Why Empty Hand Defensive Skills Are Important
Allow
me to go on record as saying that if hear that old adage of “to the man with a
hammer, everything looks like a nail” one more time, I may scream.
Regardless,
it remains an excellent metaphor. Most
persons that carry handguns would be at a complete loss as to what to do if
physically accosted by a person who did not visibly produce an obvious weapon.
When the “gun guys”
train, they tend to more or less work under the assumption that their future
attacker is obviously armed and manifesting his evil intent in a clearly
discernible fashion. All questions
regarding the validity of a lethal force response have pretty much been answered
in a situation like that, and it is obvious to any good conservative that the
correct response would be to produce a handgun and “punch their attacker’s
ticket”.
Problems
arise when the situation doesn’t play out like expected.
It is remarkably easy to encounter men (and women) at places where liquor
is served that are most willing to settle their real or imagined differences
with their fists. I don’t much
hang around bars, but I do drive, and I have seen a couple of guys "duking
it out" by the side of road after a fender-bender on more than one
occasion. I was recently accosted
by an obviously upset and emotional guy in a parking garage that did not like
the way that I parked my truck. It
is all too easy to quickly find one’s self in the middle of a confrontation
with very little notice.
It is
my contention that persons that are serious about being able to protect
themselves and their loved ones need to have some empty hand skills somewhere in
their toolbox. Where I live, one
can get into a whole heap of trouble for brandishing a firearm without good
reason, including being charged with aggravated assault.
Drawing a handgun as the ipso facto response to being accosted by a
drunken patron in a local restaurant or an angry driver is risky.
Lots of things can happen as a result, most of which are bad.
Even
if the drawing of a handgun is warranted, it may be the wrong initial response.
On more than one occasion I have executed arrests in the kitchen area of
a residence, where the subject was initially within reach of a variety of wicked
looking bread, paring, steak and butcher knives. I might get caught completely
off-guard by an armed robber, and become convinced that resistance is required
to preserve my life. I might be
better off by initially executing an empty hand technique that temporarily stuns
my attacker, or at least momentarily precludes him from shooting, knifing or
bludgeoning me right then and there. The
time I buy might just be the time I need to produce my handgun and do what I
need to do.
I
have a fairly extensive martial arts background.
I spent most of my time applying techniques to and sparring with other
martial artists who possessed skills similar to mine.
What I learned, and the manner in which my fellow martial artists and I
trained, did not provide me with very much in the way of truly usable defensive
street skills. I have learned more
about effective defense street skills in the last two years than in the seven I
spent wearing cotton pajamas in martial art studios.
Many martial art skills aren’t designed for general use in American
society where the misuse of force can cause major criminal and civil headaches,
and the bad guys play by different rules.
The purpose of this article was to alert the reader
that a need exists for basic empty hand skills, period.
It is not a “how to” article. Interested
parties should learn empty hand defensive tactics that are simple and effective
for use in the situations I described earlier.
Remember
that we need to make sure that we need to be prepared to sometimes respond to
deal with a possible assault where we might be later hard-pressed to prove that
we feared for our life. To that
end, I would like to share a few things that I have learned about empty hand
defensive tactics. Situational
awareness is absolutely critical, and many a good man has been done in by the
“sucker punch”. I need to
assume a good ready stance if physical confrontation seems even remotely likely.
The “Interview Stance” with the body bladed at a 45-degree angle and
hands at chest level is a good choice. I
need to be prepared to step off-line and parry a punch or groin kick that might
be executed with little warning. I need to remember that an attacker may produce
an edged weapon at any time. The
focus should be on delivering short, brisk shots to strategic nerve centers with
the intent to disrupt the nerve activity so as to stun our adversary or render a
specific muscle group temporarily incapable of being used effectively. I am not trying to render my adversary unconscious with one
blow (which is hard to do), nor am I relying on causing so much pain that
compliance is achieved (intoxicated or adrenalized people may be temporarily
impervious to pain). It is my
belief that my initial response does not need to be based upon whether I wanted
to avoid a good whupping (I am from Texas, and we talk like that here) or am
trying to survive the first five seconds of a knife attack.
Either way, I need to stun or disorient my adversary immediately in order
to buy the time I need to then respond with the appropriate level of force.
A short, brisk palm heel unexpectedly applied to the nose is going to
have the same initial effect upon an aggressive drunk as it will a hardened
felon. Both will feel the sensation, and both will involuntarily and momentarily
close their eyes. Perhaps they will
fold up like a rag doll, but I sure would not count on it!
The .5 to 1.0 second this buys is my opportunity to start doing
something, whether it is launch another blow, step back and draw my gun, or even
run like my hair is on fire. I
don’t think an eye gouge or throat strike is going to necessarily do any
better than that on some of the monsters I have seen.
Students
can be taught how to use a few simple techniques effectively in an eight-hour
class, which is an amazingly short time period.
That is the good part. Here
is the bad news. Students need to
practice these techniques with a partner repeatedly until the techniques become
a reflexive motion. We are talking
hundreds of repetitions. Rome was
not built in a day.
I
am sure that most people know somebody that knows somebody who said these
techniques don’t work on individuals that are high on of meth or PCP. I know that. Pepper
spray, tasers, rubber bean bags and real bullets sometimes don’t work on those
same individuals. Empty hand skills
are for use in the specific situations I described above. Go to Home Depot and ask a sales assistant for one single
tool that will do everything, and see what his or her reaction is.
I
have said it before, and I will say it again.
Persons interested in self-defense should be reasonably proficient with
firearms, edged weapons, and empty hand skills.
The journey to becoming proficient with empty hand skills starts with
defining one’s goal. That goal
might be to develop the ability to thwart a physical assault without incurring
excessive criminal and civil liability, while retaining the option of moving
right up the force continuum should things get worse.
I
truly believe that a person that knows he or she is competent exudes a certain
self-confidence that is highly repellent to those human predators that are
looking for an easy lunch, not a fight. I
am sure that you have met people like that.
They were not antagonistic, but you just had this inkling that you did
not want to mess with them.
There
is no reason not to be one of those guys.
Steve Moses is an adjunct
instructor for Lake City, Florida-based training and consulting firm Adler &
Associates International. Moses
lives in Grapevine, Texas, and is a competitive shooter, executive protection
specialist, professional firearms instructor, and commissioned peace officer.
His book “Carbine and Shotgun Speed Shooting” is available through
Paladin Press.