Yes Stevie, but can he fight?

[jdinca]

Ah, "the right tool for the job" is an exceptionally appropriate statement. It does all boil down to what the needs of the individual are. Unfortunately, the individual just walking in off the street often has no idea what it is his needs are. When people call our school and ask if we teach kick boxing, we answer yes. Why? Because the person who asks that question typically has seen kick boxing in a gym, or on tv and that's all they know. Come on in, let's show you what we teach and then we can discuss what you're actually looking for and whether or not we're the right fit for you. This is also true in the case of parents wanting their children to "learn some discipline and how to take care of themselves". Often times though, they end up taking that child to a school that promotes agressive action in a sport fighting situation. I think of a coworker who put his kid in a TKD school to learn some self discipline, because he had some agressive tendencies. Guess what? The kid ended up being even more aggressive because he was in a school that promoted fighting in the ring and taught "how to go after an opponent". I see the same thing happening in MMA. There are great schools out there that teach more than how to bash the other guys head in. But most just teach how to fight. These schools tend to draw young, testosterone drven males, who learn everything but how to conduct themselves with honor. Now they're testosterone driven and a weapon all in the same package.

Yes, it is up to the individual needs of the student to determine what type of training they need but it's also up to the scrupulous school owners to help the individual figure out just what that is, because often the potential student doesn't know. It's a shame that there are so many people out there that consider the almighty dollar first, and the needs of the student second.

 

[tellner]

And at the same time the people who really do want to learn how to protect themselves end up in sports classes or standing in lines going through contentless forms in pseudo-military order. Well, in America "La ilaha il dollar" - There is nothing worth worshipping except money :soapbox:

 

[jdinca]

And at the same time the people who really do want to learn how to protect themselves end up in sports classes or standing in lines going through contentless forms in pseudo-military order. Well, in America "La ilaha il dollar" - There is nothing worth worshipping except money :soapbox:

Yup.

 

[lostinseattle]

Yup.

Yup. Most teachers seem to be in MA for the money and not to teach skills. Therefore they will market what they think will make them money and that usually is watered down training because that is what the market is expecting these days.

It's a pity. At least in MMA they have some relatively realistic training because they actually train to fight.

 

[bushidomartialarts]

tellner -- no worries. i'm thick skinned and agree with you for the most part. and thanks for the compliment on my congruence. means a lot.

one trouble i see happening with martial arts is a lot of people are treating it like religion -- with all the bad that can come with it. my god (art) is better than your god. my emphasis is better than your emphasis. if you don't train for my reasons you're a heretic and might, at best, make a good lampshade or bar of soap.

so, like i said, i agree that my opinions and values are mine and your opinions and values are yours and neither of us is necessarily wrong.

as far as your other point (nonviolence as abdication of responsibility), the nice part about solid training is that most of us are best able to avoid violence through becoming very, very good at violence. your walk, your awareness, your energy will keep you out of 99% of possible trouble. (especially here in the pacnw -- we live in freakin' hobbiton).

now, if all of the above fail and you or a loved one or an innocent are in danger, then -- as you say -- it's time to unload.

i sort of figure a lot of us put too much emphasis on the last resort and not nearly enough on the preventatives.

 

[tellner]

I hope to see you on Saturday for the Portland meetup. You sound like a very together kind of guy with whom I would love raising a couple glasses.

We're pretty much in vehement agreement on things barring a couple things that are mostly emphasis. The problem is that, as with so much else, there are no shortcuts. The Enlightened One can, without blame, take the last bowl of rice from a starving man. But most people don't have the instruction or knowledge or tools to get to that point. The truths are simple, but not easy.

And much of my perspective comes from background. Most of my students have been the ones with overdeveloped brake pedals who need to find the accelerator and the gear shift. The majority of commercial schools make their money off of kids who we hope to Cthulhu will find the brake pedal before and the steering wheel

 

[sealth]

hi, i just dont get the whole (better to walk away than fight ) thing. a great martial artist(Mr. Skip Hancock) in my first class with him said "when someone approaches you in anger with intentions of hurting you, then the fight is already on". no one has ever given me the old speech about being the bigger person and walking away. my instructor tells me if someone is trying to hurt you dont hesitate to defend yourself. if they lean over to pick up a bat,then kick them in the face before they pick it up.but thats american kenpo and we all know it gets a little rough.

 

[bushidomartialarts]

hi, i just dont get the whole (better to walk away than fight ) thing. a great martial artist(Mr. Skip Hancock) in my first class with him said "when someone approaches you in anger with intentions of hurting you, then the fight is already on". no one has ever given me the old speech about being the bigger person and walking away. my instructor tells me if someone is trying to hurt you dont hesitate to defend yourself. if they lean over to pick up a bat,then kick them in the face before they pick it up.but thats american kenpo and we all know it gets a little rough.

i'm a kenpoka myself, and have spent much of my training in that mental space. the walk away thing comes in before violence occurs.

to use your baseball bat analogy...

by training your awareness, you can see that the guy is agitated, drunk or otherwise a potential danger and leave the area before he picks up the bat. or position yourself between him and the bat. or point him out to the bouncer or event security. or buy him a beer and make friends.

by becoming an expert combatant, you train your confidence. quite often this means the guy will look at you with evil intent and decide even with a baseball bat he wants no part of that action. remember, the bad guys look for easy targets.

by training your good sense, you will eventually decide not to go to that kind of party/bar/situation in the first place. and you will build good habits that keep you from becoming a target.

by training your spirit and goodwill, you greatly reduce the chance that anybody would want to bash you with a baseball bat in the first place. the best self-defense ever is a warm handshake and sincere smile.

as before, once that man picks up a bat, then game on. the next person to see that bat will be his proctologist. but, as an advanced martial artist, if i allow the situation to get the that point, i have to accept that i've already failed at a very real level. surviving the fight is just mitigation of that failure.

 

[zDom]

Very nice post, Bushido. Well said.

 

[sealth]

i'm a kenpoka myself, and have spent much of my training in that mental space. the walk away thing comes in before violence occurs.

to use your baseball bat analogy...

by training your awareness, you can see that the guy is agitated, drunk or otherwise a potential danger and leave the area before he picks up the bat. or position yourself between him and the bat. or point him out to the bouncer or event security. or buy him a beer and make friends.

by becoming an expert combatant, you train your confidence. quite often this means the guy will look at you with evil intent and decide even with a baseball bat he wants no part of that action. remember, the bad guys look for easy targets.

by training your good sense, you will eventually decide not to go to that kind of party/bar/situation in the first place. and you will build good habits that keep you from becoming a target.

by training your spirit and goodwill, you greatly reduce the chance that anybody would want to bash you with a baseball bat in the first place. the best self-defense ever is a warm handshake and sincere smile.

as before, once that man picks up a bat, then game on. the next person to see that bat will be his proctologist. but, as an advanced martial artist, if i allow the situation to get the that point, i have to accept that i've already failed at a very real level. surviving the fight is just mitigation of that failure.

well i do agree with you partly,but why woud you wait for someone to pick up something to hit you with.i mean,if it were a gun you definitely wouldnt wait for them to pick it up and shoot you before you did anything about. i understand what you mean by feeling like failure for letting a fight escilate,but we dont always have a choice.as some one already said (even if your not looking for troube ,trouble may be looking for you)

 

[jdinca]

well i do agree with you partly,but why woud you wait for someone to pick up something to hit you with.i mean,if it were a gun you definitely wouldnt wait for them to pick it up and shoot you before you did anything about. i understand what you mean by feeling like failure for letting a fight escilate,but we dont always have a choice.as some one already said (even if your not looking for troube ,trouble may be looking for you)

My first choice would be to diffuse, or walk away before that point has been reached.

If he reaches to pick up something to hit me with, then he has made his choice and I will act to end the situation. I will not let him hit me with it. I will consider myself to have failed because I was unable to deal with the situation without resorting to violence. Although I may consider this to be a loss, I will analyze why I was unable to diffuse the situation, learn from the experience and end up winning because I have learned from the situation.

As a supervisor, if I have to give a subordinate a direct order, I would consider it a failure on my part, not on the subordinate's part. Why? Because I failed in my duties as a leader and had to resort to the authority of the position.

We train to fight as a last resort. A true martial artist should be able to end, or remove himself from the situation before physical action is needed. This is not alway possible but it should be the mindset.

 

[bushidomartialarts]

well i do agree with you partly,but why woud you wait for someone to pick up something to hit you with.i mean,if it were a gun you definitely wouldnt wait for them to pick it up and shoot you before you did anything about. i understand what you mean by feeling like failure for letting a fight escilate,but we dont always have a choice.as some one already said (even if your not looking for troube ,trouble may be looking for you)

i was using your metaphor with the bat. expand to include anything that says me or mine is (or will probably be) in imminent danger.

and while trouble might sometimes be looking for us, our training means most of the time it won't be able to find us.

 

[kidswarrior]

My first choice would be to diffuse, or walk away before that point has been reached.

If he reaches to pick up something to hit me with, then he has made his choice and I will act to end the situation. I will not let him hit me with it. I will consider myself to have failed because I was unable to deal with the situation without resorting to violence. Although I may consider this to be a loss, I will analyze why I was unable to diffuse the situation, learn from the experience and end up winning because I have learned from the situation.

As a supervisor, if I have to give a subordinate a direct order, I would consider it a failure on my part, not on the subordinate's part. Why? Because I failed in my duties as a leader and had to resort to the authority of the position.

We train to fight as a last resort. A true martial artist should be able to end, or remove himself from the situation before physical action is needed. This is not alway possible but it should be the mindset.

Excellent job of laying out the progression for MA as avoidance training--what we want for our kids, after all--isn't it? And in fact, in our work lives, as you point out. The fact that we train for the possibiility of violence in order not to be violent is a paradox, yes, but a paradox worth struggling with until we can understand it. I see way too many teens with the mentally and morally lazy attitude: I just want to learn to kick butt. I believe part of my job as an instructor is to teach them the MA paradox.

 

[jdinca]

Excellent job of laying out the progression for MA as avoidance training--what we want for our kids, after all--isn't it? And in fact, in our work lives, as you point out. The fact that we train for the possibiility of violence in order not to be violent is a paradox, yes, but a paradox worth struggling with until we can understand it. I see way too many teens with the mentally and morally lazy attitude: I just want to learn to kick butt. I believe part of my job as an instructor is to teach them the MA paradox.

Well put. I think that one of the mistakes we make is looking at ma as if it exists in a vacuum. Yeah, when we walk in the door, we're learning how to defend ourselves, get in shape, whatever. If that's all you focus on, then you can miss the more important, deeper lessons that can be learned that can have an impact on your entire life.

 

[MJS]

hi, i just dont get the whole (better to walk away than fight ) thing. a great martial artist(Mr. Skip Hancock) in my first class with him said "when someone approaches you in anger with intentions of hurting you, then the fight is already on". no one has ever given me the old speech about being the bigger person and walking away. my instructor tells me if someone is trying to hurt you dont hesitate to defend yourself. if they lean over to pick up a bat,then kick them in the face before they pick it up.but thats american kenpo and we all know it gets a little rough.

IMO, I think that the 'defusing' part is a grey area at times. Things can get crazy pretty quick. This is where being able to read and judge the situation is important. If it looks like talking is not going to work, then yes by all means, don't wait until the guy is half way to your face with a punch before you move. A pre-emptive strike comes in handy here.

Mike

 

[bushidomartialarts]

IMO, I think that the 'defusing' part is a grey area at times. Things can get crazy pretty quick. This is where being able to read and judge the situation is important. If it looks like talking is not going to work, then yes by all means, don't wait until the guy is half way to your face with a punch before you move. A pre-emptive strike comes in handy here.

Mike

if you can hit a guy mid sentence, you're halfway home.

 

[kidswarrior]

if you can hit a guy mid sentence, you're halfway home.

Not to put to fine a point on it, because I get what you're saying, but 'home' might be jail or defendant in a civil suit if he's still talking when I hit him. At least in California. Maybe not in other states?

 

[bushidomartialarts]

Not to put to fine a point on it, because I get what you're saying, but 'home' might be jail or defendant in a civil suit if he's still talking when I hit him. At least in California. Maybe not in other states?

absolutely right. pre-emptive retaliation is a sticky wicket, ethically as well as legally.

 

[EastCoastKenpoist]

i'm a kenpoka myself, and have spent much of my training in that mental space. the walk away thing comes in before violence occurs.

to use your baseball bat analogy...

by training your awareness, you can see that the guy is agitated, drunk or otherwise a potential danger and leave the area before he picks up the bat. or position yourself between him and the bat. or point him out to the bouncer or event security. or buy him a beer and make friends.

by becoming an expert combatant, you train your confidence. quite often this means the guy will look at you with evil intent and decide even with a baseball bat he wants no part of that action. remember, the bad guys look for easy targets.

by training your good sense, you will eventually decide not to go to that kind of party/bar/situation in the first place. and you will build good habits that keep you from becoming a target.

by training your spirit and goodwill, you greatly reduce the chance that anybody would want to bash you with a baseball bat in the first place. the best self-defense ever is a warm handshake and sincere smile.

as before, once that man picks up a bat, then game on. the next person to see that bat will be his proctologist. but, as an advanced martial artist, if i allow the situation to get the that point, i have to accept that i've already failed at a very real level. surviving the fight is just mitigation of that failure.

To give a little example from Spider Man, the bad guy that you let walk away without a "lesson" will just keep on being a bad guy. And maybe someone more innocent than yourself will get hurt. I am not a procrastinator, I like to take action when action is due.

 

[Tez3]

A very deep discussion, I've just read all the way through and will have to think about it before answering or adding my bit but I'd like to pick up on a point made in an early post.

The poster said that a soldier would have to be taught things suitable for what he was going to do if he were going to Iraq for example. Can I just point out that many soldiers who come back from Iraq and Afghanistan need to fight? Sounds odd I know but we put our returnees straight into an MMA comp, a couple won, a couple lost but all agreed they needed the 'stress release' of some violence. It was a carthatic action and I think that it's also one that many young males feel in need of.

We find that the MMA fighters are less aggressive in real life than most people and it will take a lot to goad one into a fight.