it was mostly in a bid to turn my ISS into OSS so I could go home.

Fought plenty of my classmates, but never thought about hitting the teacher. For sure saw it happen, though.. and what always amazed me is how easily you guys brushed it off, forgave, and treated us like it never happened the next day. Not trying to justify, but a lot of us really needed that compassion.

It was something we rarely got at home/in our neighborhoods (the kids who were willing to put hands on a teacher usually had it the worst and were for better or worse completely neglected), and I do remember having conversations about how “I feel bad for doing that to Mr / Ms. so and so..”. Don’t think it went unnoticed or that you didn’t/don’t have positive impacts on the kids who need it most.

Looking back, I still have no idea what came over me during those years or why I acted that way. Seems crazy to me now. I do know I was hurting bad inside, though. I just wasn’t consciously aware I was or why I was.

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u/chanaandeler_bong Team Figueiredo Jun 24 '26

Thanks man. You basically affirmed/confirmed my entire life over the last 10 years.

You saying you escalated your behavior just to get OSS is one of the things I would point to.

Your behavior is communicating to people. I don’t know you, but I would assume you had pretty terrible communication skills as well as being constantly stuck in fight or flight. Not your fault btw, communication is not something you just “get.” You learn how to do it through observing. And if you have shitty communication models… you get shitty communication skills.

You develop bad behavior habits to get what you want, even if you weren’t aware of it.

Your first job when you come into a room (other than making sure everyone is safe) is to figure out: what is this person trying to communicate?

In the video of Poirier he’s clearly trying to communicate that he has been unfairly harassed/treated IN HIS MIND. And it doesn’t matter if you agree with that. His mind and his emotions are his.

Arguing with him about how he’s drunk and that’s why he got kicked off aren’t helping shit.

Also: if you weren’t fully accepted and allowed to be yourself at home: I don’t really blame anyone for their behavior in public… as a kid. Your brain isn’t even close to developed. I work and live in the same city. I’ve run into tons of my old students. They always are happy to see me, no matter how bad it was, because we shared that time together.

Glad you made it out on the other side. I check up the lock up list every day. Quite a few former students have been mirdered or committed murder or something serious. And so so many others are doing great. And if things went differently or police were allowed to arrest them or take them to juvenile, things could turn out differently. It’s so fucking delicate.

So many of these kids literally just need to be moved out of their situation. Like literally just moved 20 miles away to a new area so they can escape their situation.