Sorry had an issue posting this morning. Basically - a couple of things have been mentioned that I would like to discuss. Someone said that if you were sufficiently scarred it would be reasonable to pre emtively strike the throat with the intention to kill. What i'm saying is when does it change from being a bit of a dust up to a fight for your life? Should we always deal with fights in this way as they all have the potential to end our life? However I don't think it would be acceptable to start popping people in the throat in every skirmish we encounter? And again what happens if the person were fighting with decides it's a fight to the death before we do? I've not had many fights as an adult, and tbh I cant say in any of them I've thought it was a fight for my life???
There are a couple of points I'd like to make. Firstly regarding when it is ok to pre-emptively strike. You are the only judge of that. If you are in fear of your life it is allowable to kill in self defence. However your mind is not readable and so you will be judged on what you say, not what you did. I give my students three things to remember to say. 1) I thought he/they were going to kill me. 2) Can I see a lawyer? And in the unfortunate instance of being put on trial 3) I would like to exercise my right to a trial by jury. The other point is that aiming for such a specific target as the throat is likely to end up with you in a whole world of pain. If you absolutely have to take someone out the you should use high percentage techniques and keep the fancy stuff for the dojo. Oz
I have to agree with Oz on this one - great advice. The usual "I felt in fear for my life" statement is the best one you can make - the key here is that, for you to sleep well at night you should also actually be telling the truth when you say that and not just saying it! Which brings me to my point or, what exactly is a skirmish? A play fight? For me, if I am in a fight with someone - then it's pretty serious as, if it wasn't, I would have made sure it didn't get that far. If someone is fighting me then I am pretty certain they are going to go as hard and as aggressive as they have to in order to gain the upper hand and win - so therefore, it's going to be a life threatening encounter. Obviously we're disregarding the inclusion of your attacker having weapons or their being multiple assailants, which of course increases your threat levels and thus makes it easier to offer the "self defence" card! I'm not saying you should "go in for the kill immediately", what you are looking to do with any situation is fight to escape. You are looking to use the most effective technique(s) that will create an opportunity to escape, whether that be knocking your attacker out and running away, or disabling them in some way. You are not fighting to Win, you are not fighting to the death, you ARE fighting to escape! Finally, I agree again with Oz, make the technique a high percentage one - something that is tried and tested, if not by you, then by others who's background and lineage you respect and trust. And obviously, it goes without saying that fighting should always be your last resort, but if it's your last resort - still be first!! Stay Safe Al
Sure thing. I work on two distances, firstly The Fence, and secondly The FUT. From the fence (hands out in front of you in a natural looking position). Open hand strike to the face. If possible getting fingers into the eyes, possibly palm to nose, possibly moving to the "shredder" and clawing the sensitive areas of the face. Hammerfist to the angle formed by the side if the head, neck and shoulder. Everywhere between acromio-clavicular joint to temple is a viable target. The important aspect is to cycle rapidly between them, never relying on a one stop kill. These are not the only option by any means, simply one I find easy to teach and effective in stress drills. From the FUT (fouled up tangle) the goal is either to get a hand to the face to use the shredder or to free an arm to access a weapon. The idea is to break free of the clinch, get to striking distance and floor them as quickly as possible to allow you to use the feet to make sure they stay down whilst spitting screaming and swearing at whatever mates he might have. In my opinion the simpler the toolbox of techniques is the less likely you are to find yourself holding a spanner when what you really need is an allen key... Oz
Unless you're 21 and hitting the bars and nightclubs, I don't think you should be fighting unless it's "for real", in which case, you should be using any technique or weapon you need. A 40 year old man doesn't need to be having fist-fights in the Target parking lot because someone rear-ended his Infiniti.
In my opinion, striking to defend yourself with the intent to kill should be viewed the same as if you were to use a knife or gun to defend yourself. Killing someone is killing someone, so you best make sure the opponent's intent is there regardless of the tools you use to defend your self to that extreme. From my limited experience in fights, the dynamic of my opponent's intent can change as the fight progresses. Someone who just meant to rough you up to impress his ego might take a hit and become angry/scared and ramp things up, or perhaps might back down. It depends a lot on what intent he has and how committed to it he was when he attacked, and how you responded (phsyically, as verbally that might have failed you if you are to this point). Basically, some attackers might have resigned to the fact they will get hit, and nothing short of putting them down hard will stop them. Others, however, might underestimate you and a pop to the nose with their eyes watering will have them sputtering out apologies (even if they've already landed a few hits on you). My point being, fights are very dynamic and there is not one objective call to make, or so my opinion is. I have a younger brother, whom as brothers go, I used to scuffle with when younger. I'm glad I didn't strike him in the throat with the intent to kill. For all of our differences, I rather love the little guy. And though we were scuffling not to kill each other, there are times I remember where one of us would get knocked over and be not too far from knocking our head on something (table, wall, whatever) that could potentially have been life threatening. Just to add different context to what you wrote above. Fights, again, are dynamic. A bout of fisticuffs can escalate when a knife is unsheathed, improvised weapons (chairs, ash trays, etc.) are added, a handgun is drawn, or buddies are called in. Really, experience and awareness to the shifting of the encounter are great things to have. You can find them sometimes in your dojo if they train defence situations where the veriables are randomly changed on you. But as Al Peasland pointed out: the object is to fight to escape. Whether my opponent is punching me, kicking me, stabbing at me, or shooting at me, my goal is to escape. How you go about that will be just as varied depending on your skills, location, energy levels, and opponent variables above. The above is merely my opinion based on my own experiences, and shouldn't be taken above or beyond anyone else's opnions or your own instinct and local laws. Just food for thought.
There is always a difference in how different people assess the size of the threat. If you have never played pool ,you would not want to play someone for your wages,the threat to your money would be huge.If you were a one time budding professional snooker player ,you would see the threat as much less.In fact, probably worth a punt. So if you know you can fight for real,you might decide to slap the bad driver who confronts you in a violent manner,because for you the risk of being injured is easier to accept than the shame of locking your car door and calling the police. What might be a fight to one person might be nothing more the an irritant to another. We all know that avoidance is the way forward .But some people just need a punch in the mouth .
Under UK law you are allowed to use a preemptive strike if you fear that the other person is going to assault you and you have no other way out. However that preemptive strike must be reasonable use of force. If someone has simply grabbed your jacket and is threatening to punch you it is not reasonable to strike the attacker in the throat, however it might be if he has a weapons with which you believe he is going to attack you with and you believe you life or someone elses life is in danger. At the end of the day any action you take you have to back up in court, something I mention again and again when teaching both security staff and door supervisors. In fact the words I use when teaching the use of force are Necesary, Reasonable, and Proportionate
It is tough to know what that person really meant without the full context of the statement. However, I would say that we (as people and martial artists) should always have a goal for developing practical application. The application that is practical for one person, say a school teacher, might be different than what is practical for a police officer, or what is practical for a soldier on the battlefield. I'm assuming the person, when he/she said strike the throat with the intention to kill, was refering to some technique that crushes the windpipe. There are a couple problems with the premise of striking to the throat to kill. The first problem is "can you do it"? Many people may fail to "pull the trigger" when it comes time to use something they perceive as deadly force. If they are not willing to use the technique, then it isn't practical for them. Soldiers and such develop a different mindset in order to use lethal force... they aren't killing people, they are killing blips on the radar, etc. By dehumanizing the enemy, they are not killing people but eliminating targets. However, when the thought of hurting another human being comes up, many if not most people are likely to hesitate. The second problem is "does it work"? To get an immediate kill effect on an enemy, only damage to the central nervous system will do that. Other target areas are not an instant kill. Striking the throat has one immediate effect, and that is the gag reflex. If you invoke the gag reflex in an enemy, they will be momentarily stunned. The gag reflex does not take a blow to the windpipe to invoke, it can be triggered by pressing the fingers into the "hole" below the Adam's Apple. What I'm saying is that a killing strike to the throat may not have an immediate effect to stop the enemy. They may still be able to attack you for a bit before they go down. In fact, if they are yelling, they might not be affected as much by a strike to the windpipe. And there is a serious risk of death later... the windpipe is soft tissue, when it gets bruised, it swells up. So even if a person survives a blow to the throat, minutes or hours later the widepipe can swell and close up... then they die of suffocation. It is important to know the laws... I mean it isn't that you are scarred, that isn't enough, the attacker must have the means to carry out the threat to you... then we can get into the details of the local laws. But as martial artists and people, it isn't going to matter what we are legally allowed to do if what we do isn't practical for us. If it isn't practical application, what good is it when we need it?
I think my main concern for this is, what if the other person is escalating faster than you are, your still having a dust up and they have decided to kill you? I think I'll sig that, if you please :hat: No one grabs you and threatens to punch you, they grab you, there may be a slight delay then crack...or stab?!? How would you know? From what I have read about knife use if they show it to you it's for intimidation purposes, how are you to know if they do or don't have a concealed blade? I can't remember his name but I did read a couple of blogs by a guy who says you should always train against knives as they are so easy to hide and so common.
Unless of course, they're grabbing George's Jacket, then everyone must die!!! (I know I know...the cricket)
Then is lethal force required still? Wether they are trying to knock teeth out or put some holes in you, your same generally strategy is to not get hit, right? What circumstance would really change your strategy to be lethal?
Just imply lethal force, bare in mind lethal force does not mean killing. Some would class sparking someone out as using lethal force- or going for target's that may cause serious injury...breaking arms or legs, knees e.g. Or inducing sevre trauma into an assailant in which punching someone in the windpipe is. Again on punching, you don't have to hit as hard as possible to get a desired effect in a real fight. If you did hit with full force the possibilities are higher you may kill. Granted. But no one has come back for seconds after being booted in the balls
Ino Ninpo posted Actually in Robbery situations this is exactly what they do. They grab you and then say "Give me your money/phone" and then they either hit you during the robbery or hit you/stab you after. Because not only have I been a victim of robbery where this happened (or at least they tried to), I have written enough police statements to know exactly what happens in many instances whilst working as a police officer. So your saying that in law whenever someone grabs you, you should be allowed to strike people in the throat or at least cause them serious damage IN CASE they have a concealed blade? Nothing wrong in training against knives but you still have to stick with the law, and the law is not to strike someone in the throat just because they grab you. Just a observation on this... What if I grabbed you to save your life i.e. from a passing car, or if I was a plain clothed police officer/security officer? Do you think it would be a good idea to strike to the throat then, before the officer had a chance to state who he was and the reasons he/she was stopping you? Garth
