[user104658]

Originally Posted by Ammi

..yeah...(...from the vid that we can see atm...)... the older guy did actively appear to pursue the physical, as well as his verbal abuse...so obviously never condoning violence....it would surely be a ‘self defence’ and a ‘was it reasonable force’, type thing...and it went out of shot a bit so hopefully the police could determine that...

it doesn't go out of shot, one of the men is stood at the front of the shot with his chest right next to the camera, the ol' racist is off to the top right of the shot up a step a good 6ft away, the guy turns around and climbs the step moving towards him, he pushes him away and then he throws the punch. The old man is the initial verbal aggressor, and the initial physical aggressor. The attack was provoked but it was not by any stretch of the imagination self defense, he moved towards him with clear intent.

[edit to add] I personally don't think provokation is often a good reason for physical retaliation and it shows an alarming lack of self control. On top of that, physically attacking someone who is clearly far physically weaker than you are for any reason - again other than to stop an immediate threat to yourself of someone else - is morally abhorrent. That's regardless of whether or not that happens to be a good person.