Martial arts as defense on the streets

[Gweilo]

I have recently read that there are those who believe martial arts are ineffective in a street fight, myself, I do not believe this to be the case, yes it depends on the individual, but every little helps I say, anyhow, found this interesting video on line, and thought I would share it with you, my particular favourite is the Muay Thai cop.


Martial arts in street fight - Martial arts - Self defense - fitness in Erbil Iraq | Facebook

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Saying "martials arts are ineffective for ___" or "martial arts are great for ___" is a lot like saying "a toolbox of tools will be useful for ____ job" or "don't use any toolbox tools for ____". It really is too general a term to be useful for the discussion, IMO.

For many people, martial arts includes a wide range of systems and training approaches, which may or may not (depending who you ask) include modern Wushu, BJJ, boxing, Olympic TKD, bare-knuckle fight training, fencing, and tons more. Some of that has some pretty direct application in some defensive scenarios. Some doesn't. Most are somewhere between "all" and "none" being applicable.

What is trained, how it's trained, and how it's evaluated matters.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

A side point - most of those videos don't appear to be self-defense. They look like consensual fights.

 

[Martial D]

I have recently read that there are those who believe martial arts are ineffective in a street fight, myself, I do not believe this to be the case, yes it depends on the individual, but every little helps I say, anyhow, found this interesting video on line, and thought I would share it with you, my particular favourite is the Muay Thai cop.


Martial arts in street fight - Martial arts - Self defense - fitness in Erbil Iraq | Facebook

It's not that this art or that art or all arts are useless in a street fight.

It's that fight training and 'martial arts' training don't always have a ton of overlap.

I don't care WHAT style you do; if your training consists of doing forms or katas in the air and practicing on a compliant partner or no partner, you just aren't learning to fight.

 

[Gweilo]

A side point - most of those videos don't appear to be self-defense. They look like consensual fights.

So if an aggressive bloke approaches me, wanting to fight, engaging him is no longer self defense, it becomes consensual?

 

[Gerry Seymour]

So if an aggressive bloke approaches me, wanting to fight, engaging him is no longer self defense, it becomes consensual?

That's not at all related to what I said.

 

[jobo]

So if an aggressive bloke approaches me, wanting to fight, engaging him is no longer self defense, it becomes consensual?

there's an ongoing what is the definition if self defence debate on here, I go with the British law definition, finding yourself in a situation where you have honest belief that the other person means you harm or they are the one who is initiating the violence, even if you make no attempt to leave or calm it down. it then becomes very very difficult to split a consensual fight from an attack

 

[Gweilo]

That's not at all related to what I said.

I do not see how the security guard, doing his job was consensual, the other clips maybe.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

there's an ongoing what is the definition if self defence debate on here, I go with the British law definition, finding yourself in a situation where you have honest belief that the other person means you harm or they are the one who is initiating the violence, even if you make no attempt to leave or calm it down. it then becomes very very difficult to split a consensual fight from an attack

Does British law not include anything about something being consensual, as an exclusion from the self-defense defense? In other words, you can do just as much to someone when you agree to fight them as you could if they jumped you, with identical legal protection?

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I do not see how the security guard, doing his job was consensual, the other clips maybe.

I didn't say none of them were self-defense.

 

[Deleted member 39746]

Given most TMA generally doesnt cover the skillset needed for self defence i disagree. On a tradtional stance of all what you needing for self defence beaing a martial skill and martial arts meant to teach you that, i disagree. But thats traditional usage.

they generally dont cover the most important self defence skill: you can run.
I think Ramsey dewy put it as or at least self defence schools etc as (at least the bad ones) teaching you to meet violence with wimpy violence.

Have to say my favorite self defence thing is the person who just runs from a knife.

Edit: fat RIP, i didnt fully read your post clearly. Some styles work better than others though for diffrent things.

In other words, you can do just as much to someone when you agree to fight them as you could if they jumped you, with identical legal protection?

I will have to look into which countries have Mutual combat in the U.K. Its obviously not fully banned as we have prize fights. Im pretty sure you cant claim self defence if you agreed to fight someone though, you could if they break the rules of the fight or continue after you withdrew your consent.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I will have to look into which countries have Mutual combat in the U.K. Its obviously not fully banned as we have prize fights. Im pretty sure you cant claim self defence if you agreed to fight someone though, you could if they break the rules of the fight or continue after you withdrew your consent.

That's what I would expect.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Have to say my favorite self defence thing is the person who just runs from a knife.

Which is great when it's a good option. I'd guess in most cases running away makes it not worth their while, if you can run with any pace.

When I was 30, running was likely to fit a lot of scenarios. Today, I'd limit it to those situations where my above statement seems (to my quick judgment) to be applicable. If I think they're actually intent on doing harm, on bad days I wouldn't trust my knees to let me make that turn-and-dash without impairing the other guy first.

 

[jobo]

Does British law not include anything about something being consensual, as an exclusion from the self-defense defense? In other words, you can do just as much to someone when you agree to fight them as you could if they jumped you, with identical legal protection?

no British law includes injuries caused by concesensual activities as criminal injuries, for which you can be prosecuted, with the exception of some specifics in specific circumstances , boxing has a specific exemption, other ma are a bit open to interpretation, but proberbly coverd , at a club setting, hard sparing in the park between two private individual is very very iffy,therefore any actual fight consensual or not is likely to lead to a prosecution if anything other than superficial injuries are sustained and of course they found out

 

[Deleted member 39746]

Which is great when it's a good option. I'd guess in most cases running away makes it not worth their while, if you can run with any pace.

When I was 30, running was likely to fit a lot of scenarios. Today, I'd limit it to those situations where my above statement seems (to my quick judgment) to be applicable. If I think they're actually intent on doing harm, on bad days I wouldn't trust my knees to let me make that turn-and-dash without impairing the other guy first.

Body armour is a decent middle as it reduced the risk for getting incapacitating hit if you get ambushed, but you generally should look at avoidance for weapons first especially if you arent armed or armoured, in contrast to people who get those disarms taught to them that gives them a false confidence its good counter advice/reality based advice to have their mind based into what would happen.

I suppose it also depends on if you live in a stand your ground state as well if you could deploy a pistol in the U.S for it and how its worded.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

no British law includes injuries caused by concesensual activities as criminal injuries, for which you can be prosecuted, with the exception of some specifics in specific circumstances , boxing has a specific exemption, other ma are a bit open to interpretation, but proberbly coverd , at a club setting, hard sparing in the park between two private individual is very very iffy,therefore any actual fight consensual or not is likely to lead to a prosecution if anything other than superficial injuries are sustained and of course they found out

Okay, by that description, it should be fairly easy to draw the line between consensual fighting and self-defense. Did I mis-read your earlier post - I thought you were saying you followed the British law model of not distinguishing between them?

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Body armour is a decent middle as it reduced the risk for getting incapacitating hit if you get ambushed, but you generally should look at avoidance for weapons first especially if you arent armed or armoured, in contrast to people who get those disarms taught to them that gives them a false confidence its good counter advice/reality based advice to have their mind based into what would happen.

I suppose it also depends on if you live in a stand your ground state as well if you could deploy a pistol in the U.S for it and how its worded.

None of that has much relevance to the idea of running. Availability and legality of armor and weapons is another area of discussion, entirely.

 

[jobo]

Okay, by that description, it should be fairly easy to draw the line between consensual fighting and self-defense. Did I mis-read your earlier post - I thought you were saying you followed the British law model of not distinguishing between them?

No it's anything but easy, which was the point I was making , SD is at any point you believe your at risk, you don't need to wait to be attacked If by his words actions or movements you feel threatened then you can punch him , as most fights included some sort of threats , posturing in the build up, then the differenance between an agreed fight and SD is very difficult to determine ,

 

[Gerry Seymour]

No it's anything but easy, which was the point I was making , SD is at any point you believe your at risk, you don't need to wait to be attacked If by his words actions or movements you feel threatened then you can punch him , as most fights included some sort of threats , posturing in the build up, then the differenance between an agreed fight and SD is very difficult to determine ,

Legally, there is a distinction in many jurisdictions. If you agree to the conflict, there has to be pretty serious escalation for a self-defense claim to be considered valid. In discussion, the distinction is pretty easy in a non-legal discussion at a high level, but harder in some cases. It comes down to this: If you agreed to fight someone when it would have been reasonably easy to NOT do that (in other words, they don't force the point by attacking against your will), then it's not self-defense.

 

[Gweilo]

Does British law not include anything about something being consensual, as an exclusion from the self-defense defense? In other words, you can do just as much to someone when you agree to fight them as you could if they jumped you, with identical legal protection?

Nope, here it is either self defense, assault, or public disorder.