Your womens self-defense seminar

[[Censored]]

People ignore calls for help...but everyone reacts to FIRE.

That sounds cute but I don't think it's true. Is that your own personal experience?

[Black Jack]

Watchman- thanks for the really good post. My idea for this topic was not really that I would run one but to just get people here to start playing around with the what-if and what their what-if would be.

Knifefighter- Good post. Tactical folders are a great self defense tool. My lady actually carries a tactical spyderco on here person. To her its not about intricate kali blade methodology but distraction techniques. Someone from behind grabs her around the throat lets say in her car and she can hopefully deploy the folder and cut down his forearm to help facilitate her escape.

Imagine how most people react to paper cuts. Kinda a enlarged concept.

That and their are other reasons to carry a knife on one's person. Lets say you are in a car wreck and your seatbelt is jammed, you need to get out fast, using your knife you can cut through the caught up seat-belt.

[Royal Dragon]

"As for Women's self defense, I KNOW in order to make it work, comercially, I'd have to be instilling a level of false confidance. I'd be teaching a fantasy."

I disagree. With the proper amount of research and understanding you can arm your course participants with an array of effective tools that address reality rather than myths.

Reply]
See, here's my problem with that, no matter WHAT you teach them, no matter how good it is, without "On Going" reinforcement, they won't retain anything usefull under fire. Learning is done through repetiton. You can't just expose women to a bunch of skills, work them for a few hours, and expect those skills to be functional during a crunch.

I like what Black Jack said, and I like the idea of going to women's shelters and psycologists to really learn what goes on during the most comon assaults. That being said, "IF" I were to do it, I would have to make it a perminant, On Going course that teaches, developes and maintains the skills they are learning, not just a 6 week course or 6 hour seminar that barely introduces them to skills they have no prayer of useing in such a short time.

[Watchman]

Black Jack,

I didn't mean to seem like I was singling you out with my post - I used the singular terms to refer to anyone who happened to be reading.

After that, a full course of relationship skills should be taught. Unfortunately, many people aren't really interested in this.

Knifefighter is right on about the relationship management aspect of women's self-protection.

I agree that many people aren't generally interested in that to begin with, however if you use other material as a primer that dramatically demonstrates how important learning to manage relationships and interpersonal communication is you'd be surprised to see how many folks work to aquire those skills.

One way that I have found is in using actual transcripts from sex offender treatment programs that dramatically show how the perps use their manipulative behavior and abusive tactics to maneuver their victims into the assault. Once you point it out, women start to see where they deal with similar behavior in a number of ways in their daily lives.

If you can convince folks that their daily lives will improve as a result of applying what you are teaching, they are more apt to work on retaining it and improving on it..........hopefully.

[Watchman]

RD,

We can go 'round-n'-'round on this for a while. I would agree that, comparitively speaking, an on-going course is more "effective" in the long run. However, if this on-going course is solely physical in nature it doesn't really address the specific issues that I feel are much more important. In that case an ongoing course is worthless.

With the right foundation and outlook, you would be amazed at what you can accomplish for people in a short amount of time - and what they are able to retain.

You can't just expose women to a bunch of skills, work them for a few hours, and expect those skills to be functional during a crunch.

A lot of that depends on how you're approaching the workshop format, the skills you're teaching, and what you are using to emphasize them with.

[GLW]

The thing about FIRE instead of HELP...NOT my own idea.

That and much of what I posted comes from some of the foremost experts in the field.

Wish I could remember the guy's anme but he had a VERY good show on PBS about personal protection - not ONE minute was on the HOW of dealing with a physical confrontation.

It was all about concepts and the thngs known from analyzing assaults and rapes from Police files throughout the country...

One of the interesting statistics...

Let's say a person pulls a gun on you....

If you take off running the opposite way...with or without throwing your wallet or purse...what is the chance that the assailant will fire the gun - say 50%....

Now, if he fires, what is the chance that you will be hit - say 50%...

And if hit, what is the chance that you will be hurt so badly that you will not be able to get away - say 50%...

0.5*0.5*0.5 = 12.5% chance that you will NOT get away and really be hurt.

Now, from this guys work and the actual police statistics at the time..and this was about 6 or 7 years ago, the ACTUAL statistic was 2%. Meaning that 98% of the time, people who did the unexpected and took off running actually got away with it.

The big issue is denying the attacker privacy. for example, car pulls up, gun, and they say get in. If you take off running, you have a very high chance of getting away. The statistic is equally high that if you get in the car, you will be killed... Those are the statistics.

[Black Jack]

Watchman- I did not think you were bro. No prob. I enjoyed your post because that is the type of good info I am looking for.

It's important to hear from people who actually do these things on a consistent basis. It helps reinforce certain ideas and beliefs.

Cheers,

[Royal Dragon]

Watchman,
Yeah, you are right, we can go on and on about this. I have been teaching for a long time now, and I have tried a number of formats. The one I found the most sucsessful for teaching both martial arts, and anyhting really, is to give them a little, make them concetraite on that, and give a little more. To pass on any sort of workable skills and knowledge takes time, effort and repetition. These are something you don't have the resources for in a seminar, or short course type of format. In a short format like this, it is best to stick to the most simplistic basics as THAT is what thye will remember when it all goes down, IF they are lucky. However, if thier attacker did a semester of wreasling in Highschool or college, they will have far mor time and reinforcment in their arsenal than our "Women's Self Defense" course student. Also, an attacker is going into an attack with a much higher level of comfort in the area's of violence and physical confrontation. Many of the Women that go to these things have absolutely NO clue.

Terri was the victem of a Stalker. In her case, she had been closely associated with a "Biker club", and grew up in a really bad neighbor hood. Her brother was a rather prominat figure in the local street gang as well (He's in Jail doing life BTW). When "Stalker boy" attacker her, she stabbed his a$$. She was no stranger to violence. When we were talking about learning martial arts, she laugh at me. Her "Street Smarts" told her that stuff was for fools and weaklings. Her opinion was that good fighters go into martial art schools, learn martial arts, and come out no longer able to fight.

The idea of a "Woman's" Self defence class actually made her laugh. It wasn't till we found Saviano's White Tiger Kempo in Addison that she decided to actually take up the arts. Then, it was only in a serious way because she knew anything as stupid as a seminar or half baked 6 week course was assinine and would amout to nothing but a big waste of time, no matter WHAT they taught. Only fully imersing herself in a full training course would do her any good, and then ONLY from a good proven, competitve, reality based teacher.

[SevenStar]

Originally posted by [Censored]
People ignore calls for help...but everyone reacts to FIRE.

That sounds cute but I don't think it's true. Is that your own personal experience?

dunno if he has any stats on that, but IME, it holds true also. When you yell "FIRE!", people think about getting themselves out of danger. When you yell "HELP!" people have less of a positive reaction, as they aren't interested in putting themselves in a situation where they may be hurt or killed for the sake of someone they don't know.

[Watchman]

RD,

Knifefighter summed up in one sentence what it took an entire post for me to convey, so here it is again:

Since the majority of assaults happen at the hands of acquaintances, awareness and assertiveness training is a must. Use of these skills can prevent many assaults and can be taught in just a few hours.

I think you're still hung up on preparing someone against the whole stranger assault myth (defending against some 250lb gorilla that attacks you in a lonely, dark parking lot).

Using your story above, with a few hours of training in some of the stuff I have already mentioned, "Terri" may very well have been able to prevent that particular assault ever happening by knowing how to manage individuals with manipulative and abusive behavior and never allowing the relationship to progress as far as it did.

Of course, that is just speculation, but I'm trying to point at something I think you may not be seeing here.

The Pre-Assault Indicators began when she first met the individual who began stalking her. The end result happened after a period of built up interactions with her attacker.

Gavin DeBecker manages to prevent incidents of violence against entire organizations through "half-baked seminars" and consulting. The magic is in the material.

[Black Jack]

The thing I don't like about DeBecker is that he is anti-gun. His work is excellent. It just feels like when I am pimping his stuff that I am also pimping something I don't know if I am 100%comfortable with.

You are right though, and that is why I have mentioned him here and in the past. His work is very good.

btw- I am a believer in that a person can pick up basic skills and principles in a short period of time. IMHO some people confuse a set style and what goes along with learning that traditional set style with self defense/awareness training which can often be a different animal alltogether.

[Ryu]

Because I actually do teach this now, the main things that have to be taught are:

Environmental and situational awareness
Criminal mindset, and what predators look for in victims
Predator/prey roles and reversals.
De-escalation stances, tactics, and semantics.
Pre-emptive strike tools such as:
1. palm strike
2. eye jab
3. web hand strike to throat
4. eye rake
5. elbow
6. headbutt
7. hammerfist (all used from the non-telegraphic de-escalation stance)
concepts of offensive groundfighting including nuclear tactics like eye gouging, biting, plus much emphasis on escapes, reversals, and how to impliment nuclear tactics with sound grappling skill.
How to deal with the adrenaline dump, and how it effects your gross motor skills vs. your fine motor skills.
And finally training with scenario drills that include full contact scenarios against a resistent "bad guy"
All tactics and tools above should be able to be used in these full contact scenarios to give women the experience of fighting off a resistent attacker who is usually bigger and stronger. Avoid the lage 5 foot heads worn by some Women's Self Defense courses.
Instead use a tightly fitting (and protective) headgear with plexy glass face guards, or sturdy goggles. This gives a more realistic target to hit, and presents a more realistic adrenaline response than such a huge and often times "humerous" giant head.

I posted an anectdote about the power women really have in self-defense, and especially training properly with first strikes, nuclear tactics, resistent opponents, etc. I'll find it.

Ryu

[Ryu]

Here it is. From another forum.

A word on palm strikes....


I was giving a free self-defense lesson to a girlfriend of mine. Most of what we covered was situational awareness, de-escalation stances, pre-emptive strikes, and contact scenario drills.... She learned the eye jab, the palm heel, the knee to the thigh, and the web hand strike to the throat....

Now about the "power" of a surprise palm heel...

This girl is Chinese, 5 feet 3 inches tall, and weighs about 100 pounds soaking wet. She's never hit anyone before, etc...

After working her up to a reasonable level of proper mechanics, non-telegraphing the pre-emptive hit, etc., we began the contact scenarios. I put on headgear and durable goggles. My face was concealed behind the protective gear.

We worked her strikes with power through different scenarios. Each shot rocked me LOL, but what was beautiful was her true surprise hit.

Obviously during scenario drilling you know as the 'bad guy' you'll be getting hit. I'm always able to mentally prepare myself for the onslaught by the "victim." That way the surprise and shock isn't too bad........

Well......

On our second to last scenario drill, I came up to her, casually asked her if she had some money. When she replied she didn't, and had to be on her way, I crowded her. I became more aggressive, a little intimidating. She put her palms up in an almost "submissive" de-escalation stance. She said she had none, and wanted to be left alone. She didn't want any trouble.
I (playing the bad guy ) shouted a profanity at her, told her that I wanted some goddamm mon....
.................... She launched an amazing rear palm strike just seconds before I was expecting it (And I was SUPPOSED to be the guy who gets hit! )

When it hit my face, my whole head rocked back. I could barely manage a "glaaaah!" as she charged in with three more palms, a knee to my thigh, and high tailing it he hell out of there....

This little 100 pound, 5'3 girl nearly floored me for real! I'm about 175, 5'8, solid muscle, and have been doing JKD and grappling half my life! And THAT surprise hit nearly floored me. I didn't even know what hit me.

There is so much to be said for a pre-emptive strike... you can take out just about anyone if you know what you're doing.
Ryan Hall is dead on in just about everything he has said on the subject.

Ryu

Hope that helps,
and Watchman, if you see this, send me an email!

[Royal Dragon]

Hmmmm, not not caught up on the stranger attacking. I have known a good number of women who have been abused (Terri being the only one with enough moxi to stabb her attacker and fight back). in ALL cases, it was a boyfreind. There are deeper issues going on here. Many of them know full well the guy thye are with is dangrous, but for some reason they don't leave him. Thye become so unbelveably submissive with them it's downright scarrry. I know this one girl, her liveing boyfreind put a knife to her throat, and the next day she was making up with him. The same girl had been so brutalised by her last boyfreind that she needed reconstructive surgery on her jaw, and now has false teeth at 33. There are more women out there like this than you think. It takes time for them to comearound.

Since the majority of assaults happen at the hands of acquaintances, awareness and assertiveness training is a must. Use of these skills can prevent many assaults and can be taught in just a few hours.

Reply]
It may be able to be taught in a few hours, but like I said, humans learn through repetiton, and an on going course is going to be nessasary for them to "Retain" what they have learned for any length of time.

Many women go into some sort of "Delusional fog" when they are with a guy they are physically attacted to (I have seen it time and time again). They become totally blind to who and what the guy is. I mean, guys in prison get married to girls they have never met who write them from the outside wile they are incarserated. If your talking dealling with someone who is in an abusive cycle, yes they might get "Something" out of a seminar, but it's going to be a long drawn out, on going process of continual reinforcement before they can break the mindset that is causeing their destructive attraction to complete *******s. It's almost like wheening a drug addict off of drugs. I'm not saying you won't help a certain percentage of women with a short seminar platform, but at the very least your going to have to have some sort of self study system in place so they can continually review on thier own (A manual, or video etc...)

As for the girl who floored her boyfeind, THAT was a lucky shot. He wasn't in the leasty bit prepared for4 any kind of confrontation. If you put the same two in a REAL combative situation where he wanted to really rob her, and didn't care how bad he hurt her, she would have been busted up robbed, and left to die.

I don't mean to offend, but most women are Fragile, Giggly and naturally submissive. Even when you "Try" to teach them this stuff, they just don't get it. They act like they do, and then go right ot and meet a gy that meets every warning in the system, adn they will start dateing him, because he "Seems" like a nice guy. Then, when he starts to become abusive, they say he "turned on me" and could not see it comming. Infact, this may be true. Abusive types are often very nice guys for a long time, till thye become settled in the relationship. The abusiveness slowly comes out sort of like the same way a Cult slowly brainwashes a victem wihtout them realising it. It's the old

"Drop a lobster in a boiling pot, and it will jump out, put him in a cold pot, and slowly turn up the heat, and he will just sit there and cook to death."

This is why I don't believe in the Seminar or 6 week course deal. Only an ongoing program of continual reinforcement of all skills and knowledge taught, is sufficiently effective to rely apon. Anything less than that is delusional. The only way a 6 week course would work would be in a military setting where you are learning all day, 5-6 days a week for 6 or more weeks, Even then, I think the Military basic training is 12 weeks (Correct me if I'm wrong)

Yes, you can teach them quite a bit in the short course or seminar setting, it's getting them to RETAIN someting usefull and USEABLE over the long hual, long after the course is over, that your not going to be able to do. This means when they need it, it won't be there anymore because they forgot it, or they are trying to think, to recall what they learned, and what to do, and they will lose the window of opertunity.

[Knifefighter]

Women who have a history of abusive relationships and continue to be involved with abusive men were usaully abused as children. Self-defense classes will not help them- only therapy will.

Emotionally healthy women can benefit greatly from a well-designed SD seminar.