On Reality Based Self Defense

[Omar B]

RBSD can go take a flying leap! It's a damn industry buzzword to sell to the ignorant. TMA works, has worked and will continue to work because nobody's grown an extra arm, leg or evolved some freaky new joint so they can throw a punch from some crazy angle. The same Kyokushin and Seido I learned was effective decades ago and will be for the rest of time ... if you are fighting humans that is.

 

[Bruno@MT]

For zombie attacks, the kenjutsu guys are probably at an advantage.

I am learning a couple of basic cuts, but given that I only have a boken, it would not do much good I suppose.

 

[sgtmac_46]

If that Yin-Yang is a reference to the concept of JKD, I'd say well put! I really don't know much about RBSD, although one of my "traditional MA" instructors trained in it to test out his own skills. He came away feeling that his particular "traditional" art held up pretty well to the test. But it's also sort of reality based, in a way. In fact, every true martial discipline was once a form of RBSD for a certain place and certain time. Some translate to our times better than others.

You caught the reference as thrown.

 

[sgtmac_46]

I'd like to hear WHY folks are thinking traditional MA isn't effective out on the streets... and if it's not effective... what is?
My own scant training in MA has helped saved my *** more than once "out there" and I've seen high rank belts kick *** in bars and in parking lots... this was all in the days before everyone had a camera of some sorts.
Either way... let those who speak out against MA's effectiveness out on the streets go head to head, toe to toe with a bb of any art and let them talk afterwards about how effective it is or isn't.
Maybe a MA-ist won't do picture perfect techniques because of the changes that can happen in a "street-fight" and improvisation will be called upon but they've still more skill than the average non-MA-ist and thus would come out ahead.

The first question is WHICH TMA.........we can't really believe that all are equally effective. Stories of it's origins aside, I don't really buy the notion that Tai Chi is going to be an effective self-defense style.

The issue of RBSD isn't particular techniques........it's skipping the formality of many TMA's and taking the techniques they find most useful in specific reality situations that are most likely to be encountered (in their view)..........so the issue isn't really the techniques at all, but in their application and focus of training.

 

[sgtmac_46]

In my opinion, it seems that RBMA is really more about having the proper attitude in training, and using high quality training methods. Any traditional art could be (and often is) trained with this in mind, and be just as effective.

It's not so much the system, as it is the quality of training and the quality of instruction.

You hit the nail on the head......and the techniques used in RBMA, much like MMA, are taken from various TMA's.

 

[sgtmac_46]

Unless the are proven systems and from reputable backgrounds, i would be leery of any RBSD. Remember one persons reality is another persons fantasy. Try what works and use it. Plain and simple.

Of course the same rule applies with TMA's as well......Caveat emptor!

 

[Flying Crane]

Stories of it's origins aside, I don't really buy the notion that Tai Chi is going to be an effective self-defense style.

I can only say that I believe you have never experienced or witnessed good taiji.

Most of what is practiced nowadays as taiji is a watered-down form of exercise which it was never intended to be. It is decidedly NOT a martial art.

But again, as it was originally intended as a traditional martial art, practiced properly, with proper instruction and full understanding, taiji can be devastating.

 

[Xue Sheng]

I don't really buy the notion that Tai Chi is going to be an effective self-defense style.

And I will happily let you believe that... it would only be to any "real" taijiquan person’s advantage to have all underestimated them. Be they Chen, Yang, Wu, Zhaobao, Sun, Hao or any other.

Bet you think it is all slow too.

 

[blindsage]

I find the distinction between TMA and RBSD to be kind of a red herring a lot of the time. Most of the RBSD instructors I've seen or heard of (not all, but most) show their TMA credentials to demonstrate how "qualified" they are to teach self-defense. IMO, RBSD really should just come down to wheter you are practicing whatever you learn in a context that takes into account what you are likely to encounter on the street i.e. scenario training with resistant opponents. But if you only focus on that there's a lot you will miss out on as well skill wise, as any well trained taiji person could tell you

 

[BLACK LION]

Most everyone made excellent points here... almot making it impossible to add to.

I feel that much of the buzz or perceived difference lies in the presentation... there isnt any nuclear secrets just different approaches... nothing new and nothing secret about it...same old drink, different concoction...

I feel that what the "reality based" camps are attempting to do is more of a martial/military approach similar to what one would find in boot camp or in military school and training and thats immersion... This was/is definately appealing post 9/11... Its presented and executed in a more unconventional fashion which appeals to govt and state agencies look for the "newest and best training" as well as the average joe looking for some perceived "special ops skills".... The GWOT has kicked up many rocks and allowed for many creatures and entities to emerge and crawl into the game...

where as...

Conventional or traditional camps build the core from the ground up by instilling respect and character and the whole shebang without trying to appeal to certain types or exude some sort of "combat effectiveness"... The GWOT changed nothing aside from possible implementation of newer tools and even more rustic or arhcaic ones...

Essentially its the same thing just different approach and training....

One side will mold you into something by building you up in stages over time where the other will toss you in and expect you to get it done and get it done right in a short period of time.... like the military: they dont have 5 years to make someone into a combat swimmer they have a few months t train in hopes to survive thioer specialty aside from the actual experience... on the other hand an olympic swimmer has years to train and hone thier skills in hopes to win gold...

One is about dynamic immersion for immediate effectiveness in a combative environment and the other is about growing and developing in stages to take on life in general and combat if need be...

essentially they are of the same caliber just geared and wired different...

 

[sgtmac_46]

And I will happily let you believe that... it would only be to any "real" taijiquan person’s advantage to have all underestimated them. Be they Chen, Yang, Wu, Zhaobao, Sun, Hao or any other.

Bet you think it is all slow too.

Makes no difference......99% of those who claim they are practioners of Tai Chi solely aren't remotely combat effective by any measure.......the fact that there are some 'highly effective' skills 'hidden in the forms' doesn't really alter the reality of the art as it exists today...............it's like taking Taebo and thinking you're learning how to fight.



Now, if someone EXTRACTS those forms, applies them in a high stress environment against resisting opponents.....THEN you've done what we're talking about..........throwing up forms on the sidewalk to stretch out...not quite the same thing.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Makes no difference......99% of those who claim they are practioners of Tai Chi solely aren't remotely combat effective by any measure.......the fact that there are some 'highly effective' skills 'hidden in the forms' doesn't really alter the reality of the art as it exists today...............it's like taking Taebo and thinking you're learning how to fight.



Now, if someone EXTRACTS those forms, applies them in a high stress environment against resisting opponents.....THEN you've done what we're talking about..........throwing up forms on the sidewalk to stretch out...not quite the same thing.

Although I would agree that 99% of all taiji you see today is not an MA it is that 1% you have to watch and please continue believing this. And I still bet you think it is all slow motion. And if you extract them and do with them what you want then they are not taiji. Taiji as a martial art takes a lot of time to learn. But then many RSBD and Sports practitioners tend to judge things based on their training so your response is not surprising

I will end with this, the martial artist that most impresses my Sanda Sifu is my taiji Sifu.

 

[Joab]

Thanks for all your responses. I will say Sgt. Mac's critique of tai chi is a bit narrow in a way. While I don't know a lot about tai chi, I know a popular and well regarded RBSD system, John Perkins Ki Chuan Do, or "Guided Chaos" or "Attack Proof" system does utilize tai chi in its system primarily for helping their students relax and work on their balance. While it may be true (I wouldn't know) that tai chi is not particularly effective on the street, it does help with the overall goal of becoming a good martial artist by helping people relax and work on their balance. And it should be noted that John Perkins is a former New York City police officer with over a hundred documented victories in close quarters combat while making arrests, including prevailing over at six at one time in one arrest!

Not all RBSD systems sprang up after 9-11. Professor Bradley J. Steiner's American Combato has been around since 1975. And his traditional martial arts background is impressive, 8th degree black belt in kenpo karate, two black belts in two different forms of ju jitsu, a blackbelt in tae-kwon-do, and those are just off the top of my head. Some are experts in TMA, and taken what they have learned to put together a system that is simple, practical and effective for street self defense.

There is of course a lot of good in traditional martial arts, and I'm sure you could become an effective defender of yourself in many various traditional martial arts. RBSD tries to simplify things and utilize gross body movements instead of fine motor movements, believing that under stress gross body movements are more effective. They like to use non martial arts looking stances so the opponent doesn't think you are prepared to defend yourself, keeping the element of surprise, which is of course advantageous. Typically RBSD systems look for moves that work in close quarters, eschewing high kicks for example that need a lot of space. And they tend to encourage the use of weapons if at all possible, makeshift weapons if a conventional weapon is not available.

Or at least that is what I know from American Combato primarily, and to a much lesser extent Guided Chaos. And as many posters have expressed, it all depends upon what your looking for, there is good in all martial arts systems, the key is what you are trying to achieve. Thanks again for all your posts, they were illuminating.

 

[BLACK LION]

Most certainly, viable RBSD camps were in place well before 9/11...However post 9/11 and GWOT the approach changed and more "elite training secrets" camps emerged... allot of bidding for .gov contracts and contracts ending or declassified... every one with thier own secret potion.... SCARS was pre 9/11 but highly "modernized" for the time and threats based on his experience in Nam...Marc Macyoung has been around a long while... Lets not forget Frank Cucci... Theres also Paul Vunyak and Michael Echanis... all pre 9/11-GWOT ....

9/11 not only changed "hotzone" focus but "street" focus on a civilian level as well as private and corporate security....

 

[blindsage]

Typically RBSD systems look for moves that work in close quarters, eschewing high kicks for example that need a lot of space.

I'm not a big fan of high kicks for self-defense, but I know I could kick most people in the head in close quarters (a lot of Kyokushin knock outs happen this way) and I'm far, far, far from alone in this.

 

[jks9199]

There aren't many around -- but if you see someone who really did learn the combative side of tai chi, not fanciful explanations of the movements or the new-age "health benefits only" versions... It'll work. It's just not a quickly learned skill; it ranks, in my opinion, with aikido in that respect. Both can be very effective -- even amazing sometimes! -- in the hands of a properly trained person, or either can be a new age crap ball in other hands.

 

[tallgeese]

One of the major drawbacks I've seen in this regard is that I might be in a fight tonight, that's a far cry from the years that some of these more esoteric arts might take to develop one to a combat ready state.

There is nothing wrong with dedicating ones self to the study and practice of one of them, but if your goal is self defense then there are more direct paths to that goal. Nor do the two have to be mutually exclusive but I'd say that it's obvious that there can be defensive tactics that are effective and taught in less time than the arts mentioned above.

 

[Chris Parker]

There have ben a couple of ideas thown around here, which I would like to comment on if I may...

Xue Sheng said "Just a note.....Traditional Martial Arts were the RBSDs of their time."
I would actually argue against this a bit. I would say that original combative arts were, in the main, the cutting edge of combative technology at their time... but that is not the same as saying they were the RBSD's of their time. The main difference between them is what I have heard refered to as "the human element", in other words, the who, when, where of the situation. This is where RBSD systems excel, for the modern world.

The human element in a classical system (and here I am refering to the older arts, not those created in the last century or so. I mean no offence to more recent creations, but we'll deal with them another time) is very different to the human element found in (predominantly) Western countries today. The types of attacks you may encounter are very different, the types of weapons you may face are very different, the types of clothing you and your opponent may be wearing are very different. To take this from a Japanese Martial Art point of view (my background), a particular art may teach you certain strikes and grips whichare designed to utilise an opponents armour, or, for slightly later arts, their Kimono. These grips may not be available if your attacker is wearing a t-shirt, for instance, and there may be many more strikes available, or better striking weapons for you to use. And defending against a sword versus defending against a handgun give you very different situations.

TMA's have been developed for a variety of reasons, sometimes for practical use on the battlefield, sometimes for "street" type protection, sometimes for bodyguarding-type skills... but also sometimes simply for fitness (an exercise program), or spiritual enlightenment (rather than physical violence).

So while TMAs were the cutting edge, they were not really RBSD in the way the term is used today.

Omar B said "RBSD can go take a flying leap! It's a damn industry buzzword to sell to the ignorant. TMA works, has worked and will continue to work because nobody's grown an extra arm, leg or evolved some freaky new joint so they can throw a punch from some crazy angle. The same Kyokushin and Seido I learned was effective decades ago and will be for the rest of time ... if you are fighting humans that is."

This has been a common theme in this thread, basically "people haven't changed, hitting the throat worked in the old days, if you hit someone in the throat now it'll still work!". This takes us back to the human element. But there's a bit more to it than that.

Essentially, I see the argument that TMA training will not necessarily give you self-protection skills as coming down to training methods and an understanding of the changing nature of the violence that may be encountered. The changing violence aspect is the aforementioned human element, and that was covered earlier. But, to recap, the warriors and violent criminals of old Japan, China, and Korea attacked and fought in a different way based on various factors, including each of the above mentioned, as well as simple cultural differences (for example, in the West, we are taught [culturally conditioned] to not kick someone in a fight, as it is considered "dirty" fighting - the same cultural stigma seems to be missing from Eastern countries). This leads to very different methods of movement, which may or may not be culturally translatable.

So while people haven't (physically) changed much (there is some difference, if we want to get technical, in aspect such as height, and, to a lesser degree, ratio of limbs to trunk), there has been quite a lot of change in the cultural and social aspects of humans as a whole. We are now all very aware of Western Hands (boxing), whereas in older Japanese, Chinese, and Korean systems it wouldn't exist. This is of course just one example, but I'm sure you see where I am going with it.

Without understanding the changes in the violence which you may encounter, as well as understanding the changes which have occured from a social level (assault laws being a great example of this... I have lost track of how many times I have seen a TMA demo of a defence against a simple attack, say a double lapel grab, that is so overkill that the defender would serve large amounts of jail time whereas the attacker would be considered the victim), then your TMA system will not truly prepare you for todays encounters. No matter how much hitting someones throat works, if it lands you in jail, or if it requires a particular body weapon due to it originally being used against an armoured opponent and is therefore slow, obvious, or simply not the best weapon for the job, then TMA does have a fair bit to answer for when claims are leveled at them for being less-than effective.

The other side of TMA not being effective comes from the training methods themselves. I am not going to say which methods are good, which are great, and which need to be re-examined, as that is not my place in anything but my own school, but I'm sure you can understand from what I have already said that only training old-style movements with no regard for the effects of adrenaline, no understanding of the effect of your actions, and thinking this will work can be a little self-delusional.

That is, of course, easily rectified if the above understandings are present. And that is where RBSD comes in (when done properly).

 

[Joab]

I'm not a big fan of high kicks for self-defense, but I know I could kick most people in the head in close quarters (a lot of Kyokushin knock outs happen this way) and I'm far, far, far from alone in this.

Well, American Combato has no kicks higher than the testicles, and really the side kick to the knee is the one most practiced. I'm impressed you can kick high in close quarters, I can't, nor can I kick high at all.

 

[MJS]

I'm sure there've been topics on what I'm about to say, but its worth saying again here. I always find it interesting, how some tend to frown upon anything that involves change. This is what I was referring to earlier, when I spoke of keeping an open mind. As I said in my first post, we really don't see anything new, per se, in RBSD arts, however, the application of things differs.

Look at the world around us....everything changes. The way cars are built, the way a house is built, the way we get water, the way we get medical attention, you name it, and its probably changed. I don't need to hike a few miles to the nearest stream to fill a bucket with water, hike back, boil the water and then drink it. No, instead, I simply walk into the kitchen, turn on the water, place the glass under, fill it, and drink. Its still water, but the method of getting it has changed.

Our mode of transportation has changed, as I dont see many horses on the public streets. Instead I see cars, of various shapes, sizes, makes and models.

Just looking in the paper, you see stories about violence. Was violence present way back when? I'm sure it was. Was the method of that violence executed in the same fashion that it is today? I doubt it. Its still violence, just like people back then, had the same amount of arms and legs as people do today. But I find it hard, very hard to believe that methods of executing that violence have not changed.