Archive for the 'Self-defense' Category
People have become more civilized in the last thousand years but we really should learn some lessons from the past. The reason I say this is people should still be at the top of the food chain! We (speaking for all humanity here) are smarter than any animal but in today’s society - using our native smarts have not been cultivated in cities.
I reviewed this video about two women that were attacked by a Pitt Bull dog and were taking on lots of bites. I would first like to say that an animal owner should not own a dog he or she cannot control and I would also like to point out that these women were scared and they probably had never had to fight for their lives. Review this video and then I will talk about strategy.
I just read a story about Elle Macpherson using Tai Chi to get her handbag back from a robber here. I was kind of amazed that a supermodel would be walking about unaccompanied but even more amazed that she, after getting robbed, would get her purse back! After reading the story - all I can say is Elle probably did get some confidence from Tai Chi. Here is a picture of Elle McPherson with a surfboard. She looks like she stays in good shape.
Another Supermodel that can fight is Michelle Waterson. She works at Hooters by day and is starting to fight MMA. Michelle was in Oxygen networks, “Fight Girls.” It is really cool to see someone living their dream. Michelle states in her videos that karate is her way of life. She is a black belt in Karate and learning Muay Tai and Wushu. Here is a picture of Michelle doing a front-snap-kick.
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Many of you may be wondering what is the best style or martial art for self-defense? There are many good martial arts schools that teach adaptive self-defense moves that also teach the traditional martial arts. People often ask me what is the best way to learn self-defense. The short answer is to find something you like for the time commitment you want to make, and then follow through.
Almost any martial art will work in self-defense if one practices but it must be suited for the student. For instance if a woman wanted to learn how to fight in two weeks, I would not suggest a formal Kung Fu or Karate school (unless they also taught self-defense courses), but rather a self-defense course. If a woman wanted to learn an art form as well as some practical self-defense then almost any martial art will be good (Kung Fu, Karate, Jiu Jitsu, Judo, Aikido and so on). Here is a short video of a Kung Fu school with a self-defense offering.
The following story is of my wife (let me call her Sly) using self-defense when she was a kid! I should explain that she came from a large family with a single working mother for most of her teenage years. Her mother was away a lot and the kids went unsupervised. I have edited this account to remove much of the identifying information.
I decided to publish this becuase there are probably lots of young girls living in unsupervised conditions due to single working parents. Sly has been a fighter ever since we met and had to use her wits to escape many times when she was younger. I will publish self-defense stories of people not trained in karate to show that anyone can use their wits to increase their chances of survival! This is written in the first person - I will hold my comments until the end.
Watch out for those peeping-toms!
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What is going on? I have been looking for stories of women defending themselves against attackers and I found a bunch of articles about women punching, hitting sharks and saving puppies and kittens against pythons! I have never had an issue with sharks - I’ve seen a few blue sharks and leopard sharks while scuba diving but I have had an altercation (for me) with a Torpedo Ray.
Jessica Alba reportedly while filming “Into The Blue,” had to punch a shark in the nose that got too close to her - story here. Another woman kayaking off of Australia, had a Great White capsize her kayak and try to eat her. She responded by hitting the shark repeatedly with her paddle until the shark swam away (story here)! Both of these woman let the sharks know there would be no easy meal here! I found a promo picture of Jessica posing for the release of her movie, “Into The Blue.”
Photo from: http://www.320by480.com/wallpaper/?id=1102
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If you are like me and have scuba dived before, you have probably thought about what you would do if a shark attacked! I remember reading about this very issue in scuba classes when I was 16 years old. The instructor told us to go to the bottom and take your tank off to use as a barrier. We were taught to find a crevasse on the bottom to wedge ourselves in until the shark swam away. I don’t know about you but I think the shark has gills (unlimited air supply under water) so my best hope would be for the shark to lose interest. 
I used to read Jacques Cousteau books so I could learn about the underwater environment. One method he employed was to make shark billy sticks. I duplicated the shark billy stick by pounding small nails into a small wooden bat, snipping off the edges close to the wood so the shark’s skin would not slip off the end of the bat. I also drilled a hole into the handle of the shark billy stick so I could attach a strap. My plan was to put the shark billy stick between any shark and myself so he would not eat me (If I happened to notice him).
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Many women and children do not feel powerful when attacked by a large man. Some men think because they are generally larger and stronger - they can intimidate women. While I cannot solve gender politics in this post, I can offer ways to mitigate some men’s aggressive methods of communication.
These bullies or worse - criminals (depending on the situation) try to get a woman to give in to his way of thinking by forcefully encroaching on a woman’s space - making her backup or do what the bully wants! If a man is going to get physical - you do not have to go along with him… you can get physical back! Here is one woman learning how to do just that!
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Three armed men boarded a tourist bus near Limon, Costa Rica, and attempted to rob the 12 retired folks on vacation! In a turn of events that warms my heart, a 70 year-old ex-marine disarmed and put one assailant into a choke hold! The other tourists started fighting back and the other two assailants fled!!! The group was onshore during a stop, during their Carnival cruse in February, 2007. One of the reports is here.
While it is always sad for a human being to lose his life, the 20 year-old assailant had no business robbing people and apparently met his match by messing with retired leather neck (Marine)! Many younger people make the assumption that old-folk will not be able to fight back, let alone stand up to young punks! I have a few memories of older (I know - I keep calling 70 years, old - in 20 years I will think that is middle age too) folks defending themselves.
I was surprised last year by the band, “The Zimmer’s” that sang, “My Generation” seemingly as a cultural awaking that old folks mattered too! Well here at MySelfDefenseBlog.com, we think that old folks can kick Butt! Here is a short clip of, “The Zimmers.”
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Self defense for women and children is one of the main focuses of this blog because this group (more than half of the human population) is attacked by bullies, robbers, rapists, and murders! One lesson I learned long ago was that bad guys go after easy (perceived) targets. I often find good examples of content that I am trying to convey on youtube.com. I will use some examples in this post that show various flavors of women’s self defense.
The first example is near and dear to my own heart, being a Kenpo stylist. The women in this video are demonstrating, as near as I can tell, the adaptive nature of kenpo techniques in some real life attack scenarios.
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Stories like this keep me writing about women’s self-defense! On Saturday, February 23, 2008 a girl was jogging in East San Diego County near a college. A man leaning against a RV, grabbed the girl as she ran by. He took her down a hill but this brave girl fought back! While the details of the struggle are sparse in this story, she managed to break free and get away!
Picture from here. This suspect I believe was found dead on Tuesday, February 26, 2008.
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This is indeed a sad commentary on our civilization today that girls are not safe! A girl in Japan and another girl in Spain both fought off attackers by kicking them in the nuts! While it is true that there many great places to strike a man, the nuts are one of the easiest places for a girl to kick because bad men think they can just overpower a girl.
I found many examples of kicks to the groin on youtube.com but most of them seemed to be really staged. This one seems to be real to me but the guy might be wearing a cup. The reason for showing this video is for girls and women to see what effect a kick to the nuts can have on a male attacker. The groin area in men is very sensitive… that is why men protect it most of the time. The thing I will go into more here is when bad guys are side tracked, they make mistakes and are vulnerable!
This is one of those stories that I use to dream about when I was a kid. I use to read about Daniel Boone and Davie Crockett fighting off wild animals and planned how I could accomplish the same thing.
The 12 year-old boy picked up some fighting tricks from the video game “World of Warcraft.” According to the story here, the boy and his sister came across a moose. The moose was going to go after his sister so he use a distraction strategy (from the game) to draw the moose away from his sister!
Picture from http://www.eatonvillenews.net/images/Bob/MOOSE%202.jpg
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When I was a kid, I used to imagine ways to defend myself in any situation. One of the thoughts I had while I was drinking my hot chocolate (no - I was not a coffee drinker yet) was to use it as a weapon if someone attacked! I thought I would throw it is their face and follow up with kicks and punches. Now as an adult I have often thought of what one could do against multiple attackers in cities that frown on obvious weapons. Here is one video that shows a unbreakable umbrella that can be used as a weapon!
Video from http://www.real-self-defense.com/umbrella.html
I have noticed that women are interested in learning of other women that can fight a man and win! I have even seen some websites that cater to this jaunra of fight stories. Lets go back to basics and examine this concept. The very basic way to size up fighters are to look at their size, weight and weapons. If you are examining a man and woman opponent, who has reach, who weighs more, who is faster, stronger, has ring savy, and so on. After you determine who has the basic components that wins fights… you can look at who is the better fighter, who can take a punch and dish it right back.
Why do I care? because self-defense and sparring/fighting are not the same thing. All things being equal in a fight or sparring situation - the fighter with the most of the above qualities will almost always win the match. In self-defense the rules are not the same. In self-defense, all strikes are open… for instance if a woman kicks a guy in the nuts, she can break his ear drums or gouge his eyes to ensure her safe departure. The same woman cannot do that in a prize fight. In self-defense a woman is fighting for her life so she will use any weapon at her disposal. Here is a famous video of Joey Buttafuoco vs “Chyna” Joanie Laurer. Chyna is a pro wrestler that thought for some reason being strong and being the equivalent of a stunt woman (I mean a professional wrestler) would some how make her a fighter. Joey is just an average Joe… a guy that has probably been in a few fights in his day but out weighs Chyna and in my opinion out matches her easily.
A nurse was attacked walking home after recently seeing Miss. Congeniality. She was in her own world, listening to music. The attacker grabbed her and put a knife to her cheek but this nurse decided to fight back! She stomped his foot and elbowed his face! She had seen the move on Miss Congeniality, the Sandra Bullock movie where a female FBI agent goes undercover in a beauty pageant. I remember that movie well as I laughed when Sandra had a question in the pageant, normally answered with “world peace,” she answered with, ”stiffer prison sentences for repeat felons.” Here is a picture of Sandra Bullock with William Shatner in Miss Congeniality.
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