Would you stand up and fight back?
Clearly, "The Incident" was a social commentary encompassing themes of sociology, criminal psychology, ethics, theology, and the study of self-defense. If anything, the message of this independant movie must be that evil should be forcibly confronted at the earliest opportunity. But doing so late is better than never, although the cost might be higher. It's said that most bullies are vicious cowards as was depicted by the second of the hooligans who lost his bravado when his leader buddy went down with a bashed skull. But you can't always count on that. Indeed, the dominant of the two thugs was already so emboldened by the timidity of the subway train passengers that nothing short of superior force was going to make him back down. Moreover, the thug was armed with a weapon, a switchblade, while the courageous G.I. was not only unarmed, but had a broken arm in a cast, which must have emboldened the thug into perceiving that he was facing a much weaker, unarmed opponent.
The question is, would you fight if you were in this situation? I exempt the existence of firearms for this question because the police and self-defense experts all agree it is best not to oppose a firearm, unless a criminal has the barrel up against your head and you see him starting to pull the trigger; then you have nothing to lose. But if it was the same two thugs, armed only with a knife, would you fight?
I can speak for myself, and 'honestly' here, as if I am confessing. I feel that I could, IF, another guy stood up first. Then I would stand and back him up because then the odds would be even and the two thugs would have to think twice about facing even odds. More, seeing two guys standing up against two thugs, other guys might stand up and join us. The presumption of good versus evil is that evil retreats when forcibly confronted - against at least equal power and it has the opportunity to escape and is not cornered. I'm not going to BS about being some kung fu hero. Any kind of dangerous scenario involving armed assailants bent on hurting someone is going to be high risk and end in someone getting hurt.