A competent lawyer will tell you whether or not it's worth your time and money to sue; a good one will lay out the possibilities so you can decide.
The condescension toward suing is stupid. As another poster pointed out, our society has been sufficiently feminized that entirely justified ass-whippings and property destruction are punished harshly.
I for one would never vote to convict anybody who hunted down and killed the rogue cops who stole guns in NOLA. The government, however, would treat such an act of social hygeine as First Degree Murder. Take the chain saw guy. He should have his ass beaten, savagely. He should be hospitalized with a feeding tube up his nose. However, even the explanation that he is an arrogant high-handed son of a bitch who stole somebody else's property and attempted to lord it over a free man would be disregarded by the authiorities, and the victim who put him in his place would suffer greatly for administering the lesson.
The choice in most of these cases is not between suing and doing something "manly;" it's between suing and doing nothing.