One bit of advice I always disliked when hearing from self-defense instructors is to run away at the first sign of trouble.

[Mallic]

I assure you, it’s nothing like a video game.

Side note I have heard of a number of MMA fighters who were self taught or at the very least inspired by Tekken to learn martial arts.

 

[gyoja]

Side note I have heard of a number of MMA fighters who were self taught or at the very least inspired by Tekken to learn martial arts.

That may be, but I thought that we were not talking about MMA.

 

[Mallic]

That may be, but I thought that we were not talking about MMA.

Yes and no. As I find it hard to believe that there isn't anything that can be used in the arena that can't translate to a real life scenario even if it's in a far more basic form.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

Side note I have heard of a number of MMA fighters who were self taught or at the very least inspired by Tekken to learn martial arts.

Those are two very different things. Plenty of people get their inspiration from video games or movies.

I could also see some fighters starting off self-taught before getting training, but it's pretty much impossible to get into the ufc (I'm assuming thats what you mean by mma fighters) while being purely self taught. The ground game is not something anyone can learn on their own. Do you have an example of a self-taught professional fighter?

 

[Mallic]

Those are two very different things. Plenty of people get their inspiration from video games or movies.

I could also see some fighters starting off self-taught before getting training, but it's pretty much impossible to get into the ufc (I'm assuming thats what you mean by mma fighters) while being purely self taught. The ground game is not something anyone can learn on their own. Do you have an example of a self-taught professional fighter?

Doubtful. I know that most need formal training before they could be considered professional, but hey we all gotta start somewhere, and being self taught is still well above the average.

 

[Hot Lunch]

Those are two very different things. Plenty of people get their inspiration from video games or movies.

I could also see some fighters starting off self-taught before getting training, but it's pretty much impossible to get into the ufc (I'm assuming thats what you mean by mma fighters) while being purely self taught. The ground game is not something anyone can learn on their own. Do you have an example of a self-taught professional fighter?

CM Punk and Greg Hardy. Two people who got into the UFC with no martial arts training.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

CM Punk and Greg Hardy. Two people who got into the UFC with no martial arts training.

CM Punk was a WWE wrestler, which means he had training in that, and got into the UFC based on entertainment value, rather than being an actual fighter (and proved why you need to be trained to be successful in MMA). Besides, a quick google search tells me that he trained for a couple years before trying the UFC out.

Similarly, a quick google search tells me that Greg Hardy announced the change in 2016, started training with America Top Team back in 2016, Trained for over a year before his first amateur fight, and right around 2 years before his first UFC fight. Lightning fast time, but that makes sense given his previous athletic ability, and 2 years of training with a top MMA team is very different than no training/self-training.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

being self taught is still well above the average.

That depends on what you're saying above average in. It'll probably be above average in terms of conditioning, than if you didn't train anything, if you stay consistent. It might be above average in terms of technique, but more than likely you'll just end up with bad habits you have to fix. There'll be no difference whatsoever when it comes to staying calm in a fight.

But you'll be below average compared to the guy who joined the boxing gym at the same time you decided to start self-training, even at a mediocre gym if they get him in the ring.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

I can believe that, if fighting games are anything remotely close to how a real fight can go, I don't have the battle IQ to just rush someone down and overwhelm them, which is why I gravitate towards zoners(Yes I know it's not like a real fight, don't lambast me for making that comparison)

I don't know what a zoner is.

I've watched a man wind up to punch someone, slip,and crack his head open on a rock.

A good friend in the Marine Corps wanted to fight a guy who was working in a bar. He waited in his car in the parking lot for the guy to get off work. Fell asleep. Woke up to find the guy blowing his junk off with a shotgun. He lived, but minus his junk.

Fights are chaotic. Nothing can be predicted. Any weird thing can happen. No thanks. Street fighting is for very stupid people who can't calculate odds.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Perhaps ‘run away’ is being taken too literally or used in a lazy way. Perhaps it means ‘don’t go down that ally way in a bad area, in the dark’. ‘Don’t walk around a city centre after the pubs and clubs are chucking people out at the end of the night.’ ‘Don’t go out on foot after midnight’ (nothing good happens after midnight).

One can anticipate the probability of dangerous situations well before one is in them and if you have any sense and don’t have the attitude of, ‘I have the right to walk through that group of pimps and drug dealers because I pay my taxes and I am free’, then you can avoid being involved in an altercation. After all, would you smear yourself in meat juice and walk through a cage of hungry lions? You are free to do so (assuming you have access to a cage filled with hungry lions) but would you chose to do that? The martial arts are about remaining intact, both physically and mentally.

Get a taxi (the expense is better than the trauma of even a minor altercation), reschedule your absolutely necessary city centre/ally way walk to a the hours of daylight. Do not frequent places where miscreants gather. That is running way.

I'd agree the right wording is more like "avoid".

Unfortunately, I've too often heard/seen instructors literally talk about running away. Once, it was someone who I know to be a very competent instructor, from a technical perspective - people learned well from him. And he was quite technically capable as a practitioner. He was also my height and about 60 lbs. heavier, and it was not muscle mass. He commented that if someone pulled a knife on him, he'd just run. That seemed a bad choice - he'd be unlikely to outrun the average person, even with a headstart. Exiting the situation would be a good idea, whenever possible, but literally advising running should be given the situational context it needs. Of course, if you see no other acceptable option, running is worth trying, even if you doubt you can outrun them - maybe they'll decide not to chase.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Since running away/escape seems to be such a hot button here....are there people here who teach self defense and tell their female students to stand your ground and fight a man rather than run if running is an option? I get not showing weakness. Totally understand showing weakness invites attack. But when the hammer falls most women just aren't going to be able to win against a man ( most, not all, it's just a general blanket statement)
I guess I should clarify what I mean by ego since I tend to be one of those guys, at least in my youth. Walking away is more of an act of will than fighting for a lot of people. That's an ego problem. More than once I've been involved in brawls where it's me and one or two other guys against much larger groups. It would get to the point where we fought our way out or it just sort of petered out on its own. We could have just left at that point. The other guys were done. And we'd jump back in, getting the whole thing going again. Looking back on it, that was ego. Just couldn't stand to walk away. It was stupid in my opinion. Really stupid from a self defense perspective.

There's a difference between walking away (which implies you have the option to leave quietly) and running to escape. Running to escape is a poor choice if your chances of outrunning someone are worse than your chances of defending yourself, based on what you know at the time. When my foot was bad (before I had surgery), my max running speed was about 80% of what someone else similarly fit would have. My chances of outrunning someone were limited to folks who were obviously not fit or who were wearing something that impoved my chances (pants they had to keep pulling up, for instance).

Now, my foot is significantly better, so it's my general fitness level (above average for someone in their mid-50's) that limits me, along with what my right knee is like that day, though the knee is far less limiting on running than the toe was, unless I have to run on a steep slope. So I'm probably not going to outrun a moderately fit 20-something guy, and I'm almost certainly not going to outlast him if he decides to chase and there's no safe place nearby to run to. Outside those parameters, it'd be a judgement call for me, based on the situation.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Yes it is. You're running because you're scared of getting your butt whooped.

You're assuming fear, where it may simply be good risk management. Any physical altercation can go badly, and if I think me running removes that risk, I don't need to be scared to decide to hoof it. I don't have a need to prove I'm not scared, nor that I can fight.

There are situations where that might not apply, though. Some people live in places where they have to consider how it looks, even if they aren't scared.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

And sometimes running just isn't an option, what are you gonna do beg for your life?

Sure, if I think it has a chance of a better outcome than other options.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

That's assuming your attacker has any intention of letting you go. And let's bring women into this (to any ladies here I apologize in advance but this point needs to be made)

So you have a woman confronted by a man who wants to..."force himself onto her" circumstances beyond her control put her in this situation and she has no way of just running except past this guy.

By your own logic and stance on the matter, the best thing she could do is to just let the man do what he wants and hope he lets her go when he's done.

But you tell any woman that and she'll look at you like you lost your damn mind.

I'm not sure where you got "the best thing" from a post that said it "sometimes" is an option.

 

[GreenieMeanie]

Side note I have heard of a number of MMA fighters who were self taught or at the very least inspired by Tekken to learn martial arts.

Don’t confuse self-taught and self-conditioned, with self-trained. You can enhance your knowledge and capabilities on your own, but you cannot train alone.

 

[GreenieMeanie]

I'd agree the right wording is more like "avoid".

Unfortunately, I've too often heard/seen instructors literally talk about running away. Once, it was someone who I know to be a very competent instructor, from a technical perspective - people learned well from him. And he was quite technically capable as a practitioner. He was also my height and about 60 lbs. heavier, and it was not muscle mass. He commented that if someone pulled a knife on him, he'd just run. That seemed a bad choice - he'd be unlikely to outrun the average person, even with a headstart. Exiting the situation would be a good idea, whenever possible, but literally advising running should be given the situational context it needs. Of course, if you see no other acceptable option, running is worth trying, even if you doubt you can outrun them - maybe they'll decide not to chase.

I’ve attended exactly one school where the technical aspects of avoidance were intentionally drilled as part of the curriculum. Everywhere else, was student iniative with their partner.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I don't like the idea of "run away". You assume you are the prey, and your opponent is the predator. this is not a healthy way to look at this world.

If you assume you are the bad guy and everybody on this planet are all good guys. The earth is a nice and friendly place to live. Will that be nice?

A: Why is it so quite around here?
B: Because you are here. People all try to run away from you.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

We're falling back into macho again, which is not self-defense. It's defense of honor, or face, or ego, but it isn't self-defense.

Self-defense is defense of the physical self. It concerns itself with remaining alive above all other considerations. Everything else is secondary. Extend that to family/innocent others if you wish, but it's still not about face-saving or keeping up a tough appearance.

In true self-defense, one does what one must to preserve one's life. Run, fight, beg, use dirty tricks, etc. One engages one's brain and decides the best possible choice of action and applies it. As conditions change, one may have to modify their response.

I am glad most of you have never been in a fight for your life and most likely won't ever be. You'd get dead with a quickness.

I've heard the various protests from those who'd rather die on their feet than live on their knees, and it's boring and stupid. As they posture and pose for the sake of some Hollywood ideal of manliness, the bad guy shoots them dead and does what he wants to their loved ones mister macho can no longer protect. But hey, at least he was manly as he died, right?

I can no longer run, which means that option doesn't exist for me. That's part of the reason I still train.

 

[Mallic]

We're falling back into macho again, which is not self-defense. It's defense of honor, or face, or ego, but it isn't self-defense.

Self-defense is defense of the physical self. It concerns itself with remaining alive above all other considerations. Everything else is secondary. Extend that to family/innocent others if you wish, but it's still not about face-saving or keeping up a tough appearance.

In true self-defense, one does what one must to preserve one's life. Run, fight, beg, use dirty tricks, etc. One engages one's brain and decides the best possible choice of action and applies it. As conditions change, one may have to modify their response.

I am glad most of you have never been in a fight for your life and most likely won't ever be. You'd get dead with a quickness.

I've heard the various protests from those who'd rather die on their feet than live on their knees, and it's boring and stupid. As they posture and pose for the sake of some Hollywood ideal of manliness, the bad guy shoots them dead and does what he wants to their loved ones mister macho can no longer protect. But hey, at least he was manly as he died, right?

I can no longer run, which means that option doesn't exist for me. That's part of the reason I still train.

I'd be lying if I said they wasn't part of it. I honestly don't think I could look at myself in the mirror with any amount of respect if I just buckled down and did what I was told without any sense of pride of shame. Though it does depends on what they ask for, it might be completely inconsequential to me, but sometimes it could also be a case of "I can't just let them have it"

But I've also thought this through, we've already discussed why just trying to flee isn't a good idea, but also if you're comply and just do what your attacker says 1. You're basically encouraging them to do it again cause you know the police ain't gonna do **** and 2. What's stopping them from just offing me anyway once they get what they want?

 

[drop bear]

You gotta know when to hold em
Know when to fold em
Know when to walk away.
Know when to run.,

That got me through most of my bouncing career.