Archive for the 'Police' Category

When I owned my karate school, one of the neighboring businesses was a biker bar. One of their bartenders and I were talking about karate one day and he made the remark that if any karate guy messed with him – he would just use his gun. I retorted that would be fine if you happened to have it one you. The bartender started laughing. You see I had assumed the bartender was a law-abiding citizen and would not carry a illegal handgun.

My assumption was natural in California because up to now – only one county in the state allowed for concealed handgun permits without showing cause (that is being challenged now and may change here). So the bartender assumed since he had a fire stick – he could take care of himself if he had to against any unarmed or lesser armed man.

It this post I will challenge the bartender’s assumption as any martial artist knows like any weapons attack – you have to fully deploy it with a calm state of mind to use it. Guns are no exception. Martial artists are under no illusion that they will be ready if attacked so Bruce Lee’s famous words, “Expect the unexpected” is actually a better mantra.

I will make the case that a gun, knife, bat or whatever is no substitute for actual martial arts training. If you ever to get attacked it is going to be when you are asleep, sick, totally unaware and such so you are going to have to regroup and let your training take over. With that said – lets bust a myth. Take a look at this video to see how prepared police (arguably should be the best prepared) to take on a sudden knife attack.

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This is outside of my normal post but near and dear to my heart. Let me explain. When I was young man I often had to escort patrons of the bar I worked outside. Often they did not willingly go. I had to call the cops at time for an assist but back then cops did not have tasers in their arsenal.  The only non-lethal weapons the cops had at the time was their version of club (a type of tongfa) and mace.

Back then if you did not follow the cop’s directions – they had to get up close to you to use non-lethal weapons. This did not always go well for the cops as in the case of Sagon Penn. In that highly charged San Diego incident where a suspect allegedly was being treated bad – the suspect did not allow himself to be arrested, grabbed the cops gun and shot the officer and civilian.  So in that context I will talk about how dangerous a cop’s job is from a self defense point of view and explore the current use of tasers.

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