JerryLove

I did not realize that children and old women were in the IDF. From kravmaga.no [emphasis mine]: "Upon retiring from the IDF in the early 60`s, Imi began adapting the style for civilian use. He established two schools, one in Netanya and one in Tel Aviv."

Sorry, the question "what's the best opening hit" is a bit of a groaner (and not entirely ontopic); so I kind of went off-topic to respond.

Hyperextend his knee/foot and run like hell. If one of the other two get's close, repeat. If you have good access, you can cut an artiery and run... that will hopefully give you time to draw a sidearm before his friends react and catch up... the reason I don't like ankle holsters as primary carry (can't reach it while running).

My big problem with suggesting Muay Thai is the physical requirements. It is essentially a hard art, and not one I would recommend for very weak, fragile, small, or out-of-shape people (to be useful in short order). Similar problem with Krav... was designed for specific people. If I had to think more all-purpose, and quick, I would think of arts like Serak or some of the Baji systems. A Jujitsu comes to mind as well.

Since we are naming art names... I like Tjikulung as a mutliple attacker art. I've also seen some pretty impressive Pagua, and some decent Systema multiple-attacker stuff. I'd imagine if you have a working Akido, it should scale up to multiples without too much change; though my general problems with Akido remain.

You are going to be unguarded any time you put your limb out; though there are certainly ways around it. That said, IME Chinese arts do blocking strikes while also moving for position or distance. You either see a sticking action used from protection (WC) or getting your vunerable parts away (most others).

:nods: On a side note; I would love sometime to see how you or one of the instructors in question performs said blocks. My (limited) experience with Karate and TKD schools has them teaching a block which is not effective, but in a manner that could be fixed. It would be great to have a counter-example.

Oops, double submission

I suppose that the hypocracy of a personal attack telling me to avoid personal attacks eludes you Conversely, my attack was not personal, as every "your" in my post could simply be substituted with "ones" and the post stands. As to my position, it is enumerated on post 2 on page 1 where I specifically address the various sparring options. In the hope of putting some of *this* post on topic; I'll reiterate in asertive rather than responsive terms my position: Sparring must, neccessairily, be unrealistic. If it were realistic, it would be fighting. In the interest of not killing your opponent, you must, neccessairily behave differently than you would in a fight. The goal then must be two-fold. The first goal is to instill the skills in sparring which you would choose to have for a real fight. The second goal is to not instill bad habits from sparring which you wish to avoid in a real fight. The problem I have with most variations on full contact is the latter issue. Not having seen the poster here's sparring (and not wishing to come across as picking on an individual) let's take an extreme but easily accessable example with the "Dog Brothers". On the one hand, their padded-up high-contact stick sparring gives them a great deal of practical experience wieldinga stick against a resisting opponent, and I'm sure they will do well with one in a fight. On the other side, however, the use of facical, hand, and elbow badding has removed all the primary targets for strikes to do real damage. In short, they have crippled the stick as a weapon... they therefore do little in the way of hitting with it or defending with it and what typically happens is a few whacks followed by grappling. The problem with this, looking at any accounts I can find of actual stickfights in areas where they are a common weapon (SE Asia) is that most stick fights are won quickly from a blow to the head; and this is not an option in Dog Brother's sparring.

Of course, I'm not arguing that a 6-month student should be able to take a more skilled fighter (or that anyone should be taking more skilled fighters, that's the point of being more skilled). It seemed from the post tat, perhaps, it was only the instructors that could make the blocks work in the manner described... a (relative) beginner should be able to use a basic technique succesfully; but that does not mean he will be able ot pull it off against a superior opponent; my apologies if it seemed I was saying otherwise. It sounds like we are in relatively the same place, and I was merely confused by what you said regarding the effects of strike-blocks and at what point a practitioner would learn to use them effectively. My siutation is similar, at 6 months a student can perform our closest equivelant and injure someone; but they will still have problems against (for example) me, because of my better understanding of what they are doing and because I can avoid givint them the opportunity (usually). As a side-note, one of the clips on my website is either 6-month or 1-years students; if you are curious what they look like from my school, feel free to take a peek .

And now that you are in armor which obstructs vision, removes te feedback of real hits, moves the targets out, etc... how realistic is it. What about the hits to your throat? Didn't they do at least as much as the ones to your groin (you do wear a cup al the time right? I'd hate to think that you were practicing unrealistically as you didn't need to defend your groin in sparring but did on the street.) When you raise realisim in speed and power, you lower it in technique or target. If you are at full speed, and power, and technique then you are fighting... and if that doesn't do grave damage, then your art doesn't do grave damage. Presuming your art does do grave damage, and presuming you are not doing grave damage to your sparring partners, then sparring must be unrealistic in one manner or another. The trick is realizing how it is and how that will affect you in a real fight.

Conversely, a 6-month student at my school would achieve much the same result.... which begs the question: "if that's how your response works, can most eveyone do that; Or only the very high-level people?" It's not useful unless it works pretty early (considering it's taught early).

Let's ask the police in Kennesaw or one of the other juristictions with similar rules. In most areas, any given person *could* be armed; and the unknown is worse than a known. It's fine and dandy to speculate "I think this", but to ignore the presence of actual data in favor of speculation seems silly.

The vast majority of schools which teach Karate/TKD blocks do not teach an effective defese technique. The way blocking is taught in these schools is inherently slow and lacks enough oomph to actually stop a hard swing. There is also the general statement that "blocking" (not to be confused with passing, slipping, and striking) is not a good approach. You've gotten your arm hit instead of something else, but still it is you htat have gotten hit.

TKD is an example of the worst approach to mutliple attackers I can think of. I've yet to see any with regard to relative position, focus on a long range, no real grappling skills, deliberately unbalanced techniques, etc.

Homonid bigots

OK. The original question uses discriminitory language. A literal answer is. No, I (and to my knowledge, most people who carry) do not carry a firearm because I am paranoid.

I disagree. I think a serual rapist/murder/child molester in a fully armed society will be shot be a prospecitve victim in relatively short oreder.

Person 1: Mine! Perons 2: no, mine! Person 3: Definately mine!

There is an apples and oranges issue here. The seatbelt comparison directly addresses the "paranoid" discussion. The argument was that carrying a firearm was a paranoid act because you were unlikely to need to use it. I argued that, under that logic, wearing a seatbelt was a paranoid act because you were unlikely to need to use it... and for the record, airbags do kill people. A discussion of weather a safety device (like a firearm, or airbag) *also* poses a danger is really a seperate issue from weather it requires a paranoid society to carry one. So let's forget about the various opinions and speak about the realities. States which ban firearms do not see a resulting drop in murder rates; conversely, the only statistic we have available says that if we give almost everyone a fiream (qv kennesau) that the crime rate and murder rate goes down. It does work, and weather people *think* it will work is really insignifigant compared to the reality that it does.

Universities generally put severe restrictions on people, especially non-students, using student spaces to teach martial arts... especially if they charge. IOW, it's very difficult for an instructor to do what you suggest unless he's willing to work for free, or a student. It's far more productive to teach near the campus by opening a school there.

Post 7 and it's a "what's the best art" question? I put a basics on multiple-attacker tactics http://www.clearsilat.com/silat/Articles/MultipleAttackers.htm Akido has a good MA [MultipleAttacker] approach, but generally lacks effacacy; arts like BJJ have a poor basic approach from a MA perspective, but are very effective and therefore easily modified to decent MA arts. I tend to personally like Systema, Bagua, and some of the Silat arts (particularly Tjikulung) as MA fighting styles. I would tend to avoid purely striking arts (despite having just recommended Systema) and arts which focus havily on an immobility game (say, wrestling). The real tricks are the art should remain mobile, have a real sense of position in relation to more than one attacker, and be able to deal with upright grappling; because you need to control your position relative to your attackers and it's pretty assured that if you are not grappling with one, you want to be.

KSN Doug, I was unaware that Texas had a debate on CCW. How did that turn out? I've always viewed Texas as more right-wing that Florida, and our [FL] CCW laws are pretty well accepted. I'm surprised to hear that CCW is/was contested in TX.

And you, as usual, when confronted by the hypocracy of your post resort to ad-hominym attacks on the poster to cover your inability to address the problems in your incorrect position. I posted why your support for your personal opinions was ill-informed and incorrect. You are in MY opinion, wrong; and I've supported why. Your dismissal of my argument as "senseless" is [also in my opinion] merely an excuse to avoid having to actually support your position. What relvence do seatbelts have? I made that clear but you ignored it. You have asserted that one must be paranoid to carry a firearm because you would not likely need it to protect yourself. A seatbelt is another device you will not likely need to protect yourself, but one you choose to wear without asserting that it requires you be paranoid of a crash. As to my suggestion that most everyone carry a firarm; there are in-fact jouristictins (Kennesaw, Georgia comes to mind) which require homeowners to own firearms. It has worked quite well at lowering crime. It's hardly a new idea. The fact that you are willfully ignorant of these facts or the fallacy of your own position is not very surprising if you respond to all opinions they way you respond to mine.

Are we becoming such a paranoid society that we, as people, need to devote years to studying fighting arts in otder to protect ourselves? You've chosen an arpitrary standard; and your conclusion (that carring a firearm means someone is paranoid) is absurd. On what do you base your argument against carrying one? That you are not likely to need it? OK, then why put airbags in cars? So you point out that your community does not walk around armed; and then tell us how bad the crime and drugs are.... and this should convince me that I want to imitate you how? Let me ask you, if every sound adult carried a firearm, do you think you would still have 2 serial rapists? There is no where near enough information there. "It depends". You don't shoot someone to protect your wallet (I hope), you do it because you think he's gonna take more than your wallet. What is the cut-off? 1%? 5%? 10%? Do we do the same advocating wearing seatbelts?