Self-Defense???

[Danny T]

There numerous threads concerning self-defense with most all on fighting, fighting back, and/or about one system being better vs some other system.
But what is self-defense? Is it fighting or is it much more? Most all MA schools, gyms...etc claim to teach self-defense; do they?
What is self-defense???

 

[Shai Hulud]

I like to treat the term as self-explanatory, but I may be too banal about it.

I personally define "Self-Defense" as a brand of fighting where the immediate concern is your own safety - namely, the removal of your person from imminent/potential/immediate harm. It isn't necessarily fighting though either. In an ideal world, self-defense classes would give you pointers and tips so that you can protect yourself at all times without having to recourse to fighting. That would be the last resort.

Just my 2C.

 

[S33KR]

Agreeing with you, I feel like self defense is the window of time where you've been attacked and you respond with everything you've got (so to speak). Maybe it works, or maybe the encounter is prolonged and you have to move into using combinations and a bit of strategy. Hopefully none of us will never experience it.

 

[Dirty Dog]

Self defense is anything and everything you do to protect yourself. Anything from washing your hands or wearing your seat belt to situational awareness, conflict avoidance, learning defensive tactics and techniques...

 

[Paul_D]

My definition...

Most clubs don't teach SD no, they just put that on their website to get more people through the door. Martial arts, fighting and self defence are three different things. Learning martial arts to learn self defence is like taking tennis lessons to learn how to fly a plane.

When you teach your children to cross the road you don't tell them to step out into the road without looking and instead teach them to do a stuntman roll over the bonnet (or hood I think you call it in America?) of the car. Instead you teach them the skills to avoid being run over in the first place.

For me Self Defence is about the skills you need to avoid a getting into a situation, or allowing one to escalate (if you can't avoid getting into it) before it gets to the point when violence starts. Once violence starts then your self defence has failed, you are now fighting.

Successful SD skills therefore are the ones that allow you to avoid getting violent, rather than the skills which allow you to "win" once violence starts, those are fighting skills, and fighting and self defence are not the same thing.

Also, as I stated yesterday in a different thread, men always talk about fighting when they mention SD, ignoring the fact that for the majority of people a "fight" isn't what they most need to worry about, so what is the point of making the focus of your SD training something which you will most likely never encounter. Sending your Granny to the local MMA gym is as pointless as it is necessary as that isn't the sort of attack she need to worry about.

Old people, middle aged people, sexual atatcks, women attacked by ex partners, young teens having their phones or bikes stolen, people mugged at cash machines etc don't get into into "fights" because casual criminal don't want "fights" they want easy victims, so the focus of most peoples SD training should centre on Threat Awareness & Evaluation and Target Hardening skills.

I am fully aware of course that this isn't the definition most others have (and wasn't the one I had until a few years ago), but it';s the one I have now, which usually leads to confusion and much discussion/explanation in threads lol

 

[Tony Dismukes]

Rather than do a whole bunch of typing, I'm just going to quote something I posted a year ago on the relationship of self-defense, fighting, and the martial arts:

Fighting - covers any situation where two or more people are trying to violently defeat each other. This can occur in a sportive or a street context. The combatants may be armed or unarmed. They may be operating under different sets of rules (even in a non-sportive context). Just a few examples of a fight might be: a MMA bout between two pro fighters, three cops subduing a resisting suspect, a pair of drunks squaring up outside a bar over some verbal offense. Many, many more situations are possible. These different contexts significantly affect what tactics, principles, and techniques are most effective in winning the fight. Nevertheless, there is significant overlap in what works as well.

Not all violent situations are fights. A canny asocial predator will attempt to use surprise, intimidation, or overwhelming force to ensure that there is no fight - that all the violence is directed towards his victim with no resistance.

Most fights are not self-defense, but some are. (None of the examples I listed above would qualify.)

Self-defense - covers the necessary actions and skills to get home at the end of the day unharmed by violence, without any unscheduled stops along the way at the hospital or prison. Some of the relevant factors here include lifestyle, awareness, attitude, de-escalation skills, evasion skills, and understanding of how different types of violence begin.

Most of self-defense does not involve fighting. Sometimes it does, but usually that is an indication that you have either screwed up the other important aspects of self-defense or else gotten really unlucky. If you get into fights on any sort of regular basis and it's not part of your job, you should strongly consider the possibility that you are not just unlucky.

Based on these definitions, fighting and self-defense can be seen as separate circles in a Venn diagram with about 5% of overlap.

Martial arts: For some reason many people like to bring up the derivation of "martial" as evidence that martial arts have something to do with the arts of war. Regardless of the etymology, the overwhelming majority of martial arts have nothing at all to do with war-fighting.

Given the diversity of the martial arts, the best definition I can muster is "a formalized system in a certain historical context for training certain skills, attributes, or techniques in some way related to or derived from methods of violence." This can cover a lot of ground, for example:

• an acrobatic performance art with stylized movements derived from old fighting techniques
• an historical recreation of medieval swordfighting methods
• a system for cultivating certain spiritual or mental attributes through the practice of physical techniques
• a system for unarmed fighting in a civilian context
• and many, many more.

Chris would probably insist that a martial art has a unifying set of principles that tie together its various techniques and training methods. I think it might be overstating the case to say that this is always true. I've seen plenty of martial arts where the principles don't really seem that unified.

Once you understand the nature of fighting, of self-defense, and of a given martial art, then you are in a better place to evaluate how your martial arts training may affect your ability to defend yourself or to win a fight in a given context. Bear in mind that defending yourself and winning a fight are not the same thing. For example, if your training encourages your aggressive nature, then it may help you win a fight. If your training helps you stay calm, it may help you walk away from a fight, which is a much higher form of self-defense

 

[Mephisto]

i think someone explained it best earlier, self defense has "soft" components; situational awareness, deescalation, and even legal aspects one should be aware of. Each of these soft areas of self defense could involve and number of experts that have no experience or knowledge of fighting. A discussion on these topics could easily take up a lot of time and is a class in and of itself.

That being said the other side of self defense are the physical components. I think in a classical sense "self defense" refers to the physical components of protecting ones self when being attacked. This is based on the realization that soft techniques will not stop every assault. Plenty of us have been in fights or known someone who has, at such a point soft techniques have failed and knowledge of physical techniques are the only option. Physical techniques with SD in mind can and should be trained with the goal to get away. However, you can't always flee and sometimes you must break an attackers will to continue with the attack. Many would refer to this as fighting, that's fine but the need may arise to physically defend yourself. Fighting and being familiar with a fight are crucial to such a situation.

Each area is a specialty and a specialist should be sought out when learning self defense. A few situational drills and screaming and yelling in the dojo to simulate reality don't make an expert in self defense. Neither does a championship belt. But a solid competitor will teach you how to defend an aggressive physical attack, and will be qualified to do so. What makes one qualified to teach soft techniques? I can think of a few, an LEO, lawyer, a psychologist, in some cases.

 

[jks9199]

There numerous threads concerning self-defense with most all on fighting, fighting back, and/or about one system being better vs some other system.
But what is self-defense? Is it fighting or is it much more? Most all MA schools, gyms...etc claim to teach self-defense; do they?
What is self-defense???

Self defense is a legal concept, a justification for using force to protect yourself. It's an affirmative defense to the allegation that you broke the law and committed an assault and battery on someone. You're saying that you did indeed do it -- but that you were justified in doing so because you were in reasonable fear of imminent bodily harm.

In a broad sense, it's the set of skills that go into recognizing, avoiding, and preparing for a situation that could lead you to using the legal justification.

 

[Mephisto]

I think a lot of people looking into martial arts want fitness and the ability to protect themselves if they were ever attacked. Most people rarely get into fights so it's fair to assume they're good at avoiding conflict. More knowledge never hurts, but a lot of the soft techniques seem like they'd be pretty obvious. How many people sign up for self defense classes expecting to be lectured for an hour? A lecture is just what smart self defense may call for but I don't think it what most people are after.

 

[MJS]

There numerous threads concerning self-defense with most all on fighting, fighting back, and/or about one system being better vs some other system.
But what is self-defense? Is it fighting or is it much more? Most all MA schools, gyms...etc claim to teach self-defense; do they?
What is self-defense???

Tony pretty much summed it up with the post he made. IMO, fighting is 1 part of it. Awareness, verbally defusing a situation...those are things that are just as important, but are often left out of the material taught at the typical martial arts school.

 

[ShortBridge]

I'm doing all I can to not get into the "you are a larper and your art is a sham" discussions that go on here and every place on the internet that people gather to talk about martial arts. I agree that self defense and martial arts are not the same thing, though I don't think they are mutually exclusive. Any time I read "most schools don't..." or "the majority of styles can't..." it's all I can do not to start asking for supporting data. What percentage, what's your sample size? What aside from YouTube and the x places that you've trained or visited are you basing that on? But...

Without getting into how I teach, let me tell you the ongoing game that I have with my 6 year old son. We're in a parking lot and I say "Okay, what color is the car that we just walked past? Was it empty or was anyone inside?" or "Okay, don't turn around, how many people are sitting at the table behind you?"..."where are the exits?" ... "Was the person walking that dog a man or a woman? What color was their coat?" (he can always describe the dog) It's a game that he's grown up with. He doesn't really know why we play it, but he wants to win, so he notices stuff. I don't scare him, it's just a skill that I want him to develop.

When we're downtown, he understands that he has much less freedom than in our neighborhood to drop behind or run ahead of me. We have code words for safety and when I say them, he immediately and explicitly follows my instructions and he knows that he can ask me later and I will tell him why, but right now....

I don't teach kids, I only teach adults. They get MUCH more and more explicit versions of this training, coupled with physical training and our system. I don't want to get into how I teach beyond that, because it's private. I'm not "most schools", but I am a fairly common style. We're not all the same. The more public schools and people tend to be with their training, the less like us they are likely to be. That said, I'm not alone, a lot of people are less public about their training, don't assume you know about what you aren't seeing on-line. I also don't claim that what I do is better than what someone else does, though I'll bet the forum $1 that someone will reply and say that about this post.

When students ask what Wing Chun books they can read to help them learn faster I give them a list:

Strong on Defense - Sanford Strong
Meditations on Violence - Rory Miller
The Little Black Book of Violence - Lawrence Kane and Chris Wilder
Scaling Force - Lawrence Kane and Rory Miller
The Gift of Fear - Gavin de Becker

I usually use the term "Personal Safety" over "Self Defense", though it's semantics. I was taught that way, I study, I practice and I teach that way. I also practice and teach a traditional Chinese style in a very traditional way. They are not mutually exclusive in my eyes, but I'm not selling anything and I encourage everyone to find what and where is best for them to train.

Just my input. I think this is a great conversation for us to have if we can avoid the very stale argument about MMA vs TMA, NEITHER of them are self defense on their own.

I'm sure that I could learn a lot about personal safety from some of you here and I would like to do so.

 

[Danny T]

Defend
: to fight or to work hard in order to keep someone or something safe
: to not allow something or a person to hurt, damage, or destroy (someone or something)
: to fight or work hard in order to keep something, such as a right, interest or cause from being taken away
: to speak or write in support of something

Self-defense
: the actions taken to protect yourself, your love ones, your property from: damage, destruction, being used without permission, or being taken from you.
: the actions that make you capable of protecting yourself during an attack or a situation that you may be harmed by something or someone.

Self defense is being aware of the potential dangers and doing what one is required to prevent or to lessen that potential.
-Locking the doors and windows to your home or place of business.
-Having outside lighting.
-Understanding the possibility of going into the bad areas of your town at the wrong time of day/night and not being there.
-Using a bit of human psychology to defuse a potential argument preventing it to become physically aggressive.
-When out on the town being with friends and not going it alone.
-Acknowledging bad weather is approaching and batting down your shutters picking up the things in the yard that could become wind blown missiles. If need be leave the area; like when a hurricane is approaching with devastating winds and storm surge.

These are but a few examples of forms of self defense that have nothing to do with fighting or the marital arts. Yet all could be taught within the martial arts or a self-defense class.

Self-defense is far more than fighting, though fighting when justified can be a form of self-defense. Simply getting up and leaving can also be a very effective form.
There are many others, thing is that self defense is much more that the confines of fighting or the martial arts.

 

[drop bear]

Situational defence would be the better term.

 

[Danny T]

Situational defence would be the better term.

It is all situational.

 

[Zero]

I'm doing all I can to not get into the "you are a larper and your art is a sham" discussions that go on here and every place on the internet that people gather to talk about martial arts. I agree that self defense and martial arts are not the same thing, though I don't think they are mutually exclusive. Any time I read "most schools don't..." or "the majority of styles can't..." it's all I can do not to start asking for supporting data. What percentage, what's your sample size? What aside from YouTube and the x places that you've trained or visited are you basing that on? But...

Without getting into how I teach, let me tell you the ongoing game that I have with my 6 year old son. We're in a parking lot and I say "Okay, what color is the car that we just walked past? Was it empty or was anyone inside?" or "Okay, don't turn around, how many people are sitting at the table behind you?"..."where are the exits?" ... "Was the person walking that dog a man or a woman? What color was their coat?" (he can always describe the dog) It's a game that he's grown up with. He doesn't really know why we play it, but he wants to win, so he notices stuff. I don't scare him, it's just a skill that I want him to develop.

When we're downtown, he understands that he has much less freedom than in our neighborhood to drop behind or run ahead of me. We have code words for safety and when I say them, he immediately and explicitly follows my instructions and he knows that he can ask me later and I will tell him why, but right now....

I don't teach kids, I only teach adults. They get MUCH more and more explicit versions of this training, coupled with physical training and our system. I don't want to get into how I teach beyond that, because it's private. I'm not "most schools", but I am a fairly common style. We're not all the same. The more public schools and people tend to be with their training, the less like us they are likely to be. That said, I'm not alone, a lot of people are less public about their training, don't assume you know about what you aren't seeing on-line. I also don't claim that what I do is better than what someone else does, though I'll bet the forum $1 that someone will reply and say that about this post.

When students ask what Wing Chun books they can read to help them learn faster I give them a list:

Strong on Defense - Sanford Strong
Meditations on Violence - Rory Miller
The Little Black Book of Violence - Lawrence Kane and Chris Wilder
Scaling Force - Lawrence Kane and Rory Miller
The Gift of Fear - Gavin de Becker

I usually use the term "Personal Safety" over "Self Defense", though it's semantics. I was taught that way, I study, I practice and I teach that way. I also practice and teach a traditional Chinese style in a very traditional way. They are not mutually exclusive in my eyes, but I'm not selling anything and I encourage everyone to find what and where is best for them to train.

Just my input. I think this is a great conversation for us to have if we can avoid the very stale argument about MMA vs TMA, NEITHER of them are self defense on their own.

I'm sure that I could learn a lot about personal safety from some of you here and I would like to do so.

Thanks, my kid is a bit younger but I already try to impart the basics of SD, from road and traffic safety to rules to not opening the front door etc unless mum or dad have given the go ahead, and making activities of such where appropriate so they are drilled home. The situational awareness "game" you play with your boy is a nice example and will be fun without adding elements of concern for a young mind so I am going to take that off your shelf and use it myself. Cheers. ...also, my own memory could do with a bit of a jump start at times so it may be just as useful for me!! : )

 

[Argus]

Without getting into how I teach, let me tell you the ongoing game that I have with my 6 year old son. We're in a parking lot and I say "Okay, what color is the car that we just walked past? Was it empty or was anyone inside?" or "Okay, don't turn around, how many people are sitting at the table behind you?"..."where are the exits?" ... "Was the person walking that dog a man or a woman? What color was their coat?" (he can always describe the dog) It's a game that he's grown up with. He doesn't really know why we play it, but he wants to win, so he notices stuff. I don't scare him, it's just a skill that I want him to develop.

Interesting.

That's a really neat game. Unfortunately, I think I would fail miserably no matter how often I were to play it. I'm a highly intuitive type, rather than sensing, so I tend to take in general impressions and gloss over the details entirely. I'm pretty much useless if you ask me for directions

Nonetheless, I feel that I do cultivate a "defensive" mindset in other ways. I make it a point to form good / safe habits, anticipate behavior, and think about the situation at hand and how it might develop. This has served me especially well in driving. Many people are very "reactionary" in the way they drive, and I believe that, more than anything, leads to accidents. So, in contrast, I'm always making note of people's behavior and intentions, and looking for potentially dangerous situations before they occur. I make it a point not to surprise, cut off, or in any other way cause other drivers to react to my actions, while also perceiving their intentions, and looking out for any unexpected or dangerous actions they might take. Driving is almost like a game of "flow" for me, where I try to work with peoples intentions in order to navigate traffic, rather than trying to "impose" my will. This has allowed me to avoid accidents on numerous occasions, and is probably one of the most practical every day "self defense" skills one can develop.

 

[LibbyW]

I like to think that good self defence is the absence of fighting, so by not allowing a situation to progress into a fight i.e. throwing down with someone. I think if a situation has developed to the point of trading blows with an attacker you are no longer defending yourself - you are in fact in a fight.
The alternative is that as soon as someone is physically aggressive towards you, even just them putting their hands on you, immediately immobilize them, don't give them the chance to start throwing around haymakers.
Controlling them with locks or takedowns is probably best. But saying that I think the applicability of what I just said breaks down the more the opponents stack-up. So if you are faced with any more than two, whether it has gotten to the fight stage yet, chances are you are going to need to start kicking and punching really hard if your going to make it out in one whole piece.
And coming out in anything less always sucks ballz. I've lost a whole fistful of hair during a scuffle once, hurt like a SOB when it got ripped out.

Almost all situations where you will need to defend yourself will vary greatly. More often than not, if you can, run your *** off like you have all the 66 legions of Baal chasing you.
If running isn't much of an option (I'm always in danger of being knocked out by my own appendages) then you need to make sure your are the baddest mutha f**ker in the room.
Which I have been told can be achieved by looking like this:

 

[Jenna]

These are but a few examples of forms of self defense that have nothing to do with fighting or the marital arts. Yet all could be taught within the martial arts or a self-defense class.

Agree with you these can be seen as forms of defending oneself or defending others. Are you saying these SHOULD / OUGHT TO be taught along with MA techniques in an MA class or just that you would welcome it? Jx

 

[Danny T]

Agree with you these can be seen as forms of defending oneself or defending others. Are you saying these SHOULD / OUGHT TO be taught along with MA techniques in an MA class or just that you would welcome it? Jx

Hi Jenna,
What I wrote was:
"These are but a few examples of forms of self defense that have nothing to do with fighting or the marital arts. Yet all could be taught within the martial arts or a self-defense class.

Self-defense is far more than fighting, though fighting when justified can be a form of self-defense. Simply getting up and leaving can also be a very effective form.
There are many others, thing is that self defense is much more that the confines of fighting or the martial arts."

My original question was to ask what others defined as self-defense because from my experience in the martial arts world most teach fighting or fighting back as self defense. In my opinion fighting has very little to do with self defense and 'if' a martial school is claiming to teach self defense but only instructs/teaches/trains fighting or fighting back then all they are teaching is fighting. Self defense is far more than fighting.

 

[Hanzou]

Defend
Self-defense
: the actions taken to protect yourself, your love ones, your property from: damage, destruction, being used without permission, or being taken from you.
: the actions that make you capable of protecting yourself during an attack or a situation that you may be harmed by something or someone.

Self defense is being aware of the potential dangers and doing what one is required to prevent or to lessen that potential.
-Locking the doors and windows to your home or place of business.
-Having outside lighting.
-Understanding the possibility of going into the bad areas of your town at the wrong time of day/night and not being there.
-Using a bit of human psychology to defuse a potential argument preventing it to become physically aggressive.
-When out on the town being with friends and not going it alone.
-Acknowledging bad weather is approaching and batting down your shutters picking up the things in the yard that could become wind blown missiles. If need be leave the area; like when a hurricane is approaching with devastating winds and storm surge.

These are but a few examples of forms of self defense that have nothing to do with fighting or the marital arts. Yet all could be taught within the martial arts or a self-defense class.

A prime example of why I never attended a Self-Defense class.