million dollar question: part deux

so i've been reading the other topic here: https://selfdefence.darkbb.com/self-protection-and-martial-arts-f17/million-dollar-question-t484.htm

and this has raised another issue for me, which is a bit off the wall for the other thread, hence part deux.

now, after reading through all the replies of the other thread i kind of decided it was a double edged sword. to experience, or not, that was the question, and there is a lot of debate on the topic. here is another question to ponder....

what is more important in an instructor of self protection, honesty (to both their students and themselves) or experience?

personally, my answer would be honesty. if they are honest about their experience, and honest about where their knowledge came from and why they are teaching it, then that provides at the very least a solid base for the student to better understand the techniques, why they are using them, and what good they will do, regardless of experience. Thus allowing the student to make up their own mind about their instructor.
if an instructor taught a technique and even the greenest of students asked about the history of its use in a real situation, so long as the instructor is honest, surely it would be easy for the student to make the correct decision about it, and decide if it is for them?

Honesty - absolutely.

To be a good instructor you need rapport with your students. To gain that you need trust.

When you go to your Dentist, you trust that he/she is fully qualified and knows exactly what they are doing. You also trust them when they say you need certain work doing.

The same should apply to any self protection instructor. And trust cannot be maintained if you are not at the very least honest with your students.

And just as you may seek a second opinion with your health matters, so you are more than entitled to seek second opinions with your self protection instruction. What better way to find out if you're being given the right informaiton than seek it from several sources and see if you get the same, or similar message.

If I'm teaching techniques that I've never used for real, I will be totally honest with my students about that. I can tell them where I got the technique from, if I know of any times it's been used for real. They can then make their own mind up whether the technique is going to work for them, whether it looks realistic based on the other evidence and teachings they have gathered over time. And they can seek a second opinion if they wish.

So, definitely HONESTY, every time

;-)

honesty...without doubt.

in my group we have always questioned everything and tested everything, thrown out rubbish and welcomed new ideas. we have never proffessed to know everything but will always try to find an answer to a question. what we do is based on the little experience we have had and the training we have done.

and it works............ excellence through tenacity, and keeping a beginners mind have served us very well.

Absoloute honesty on all levels. Tell the good the bad and the ugly. thats me you and al covered les im so funny.

I am looking to enhance my knife skills and i have only ever had three encounters with knifes where i had to defend myself. so i will have to seek out the person who i see best to teach me about knife culture fighting defence and if one day i pass that on to students when i feel i am capable, I may have to tell them this works because a certain instructor says so,when my students ask how they know then i can tell them because the that guy has been there and done it.

Great thread les.

i guess i am the ugly one

yeah...knife defences..... not found a full proof answer yet unfortunatley, in training though we have gone from fatally wounded to flesh wounds so i guess thats cool. i cant remember who told me but i keep thinking about " dont worry about expecting to get cut, more , if you get cut then accept it and carry on" ( a whole new thread in itself )

credit for the thread goes to the main man Rich

Just quickly as i don't want to drag this off topic but knife defence is about damage limitation, so Les, be happy with a flesh wound mate, if you get my meaning
Winners drip, losers die or words to that effect.

Three outcomes in a knife fight he dies, you die, you both die! Dog brothers

winners drip, losers gush

Peter the dog brothers quote is CRAP ... no one here wants or should be involve din a KNIFE FIGHT .. we are talking about defending against knives , not FIGHTING with them (each man with a knife)

ANYTHING less than dead when faced with a knife is a result.. all that can be hoped for is the DEGREE of that result.

One of my SDF instructors in London (Alex McMahon), was stabbed just this week whilst working as a security guard in the Blue Water complex

he did everything we practice up to the point where it was a sudden 'lunge' from the attacker toward Alex's Spleen area.
Alex used our (ergo MY) defence techniques .. the blade enetred his body but stopped at his lower ribs

Why? because Alex used one of our 'jamming' moves, and managed to punch the lad who was then subdued and subsequently arrested.....
Alex required a few stitches and the A&E folk said he was damn lucky that the blade hadnt entered any deeper. if it had Alex could have died.. the knife had a 7 inch blade..

Alex replied that he WASNT lucky, he was trained by me ( Ha Ha)

Point being DAMAGE LIMITATION.. to me Alex had a great result.. some idiots might say my teachings and methods are crap because he actually go stabbed
My answer would be .. by doing the right things he didnt die and the result wa sto me a victory

In fairness the Dog Brothers quote is a good one, in a true knife fight (knife on knife) those words are an accurate reflection of the futility involved in the situation. However, I understand your point Dave in that the discussion was around defending against a knife, not fighting with one. So it was perhaps just a little out of context.

Like Stuart says, don’t want to drag this into a knife defence thread, but just to add one thing. Knife defence in martial arts tends to be a little over dramatised. If you don’t read the Daily Mail, and instead read the National Crime Statistics, only one in seven knife attacks in the UK result in a fatality. So for every one person who unfortunately dies, another six people successfully defend their lives. The vast majority of these people (statistically speaking) will be completely untrained, and will defend their lives with pure instinct and will.

We as martial artists therefore have no excuse, and it always irritates me when people say knife defence is a waste of time, or doesn’t work. It worked just fine for your student in London Dave, and I am pleased he is OK.

Dave, why when the knife was produced didnt he run off? In fact why in a job like his in an area like that wasn't he wearing a stab vest?arnt we told and teach all the time that preperation is the key.

The reason i like the dog brothers quote is it drills home the importance of not fighting with a man with a knife. Ok i understand that your friend may have been cornered, but i suspect rather than flee the knife and live to fight another day he tried to confront him because of his job.

Like i say dave i am no knife expert but if i am ever put in a situation where i know the chances are i will come up against an attacker with a knife i will do everything possible for prevention, IE: stab vest & nike trainers.

Again i wasnt there so i dont know if he had the chance to flee and alert people better equipt.

I pray your friend has a quick recovery.

Hi Peter sorry to jump in.
I suspect Alex was just doing his job as a security guard and obviously situations do escalate at a rapid pace.
If I was an employer of a security guard I would be pretty annoyed if he ran off possibly leaving shopping centre staff members and public at risk.
As for the stab vest I suspect the Risk assessment will have to reviewed and possibility of stab vests being introduced may be the outcome.
The 'jamming' technique works very well in training and the theory behind it is sound. I know some of the other SDF guys who worked the doors etc have used it with success. I myself have never had to use it and I explain that when I am teaching, I also explain Avoidance as the first course of action when dealing with knife confrontations/attacks.
I agree with you all on that honesty is always the best policy.

Michael Wright
The national Crime Stats give NO indications of the fact that ANY of those who survived knife attacks actually sucessfully defended themselves.. they survived mainly because they werent stabbed in a rapidly potentially fatal area.
In fact one agency we have worked very closely with who collect stats for the Home Office state over 90% of of survivors of knife attacks did little to actually defend themselves... they simply werent fatally stabbed ( a bit obvious I know if they survived, but you know what I mean)

We have been in discussions for over two years with a senior member of the Serious Crime Unit of the Home office as well as with several high ranking Senior Police Officers from several forces with a view to developing anti-knife programmes ... working alongside the ICM as their ONLY recognised professional safety and protection body.. again working our knife programme, we have produced a DVD to be used in our presentations etc, and I am sorry to say again that those 5 out of 6 gave little if any indications that they PHYSICALLY defended themselves according to the Home office's official stats gatherers

Alex had been informed by the CCT guys that a youth was brandishing a knife in full view of shoppers .. the police had been informed and had requested that the lad in question was 'covered' by their own Security pending their arrival... Alex had 'cornered' the lad deliberately so that there was no way he could be a danger to shoppers...

the lad had seemed compliant but wouldnt release the knife however had HAD dropped his arm at his side and was becoming less agitated, when he simply lunged at Alex.... The police were there in time to assist Alex inhis arrest..

I have NO idea why he wasnt wearin Kevlar or whatever, I will ask him.. however Alex had considered that he was a better 'traget' than Joe and Jill Public

Dave Turton wrote:Michael Wright
The national Crime Stats give NO indications of the fact that ANY of those who survived knife attacks actually sucessfully defended themselves.. they survived mainly because they werent stabbed in a rapidly potentially fatal area.
In fact one agency we have worked very closely with who collect stats for the Home Office state over 90% of of survivors of knife attacks did little to actually defend themselves... they simply werent fatally stabbed ( a bit obvious I know if they survived, but you know what I mean)

I appreciate that Dave, to clarify the points I was trying to make:

Many of the people I meet consider a knife attack to be a no-win scenario which always ends at the morgue. No those stats don’t indicate how pro-active the survivors were, but they tell one simple fact – they didn’t die.

I know about the findings of such research, I work with the Police too, they are always throwing those kinds of figures at me. It is a very important point, that luck on the part of the defender and incompetence on behalf of the attacker, account for a lot of survivals. It is an important message to bring to the discussion.

However, here is my point. As an instructor, I can’t teach people to survive by accident, I can’t hand out extra doses of luck, and I’m certainly not going put their hope in the incompetence of the attacker. My message is one of empowerment, confidence and will – have faith in your ability and your training. The biggest scaremongers in martial arts are us, because fear attracts students into the class, and paranoia keeps them there. I try to stay away from that.

I agree more or less mate

When teaching Knife Defence classes, I usually tell people that death ISNT a foregone conclusion, and often they can survive, but there are also DEGREES of survival.. amptutation/s are fairly common due to to infection..

All I tell my students really is that doing all you can to increase the chances of either survival or limitation from a knife attack is what I hope to achieve

thanks for your input

oh by the way.. Alex was back at work the next day.. tough Jock

I glad alex is ok dave. Could you ask him with repsect.
What is his view on training knife defence now he has actually been stabbed? Does it differ much from before the incident? Does he (i hope he does) now wear stab vest?

I apprieciate that he was doing his job and protecting the public but is his job as a security gaurd worth his life?

What is your advice to him now dave?

Hi Peter

If you look at my earlier posts. I do say that he commented that he wasn't 'lucky' but had been trained.... (albeit a bit tongue in cheek)

His views as such havent altered. he is a former 22 years man in the British Army, with several tours of N/Ireland and came out as a RSM...

He believes the training he has received to date helped him to minimise the impact from the knife itself ....

Not sure on the wearing of stab vests at the moment as apparantly somebody from 'head office' is going to see him (them?)

I dont really HAVE any advice per se at the moment Peter, I have NO control over whether stab vests are to be or are issued by his company, I have NO control over him doing his job, he is a 50 year old former RSM, (AND a tough Glaswegian Jock to boot)

Who am I to offer further advice.. the methods we teach obviously worked to a fair degree or else he wouldnt have been able to resume work as quickly as he did

I have faith in my methods and others from the SDF HAVE made these methods work as well

Anyway from what Alex said I dont believe the PHYSICAL aspects were weak, he says himself, he kind of slightly relaxed when the lad did.. therefore any advise at all would be based around AWARENESS rather than teh physical.. which is where the best self-defence starts anyway

Thanks dave wasnt searching for anything just want to get as much information for my own learning as possible. I am glad what you did teach held him in good sted and probably saved his life.
Thanks for your answers dave.
repcetfully
Peter

The Dog Brothers quote, unfortunately, is based on a duelling structure that is still very dominant in martial arts today and sadly spills over into the self defence/self protection arena. This is why many say you will be unsuccessful when facing an empty hand versus the knife scenario. Again, is the attacker Dan Inosanto who has had one too many cups of coffee or a cracked up Somalian who is impaired by his condition? While working at the night club Embargo in Chelsea, I once had that cracked up Somalian trying to get past me on the front door. This guy was so skinny and out of it, I could have blown him over. As I went to move him out of the way, he pulled a full bottle of Red wine out of his back pocket (he was wearing those huge baggy jeans with massive pockets) and delivered an overhand strike towards my head. I countered, very easily, by deflecting the overhand strike and wrapping his arm and web handed him in the throat. This was not hard to pull off. He was slow, diminished and impaired just like most of the people I have ever had to deal with on the door. Getting back to the Dog Bros quote: I have personally seen two knife-on-knife presentations and both ended up as a Mexican standoff, in fact National Crime reports in the US report that 68% of the time, if you respond to an armed hold up by presenting a weapon of your own, the attacker backs off. The incidents that I witnessed were both in the UK; interesting.

You see, what the Dog Bros left out is that 68% of the time both people live. Just like the grappler's axiom of 99% of all fights go to the ground (to get people to enroll in their sport grappling program), so it goes with incorrect stats of other elements of self protection.

Out

Joe

Fair points mate .. it doesnt matter WHAT percentage of fights go to the ground .. and 99% is way too high.. 100% start standing anyway.. and what is a FIGHT (I dont want to start another topic here .... BUT)

A fight to me is when both protangonists end up trading strikes and/or rolling about on the floor..
where as GOOD Self-Protection is (or should be) about no physical contact being made, and methods employed to become safe.

and GOOD Self-defence is (or again should be) about using very little to neutralise the antagonist, which is where methods such as the pre-emptive strike and other similar methods come in to play...

I have never witnessed a real knife FIGHT, but I agree with Joe on the massive potential of producing an equaliser or counter weapon, as I have done this myself quite successfully..

I was faced with a small 'gang' of youthful asian kids a few years back (about 4 or 5), two of the half a dozen had a knife..I had sufficient warning to be able to open the boot of my car (I was sitting in it waiting for my better half to come out of the sodding Bingo).. get out my own personal 'equaliser' my trusty pick axe handle, face these kids, challenge them quite aggressively, take a couple of steps towards them, and watch their 'bravado' vanish as they turned and legged it.

[i]"The only way the PREY stops being the PREY is to become the PREDATOR"

Great posts guys x