This is the issue. Somewhere along the way someone decided that they should be protected.
The reason what you saw happen is because "thing" knows damn well that if it gets it's teeth knocked in that it will receive a big payout and that someone simply protecting themselves from a perceived threat will get to sit in jail because no matter the initial intent of throwing hands, it will get spun into a hate issue.
The way I see it is, thing should have gotten stomped for screaming in peoples faces.
I personally have some rather medieval thoughts as to how many of the worlds issues should be handled which tend to be very unpopular. So I keep most to myself.