Self Defense/Martial Arts

Musashi

Lads,
I ask this to promote discussion,not dissension or a fragmenting of the ranks.Is there a difference between self defense and the martial arts?Does your style teach both?
Does it make any differentiation?Is your style too traditional or too reality based?How do you find it?Do you think it will work when you and yours are under the threat of violence?Has it?
Or do you think you've wasted time and effort?People often ask "what should I learn to defend myself and those I care for".
What do our members recommend?

Unjaku

Below is my personal opinion, I'm sure a lot of people will disagree ....

A self defense programme should focus primarily on situational awareness, boundary setting, target-hardening (i.e how to live a low risk lifestyle), de-escalation, pre-fight indicators, basic psychology of fear and most vitally, it needs to emphasise a combatative mindset: the most important thing for surviving a violent attack. This kind of material is your main arsenal when your goal is self-defense and with that in mind, your main focus is on avoidance, and failing that de-escalation and / or escape and evasion.

The physical components in a self defense programme should be secondary, and in effect, there for when things go wrong, not right.

Techniques in a self defense syllabus should, IMO, be workable for the lowest common denonimator in the class given that they will need to be viable now not in two years time. They should require little fine motor skill, as little athletic ability as possible, and fit in with an overall strategy of pre-emptive striking where possible and then an exit.

Preferably : attacking off a neutral posture with open-hand strikes, heel of the hand blows, knees, eblows, finger jab, headbutt, simple outer leg reap, possibly some material like rear naked choke, fish hooking etc. Use of improvised weapons like phone, ashtray, umbrella as impact weapons, use of coins, contents of pockets as distractionary measures. No fancy high kicks best left to semi-contact tournaments, no leglocks best left for grappling contests, and no flowery aikijujutsu wristlocks best left to Steven Segal.

All of these things might have their place, but in a SD syllabus you are trying to trim the fat to make it easier to learn and retain.

Overall, the training ethos should obey Hicks' law. Hick's law applied to self defense training is essentially the idea that you do not practice four defenses against a frontal choke when one will do etc. By offering trainees a bizillion techniques to utilise under stress, you risk them having a kind of mental log jam where they get too analytic.

Instead, KISS: keep it simple, stupid. Instead of four or five 'martial arts' type techniques, emphasise that an agressive attack with durable natural body weapons like elbows, knees and finger jabs etc. presents the relatively untrained person with their best chance of success. Honing a few reliable tools is far superior to having a catalogue of superfluous techniques.

Training should take place according to a scenario type format. Situations should be role-played from start to finish, emphasising pre-fight rituals and de-escalation techniques, then moving into pre-emptive attacking and / or sucker-punch drills where the defender has to defend off a natural kind of flinch. This familliarises the trainee with the mechanics of various types of conflicts and gives them some idea of how to apply the tools they are learning to specific targets that get presented.

The verbal exchange (coarse and nice and real) is important, if they've heard it all in training then surely there'd be nothing left to shock them outside the chip shop if it went off, etc.

Where possible, there should be a gradual progression into more intense training, getting people used to what a bit of adrenalin is like, and get a (sanitised) glimpse of what the 'fight or flight' repsonse is like.

For women, there is a plethora of issues surrounding rape and sexual assault that need to be examined and hammered out in a supportive environment.

Issues surrounding the law, your right to a pre-emptive strike, risk of prosecution after the fact et cetera should also be considered.

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The average martial art or combat sport rarely fits the above profile. They tend to be long term solutions, if indeed they ever address what a 45 year old mother of three might need to live a safer life with her family (example): If she wants a hobby, a martial art will offer her a lifetime of fitness, and steadily build her knowledge of whatever aspects of fighting that martial art covers. In contrast, if she is looking for self defense training then she doesn't need to spend a long time slowly building her ability and knowledge, she needs a good framework of awareness, avoidance and de-escalation skills, and then she needs a rock solid simple curiculum that she can apply within days or weeks, not years. Instead of building up to something, she starts with a stripped-down KISS (keep it stupid, simple) syllabus and works on retaining that.

Many martial artists obviously come back later in their training and fill in gaps, develop their awareness and address self-defense issues. IMO, this is why on the seminar circuit reality self defense instructors make such a killing- they are appealing not just to beginning self defense enthusiasts, but to hordes of established martial artists who recognise that they still need to address a lot of material. It is also probably why so many TMA associations have a paralell self defense course which is geared towards beginngers but also designed to offer specific self defense training (i.e anti-rape techniques for the ground) that might not be covered in a classical syllabus.

Most of the misconceptions surrounding self defense and how it relates to the martial arts arise, IMO, because people think of self defense as being primarily about person-to-person fighting. Of course, that's bollocks : If someone finds themselves scrapping and even winning on a consistent basis, then they are not good at defending themselves: they are crap at it, because they are consisently failing to perceive threats before they become unavoidable. And eventually, everyone's luck runs out.

*editted for clarity a bit later in the day*

Musashi

"Be Aware" should be the first precept of self defense.
I once saw a quote from "Jim Grover" a pen name he used in "Guns And Ammo " years ago, wher at an SD seminar a lady proudly declared his was her fifth seminar and she'd come there as she'd been mugged like six times!
She obviously was ill advised or learnt nothing!
Have you read or trained with Geoff Thompson, Peter Considine,
or the US based reality fighters?Hock Hocheim or WWII Combatives and Defendu spring to mind as having the same (correct?) attitude?
Yours In Sport,
Musashi

Unjaku

Geoff T. and Peter Consterdine are worth checking out if anyone is in the U.K. I haven't trained with them but I have corresponded with Geoff and trained with one of his students.

In the U.S there are definitley many progressive self-defense programmes which are clearly distinct from the martial arts culture. Eventually, I hope we will see the same situation here in Ireland, with a few quality self-defense companies offering affordable and cutting-edge training.

Those interested in the big authors should take a look at Jim Grover / Kelly McCann (his pen name, as musashi mentions, and his real name), Peyton Quinn, Marc 'Animal' MacYoung, Carl Cestari, Gavin De Becker and others. If you do searches on the web you'll find their pages, don't know the URL off-hand.

The best place to start reading about awareness and how it relates to self defense is probably with Gavin De Becker, and his book 'The Gift of Fear' which is widely available in Ireland.