What Is Reality Based Self-Defense?

[Brian R. VanCise]

I thought I would start a thread similar to the "What Is TMA?" thread to hash out what exactly is Reality Based Self-Defense. We are blessed here on MartialTalk with several individuals that practice and teach Reality Based Self-Defense and this would be a great opportunity to speak out about it as well as get input from other practitioners.

 

[Transk53]

What is reality based and what it cover. IE, LEO's, security or general public, or all three?

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

Let's take a broad scope and discuss how it includes anyone practicing it. (civilians, security, LEO's, etc.)

 

[Transk53]

Let's take a broad scope and discuss how it includes anyone practicing it. (civilians, security, LEO's, etc.)

Yeah the reverse is the same I would love to discuss it, not sure what it is exactly? Sorry, on 4g and not WiFi, I would Google Brian!

 

[Transk53]

Sorry, 3G plus, not on EE4g network, so I am limited with vids etc.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

Just to get the ball rolling I have included a few links from some individuals on their opinion on what makes up a Reality Based Self-Defense system.

Here is what Sammy Franco wrote on his opinion of what makes up Reality Based Self Defense:
Reality Based Self-Defense Contemporary Fighting Arts

Jim Wagner opinion:
Jim Wagner Reality-Based Personal Protection

Chris St. Jaques opinion on what Reality Based Self Defense is:
Why Reality Based Training is Better

 

[Transk53]

Yeah, looks like I have been doing some of that myself in "verbal de-escalation" Nice post

 

[Aiki Lee]

Well reality based self-defense would be any self-defense training that deals with potential dangers in your current environment as well as how to address the before and after of such confrontations. Whether or not you have the trappings of a traditional martial art or not is irrelevant in my opinion.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Todays RBSD can become Tomorrows TMA.... see Xingyiquan, Changquan, or anything ending in "itsu"

I know a RSBD guy and I trained with him briefly, it was Chinese Police/Military Sanda. It was based on drills that were based on real attacks. It also had strength training (all body weight) and striking training (hitting trees and walls), qinna and tuishou.... but there were no forms as you see in a TCMA. There was also a LOT of repetitive drills for kicks and punches... along the lines of throwing 300 snap kicks per leg per day kind of repetition.

What I found real interesting was the overt avoidance of anything that seemed or sounded traditional as it applies to terminology. I was specifically told there was no Qi involved but I got to tell you the description of how to get power in your punches was a lot like the description you get in Taijiquan and Xingyiquan.

 

[Touch Of Death]

To have a better understanding of what it is, we must often discuss what it is not: Rules (I would say there aren't any, but we all come to the table with our own set of rules, and so does your opponent!); Refs( I would say there are no refs, but somebody always has a buddy making sure you, or your opponent, wins); safety (you may have brought a knife to a gunfight) LOL

 

[drop bear]

I still go for a hybrid that isn't a sport.

 

[Buka]

To me, "reality based self defense" would be to train in **** that happens in a fight.

 

[tkdwarrior]

Krav maga comes to mind.

 

[drop bear]

To me, "reality based self defense" would be to train in **** that happens in a fight.

everybody is claiming that though. Sport,traditional and rbsd

 

[drop bear]

Krav maga comes to mind.

ok then what separated krav from karate?

 

[tkdwarrior]

Not krav maga but interesting points.

 

[tkdwarrior]

ok then what separated krav from karate?

Maybe its in their training methodologies. Karate or any traditional martial art trains in a strict formal way and real world application you will have to learn on your own, while krav maga trains in real/actual world situations. A short cut version of where you want to be.

 

[Transk53]

I don't think anybody can actually predict what happens out there, just go on instinct a lot of the time, however flawed that may well be.

 

[Chris Parker]

I thought I would start a thread similar to the "What Is TMA?" thread to hash out what exactly is Reality Based Self-Defense. We are blessed here on MartialTalk with several individuals that practice and teach Reality Based Self-Defense and this would be a great opportunity to speak out about it as well as get input from other practitioners.

Cool. I like this topic… as it's an area, like many in the martial arts, where, although the term is well known enough, what it actually is isn't… which has lead to misunderstandings, and the usage of the term by groups that aren't actually doing RBSD itself. There are some good answers already, but I thought I might add to them a bit.

What is reality based and what it cover. IE, LEO's, security or general public, or all three?

If we're going to get technical, then RBSD is pretty much just aimed at civilians… LEO's and security aren't actually concerned with self defence… their role is a bit different (law enforcement and security, funnily enough!), which leads to different contexts, different tactical approaches, different preferences, and so on. So while they will certainly have a very realistic combatives program or methodology (well, at least ideally), commonly as DefTac (Defensive Tactics) programs, or simply as combatives programs… which are often mistaken for RBSD, but actually aren't.

Just to get the ball rolling I have included a few links from some individuals on their opinion on what makes up a Reality Based Self-Defense system.

Here is what Sammy Franco wrote on his opinion of what makes up Reality Based Self Defense:
Reality Based Self-Defense Contemporary Fighting Arts

Jim Wagner opinion:
Jim Wagner Reality-Based Personal Protection

Chris St. Jaques opinion on what Reality Based Self Defense is:
Why Reality Based Training is Better

Cool, I think they sum it up pretty well… especially Sammy's article in the beginning. The biggest issue I have with the others (mainly) is the heavy rhetoric of "you won't get this from anyone else!"… er, yeah, you will. There are many, many RBSD instructors around, all offering variations on a theme of what Jim and Chris there are offering… their approach is very much theirs, but what they're saying is unique to their approaches, well, just ain't. Richard Dmitri, Deane Lawler, Geoff Thompson, Marc McYoung, and many more are also offering the same type of thing… in many cases, better than some of both Jim's and Chris' approaches there, honestly…

Well reality based self-defense would be any self-defense training that deals with potential dangers in your current environment as well as how to address the before and after of such confrontations. Whether or not you have the trappings of a traditional martial art or not is irrelevant in my opinion.

The first part, yep, definitely. The second part (whether or not there is the trappings of traditional martial arts), well… less so. If there are the trappings, then you've moved away from the "reality" part of the reality based… which is a grounding in the context and environment that the methods are expected to be applied in. In other words, if there are the trappings of a traditional martial art, it ain't an RBSD.

Todays RBSD can become Tomorrows TMA.... see Xingyiquan, Changquan, or anything ending in "itsu"

Well… no, actually. The closest you could say is that the combative systems of today become the "traditional combat systems" of tomorrow… RBSD is really a different beast (and I'm not getting into the idea of "itsu" being the ending there… ha!). As mentioned by Himura, and in the articles Brian linked above, RBSD are defined, as much as anything else, by the attention paid to things that are not the fighting aspects… martial arts, on the other hand, like combative systems, are concerned with the conflict itself.

In addition, you could very well argue (and, particularly in the case of the bulk of old Japanese systems… none of which end with "itsu"…) that the old, traditional martial arts aren't really, and weren't at the time, actually "combative" systems… teaching you to fight was not really the purpose, and if that was the aim, there are much better, faster ways to achieve that. Martial arts, in a traditional (particularly Japanese) sense were more about military education than (individual) fighting ability.

I know a RSBD guy and I trained with him briefly, it was Chinese Police/Military Sanda. It was based on drills that were based on real attacks. It also had strength training (all body weight) and striking training (hitting trees and walls), qinna and tuishou.... but there were no forms as you see in a TCMA. There was also a LOT of repetitive drills for kicks and punches... along the lines of throwing 300 snap kicks per leg per day kind of repetition.

Yeah… that's not RBSD, that's a combatives system. Such things can be found in an RBSD system as well, but it doesn't get anywhere near the emphasis that it does in a combatives system, nor is there any real guarantee or necessity for such methods to be present at all. While RBSD do deal with the "conflict" portion, depending on the instructor, there might be a reasonable amount of material (more likely in the form of drills than "techniques"), there might be a few key concepts and principles (such as Richard Dmitri's "shredder" concept in his Senshido group), or there might be almost nothing… Deane Lawler, for example, in his R-SULT system has almost no physical "techniques" at all… just a particular cover he prefers (I'm honestly not fond of it… I have some feelings as to how it came about, and I'm just not over on it as an idea… it's a little contradictory to really be reliable), leaving the rest to whatever methods (striking, grappling, throwing etc) the students might have from their martial art study. In the last training seminar I did with him, there were BJJ guys, MMA guys, Krav Maga guys (and girls… can't miss Adori…), Ninjutsu guys, Karate guys, door staff, security personnel, and more. Rather than teach them all a brand new way of doing things, he simply let's them do what they already know… and allows what he teaches to fit in around that.

What I found real interesting was the overt avoidance of anything that seemed or sounded traditional as it applies to terminology. I was specifically told there was no Qi involved but I got to tell you the description of how to get power in your punches was a lot like the description you get in Taijiquan and Xingyiquan.

Yeah, that's just a personal value system showing… and, while the same thing can be seen in RBSD, it isn't necessarily RBSD in and of itself.

To have a better understanding of what it is, we must often discuss what it is not: Rules (I would say there aren't any, but we all come to the table with our own set of rules, and so does your opponent!); Refs( I would say there are no refs, but somebody always has a buddy making sure you, or your opponent, wins); safety (you may have brought a knife to a gunfight) LOL

Yeah… again, while those aspects do come into play in RBSD, they're not really unique to RBSD at all… no refs is anything that's not a sport… and everything you have listed there is only concerned with the "conflict" section… again, not even the main emphasis of RBSD… and, when it is, it's not even as cut and dried as you're making it out to be here. For example, when you mention "rules"… any good RBSD instructor will always point out that there are always rules… and a big part of the understanding of actual self defence, which RBSD is concerned with, you absolutely need to educate yourself on what those rules are, and how they will affect your likelihood to get into an altercation or not… which will change depending on where you are.

I'll put it this way… we can contrast two RBSD instructors… Richard Dmitri and Deane Lawler. Richard came out to Australia a number of years ago, and was presenting a series of seminars on his Senshido system, including covering verbal de-escalation. And Richard's method of verbal de-escalation was geared up largely to many areas of the US, where there was a real likelihood that the aggressor (or whoever you were de-escalating) would be armed… likely with a firearm. As a result, Richard advised an approach that was largely apologetic and submissive… in order to not further give the other guy a reason to escalate further and produce the weapon. Deane Lawler, who grew up in the rough Western suburbs of Sydney, when he saw that approach, noted that if such an approach was utilised where he grew up, it sent one simple message: "I'm weak, please attack me". The rules (social) in both places were very different… both advised de-escalation… but a lack of awareness of the "rules" in the situation can have you pick something that is simply not going to help… which goes against the idea of RBSD in the first place.

I still go for a hybrid that isn't a sport.

Then, well, you'd be wrong. For one thing, RBSD's aren't, by any stretch of the imagination, "hybrids"… some are certainly from the variety of experiences of the instructor in question, but that's not necessary or definitive. And "not sports"? There are many things that aren't sports that aren't RBSD's either… Krav Maga would be one… many Koryu would be another (and, so you know, many of those are just as much "hybrids" as anything else you can think of)… modern Ninjutsu systems… many Chinese systems… and many more.

To me, "reality based self defense" would be to train in **** that happens in a fight.

Partially. It's also training for what happens before, and what happens after… and covers a lot more even in the "conflict" period than simply combative skills… if it deals with that much at all, really.

Krav maga comes to mind.

Krav Maga is a modern combative system, not an RBSD. Hopefully by this point you're beginning to see why.

everybody is claiming that though. Sport,traditional and rbsd

Er… what? Nope. Combatives systems, sure… RBSD, not so much… sports? Again, highly context dependent. Traditional, the same.

This is Christopher Roberts, the successor to Richard Dmitri's Senshido system, and the most senior instructor in the organisation. Cool guy, and seriously knows his stuff. Richard has moved onto other things, but still gets involved in Senshido from time to time… although he leaves much of it in Christopher's hands these days.

Ah, Peter Sciarra… he teaches around here relatively frequently. Realistically, again, his ICS (Integrated Combat System) is a combatives system, not an RBSD system. Overall, he seems to be getting a fair bit of success… I have some issues with the way he does a few things, but not important enough to go into here. The main point is that this is not RBSD, it's very much combatives.

Not krav maga but interesting points.

Yep, neither are Krav Maga, although what Peter does certainly has some similarities. His sporting base (wrestling and a few other things) also have quite a say in the way he presents things, of course.

Maybe its in their training methodologies. Karate or any traditional martial art trains in a strict formal way and real world application you will have to learn on your own, while krav maga trains in real/actual world situations. A short cut version of where you want to be.

Well, training methodologies will be one of the largest differences between any two systems… Krav Maga grew out of the Israeli Military… so they tend towards more modern attacks, weapons, and tools (some of the stuff they do with a shovel is just wonderful to watch… ha!), and, as it's military, aggression is the keyword. That finds it's way into the training methods, the drills, the tactics, the application of technique, and so on.

I don't think anybody can actually predict what happens out there, just go on instinct a lot of the time, however flawed that may well be.

Well, if you just rely on instinct, that kinda defeats the very idea of having a method of training for the situation, don't you think? I mean… whether it's a martial art, a combative system, or an RBSD system, the whole idea of training is to give you some "in-built" skills that you can depend on, rather than rely on an instinct which might be inappropriate, or completely lacking in the moment.

 

[Transk53]

Ah, Well, if you just rely on instinct, that kinda defeats the very idea of having a method of training for the situation, don't you think? I mean… whether it's a martial art, a combative system, or an RBSD system, the whole idea of training is to give you some "in-built" skills that you can depend on, rather than rely on an instinct which might be inappropriate, or completely lacking in the moment.

Yes from a technical viewpoint you are quite right, and instinct would defeat the purpose of the training. However, I must point out that I have not reality based training. So right or wrong, intelligent or dum, instinct has always been in my armoury. That coupled with other job based stuff and whatnot.