Reactionary Strikes as Trained First Reaction?

[Koshiki]

I think pretty much everyone agrees that to defend yourself, whatever it is that you do has to be fast, committed, and effective. My lovely lady was reading through my copy of Rory Miller's Facing Violence yesterday, and commented on his section where he details his favourite got-to reactions when he feels/sees anything that seems like violent attention, which essentially consist of either a guard and a crashing elbow strike, or a guard and a forearm strike. Last weekend, a reaaaaaally drunk girl surprised me by clawing across my eyelid from behind, and promptly falling to the ground. My go-to reaction is always control a la Sticky Hands type schtuff, which I did, whipping around in surprise, and then latching on to try to keep her on her feet. My girlfriend, reading that section, mentioned that, had I done something more aggressive and damaging, I would have probably nailed a completely innocent metal-head in the face with my elbow. NOT, a good situation.

In his book, Miller actually relates a story where he reacted with his spinning elbow and guard, and barely missed clocking one of his friends, who was just trying to surprise him. It worked, but it was lucky he missed!

In terms of keeping YOUR body in good condition, training a first-reaction strike is probably the absolute best thing that you can do. I agree. In terms of everyone else's bodily condition? In terms of not getting assault charges laid against you?

What do you guys think/train for?

 

[J W]

My wife used to train Muay Thai. One day at a department-type store, I snuck up behind her on the escalator and smacked her backside. Her first reaction was to use the elbows she had been learning and crack whoever it was in the face. Lucky for me, her instructor had trained her to always look at her target. So as soon as she saw my mug she caught herself and I didn't get an elbow to the eye. That would've been a bad day if she hadn't looked first.

In Wing Chun we train to react and strike without having to think about it. Your body should react to the conditions present without your thought process getting in the way too much. However, you always have to be aware of what you are doing. Striking blindly or without control can get you into trouble.

 

[jks9199]

I think pretty much everyone agrees that to defend yourself, whatever it is that you do has to be fast, committed, and effective. My lovely lady was reading through my copy of Rory Miller's Facing Violence yesterday, and commented on his section where he details his favourite got-to reactions when he feels/sees anything that seems like violent attention, which essentially consist of either a guard and a crashing elbow strike, or a guard and a forearm strike. Last weekend, a reaaaaaally drunk girl surprised me by clawing across my eyelid from behind, and promptly falling to the ground. My go-to reaction is always control a la Sticky Hands type schtuff, which I did, whipping around in surprise, and then latching on to try to keep her on her feet. My girlfriend, reading that section, mentioned that, had I done something more aggressive and damaging, I would have probably nailed a completely innocent metal-head in the face with my elbow. NOT, a good situation.

In his book, Miller actually relates a story where he reacted with his spinning elbow and guard, and barely missed clocking one of his friends, who was just trying to surprise him. It worked, but it was lucky he missed!

In terms of keeping YOUR body in good condition, training a first-reaction strike is probably the absolute best thing that you can do. I agree. In terms of everyone else's bodily condition? In terms of not getting assault charges laid against you?

What do you guys think/train for?

Dracula's Cape and that guard are a counter-ambush technique. It's trained and practiced to be an instinctive, unthinking response to essentially shortcut the OODA loop when you're taking damage, and give you time to respond. It's very effective -- but it's not designed or intended to be gentle.

You have to assess the situation you're training for -- and design and adapt your training to the situation.

 

[SENC-33]

Open hand slap to the the jaw or neck area. It looks better if you get caught on a camera and it is effective. If it only stuns the person and they want more then you give them more.

 

[CK1980]

I have spent years learning to yell things like "stop resisting, get back, get down, etc." That added in with open hand strikes, eye gouges, etc. are pretty instinctive/first reaction for me... Much like SENC-33 said, it looks better on camera (because you know someone IS recording it).

Interestingly enough, from a psychological standpoint, if an eye witness sees you hit someone and you spout out something like "let go" they will often transpose the two events and even recall seeing the person grab you- even if they hadn't.

 

[Koshiki]

Personally, I'm just as concerned with not hurting people that don't need to be hurt, as with not getting in legal trouble. If I dracula's cape some drunk girl in a mosh pit, I don't care if everyone thinks she actually attacked me, because I yelled, "let me GO!" (Leaving out the fact that in a cluster of guys all trying to crash into each other, with music loud enough that you can't hear a shout, and strobe lights essentially blinding everyone, no one would even notice whatever transpired...) I care that I hurt someone who should NOT have been hurt.

So, while Dracula's Cape may be intended as counter-ambush, and may be excellent in that regard, in moving you on to Decision and Action, out of Observe and Orient, it could be potentially quite immoral in every other situation than a true ambush-style assault. To me, morality of technique is more important than effectiveness and legality of technique.

Relying on your analysis of the situation is a perhaps good approach, but I think it may fall down a bit in cases where you need to act IMMEDIATELY, or where, (as in a mosh pit at a strobe-light heavy concert) analysis can be quite difficult. If you are truly being attacked, that split second of analysis is time where you're not acting. As mentioned with the ever popular OODA loop concept, that's potentially time where you are getting more and more hurt, more and more confused, and less and less likely to be able to defend yourself. If you're in a disorienting, vision and hearing impaired place, like a club, concert, whatever, that analysis can be even more time consuming, and even less likely to be accurate.

I'd say that you need to be doing something as soon as possible, ie, right away, and that that something should, for the average first world lifestyle, be something likely to cause serious damage, or possibly even pain.

 

[skribs]

This is just my opinion, but if you try to scare someone (either someone you don't know, or someone you KNOW has martial arts training) you run the risk of getting hurt. You wouldn't pop a paper bag over someone who has PTSD, and if I saw my master at the store, I wouldn't jump out from an aisle behind him and yell "BOO!" I think it's definitely important to spot your target, but I don't think an instant explosive reaction is necessarily a bad thing.

This does remind me of a moment in class when we were going over self defense techniques. This particular one was an armbar off of someone grabbing your shoulder from behind. Of course the kid I'm working with is being funny, and he grabs my shoulder and says "hey, I have a question about our homework..." (I personally would have gone with, "excuse me, mister, you dropped something!")

 

[Koshiki]

I'm odd, in that I don't really believe anyone ever, "has it coming." Even the most evil person in the world, I don't think "deserves" to suffer. Pain and suffering is terrible, and someone that no one, no matter how vile should have to experience. That said, there are obviously times when you have to cause a little suffering to prevent greater suffering, and I'm ok with that. So yeah, you run the risk of getting hurt when you prank people, but I'd still rather NOT accidentally hurt someone trying to prank me. Especially not with my friends; we'd all be in traction several times a year.

Gotta ask though... Did the kid end up in an armbar? I had an English teacher in high school who I think might have reacted like that, if anyone had the guts to actually put a hand on his shoulder. First thing he ever said to me was, word for word, "Kid, shut up and sit down or I'll rip your heart out." Aaaaah, Mr. Wally...

 

[Koshiki]

This is just my opinion, but if you try to scare someone (either someone you don't know, or someone you KNOW has martial arts training) you run the risk of getting hurt.

On a serious note, I like to think that people with martial arts training are the LEAST likely to accidentally hurt you. The control, awareness, judgement and knowledge you are attempting to develop should, I think, be as much for defense of others as defense of self, and laying someone out cold for trying to startle you for a laugh, to me, is definitely NOT defense of others!!!