An open letter to the ‘man’ who assaulted a waitress

In my opinion, it depends.
Yes, if you were acting in self-defence after she attacked you – in which case it might be proper to pay no settlement at all.
Yes, if it was in the heat of the moment, when you were quarrelling with the waitress and she provoked you to the point of losing it.
 But, no, it is not okay when the waitress was standing sombrely metres away, silent and not even looking at you, and it was you who moved toward her with ill intent.
No, it was not okay when the argument leading to the assault revolved around a restaurant rule that she was simply obeying. In effect, you slapped someone who was only doing her job, and politely it seems.
No, it was not okay – unless Bt40,000 means the world to you and losing it represents substantial punishment. But to a man in your position, Bt40,000 is small change.
No, it was not all right, because it sends the message to other wealthy people that they are free to assault less fortunate human beings safe in the knowledge they can “settle” with little more than the change in their pocket.
No, it was not all right, because you have shown no sign of remorse. Throwing stuff around after attacking her is one thing, (you were obviously drunk), but threatening to sue whoever released the CCTV footage of the slapping is another. If you were truly sorry, you wouldn’t be angry at the video’s poster; you would hate yourself.
If it were not for the security camera clip, you would have already forgotten that you slapped someone, hard, simply because she asked you to respect the non-smoking rule. Without the CCTV camera, the person on the wrong end of your dark temper would still be wondering what her fault was.
There is no CCTV record of exactly how she told you to put away the cigarette. Witnesses and the waitress herself said she did so humbly and with a friendly smile. You were the only one to claim that her manner was offensive, which was why you felt the need – in your own words – to teach her “a lesson”.
“Don’t you know who I am?” you reportedly asked. Were you saying that a man of your status can ignore the non-smoking law anytime and anywhere? Which you followed up by demonstrating that a man of your status can, anytime and anywhere, slap someone, hard, for simply asking you to respect the rules? 
The actions of the police are not your fault. You can’t be blamed for the policeman who was pictured smiling as he oversaw the “settlement” – as if he was doing something heroic. 
But you and the police are the products of the same faulty system, which considers Bt40,000 a just settlement in a case like this.
It does not matter whether or not the waitress is satisfied with the amount. She didn’t have much choice to begin with. And even if she is okay with the money, the point of paying damages is not just to satisfy the victim. More importantly, it should be a penalty that discourages the aggressor from repeating the violence in the future.
If the police think Bt40,000 is enough, why is the non-violent offence of drunk driving penalised by a similar-sized fine? Why is an action that can potentially harm others placed in the same category as an action that actually does harm others? 
You, sir, don’t have to answer this. Neither do you have to answer for human rights activists’ deafening silence on your case. Your assault was not political, and they have a funny habit of overlooking cases like yours, despite the fact that the dignity of the individual is at stake. If a person is assaulted for asking others to observe good, sensible rules, and nobody cares, we can simply flush any ideology down the toilet.
You only need to answer two simple questions: Is what you did wrong? If it is, have you done enough to address it?
The good news is that, despite everything mentioned above, money may be irrelevant if you are truly remorseful. One wrongdoer may pay Bt1 million and remain defiant, and another may respond with nothing but wholehearted regret. The difference between the two is huge, but there is still one other “type”: the one who pays a lot less and remains unrepentant.
Which category you choose defines your whole life.