weapons against unarmed oponents?

[Jay]

Do you think using weapons against an unarmed oponent is cheating?

I think that it is cheating as you have an advantage over the other person but then again a experianced black belt would have an advantage of an untrained person

[Shorinryu Sensei]

There's no such thing as "cheating" in a street fight. However, depending on the circumstances and the type of weapon used, using a weapon against your opponent may not be advisable.

For example, I'm 6'6" tall and weigh 240lbs with 30 years in the arts. If someone 5'9" tall, 160lbs with no fighting experience attacks me and I pull knife on him to defend myself and stab him, most likely I'm headed to jail.

[sdargie]

I said yes but I was thinking if you used it aggresively or if you disarmed a knife from an attacker and started stabbing them then that's not good either.

[ZR440]

S Sensei has a point, but I'm not built like a linebacker like him either. So I'm going to use whatever advantage I have at the time.

[yamesu]

I put no.

The way I thought of it as I was putting in my poll-option was:

If any two or more persons attacked me or my family, id have no problem belting them with the closest thing to me. Be it keys, a beer glass or even a can of softdrink.

As previously stated,

There's no such thing as "cheating" in a street fight.

[Ninjitsu]

There is no cheaters in a street fight, only winners and losers.

[Sauzin]

You know chances are as a black belt we're going to jail anyway. Either that or we're bound to get sued.

Still in my mind you use what is necessary and you don't take chances. Worrying about legalities is a convenience you can afford afterwards assuming you are still alive. The term "cheating" implies rules and or codes of conduct in a fight. My first code of conduct is "don't fight". If that code gets broken then the only other relevant code is "survive". Things like "fair", "honor", or "even ground" have no relevance when your goal is to survive.

[yamesu]

Agreed.

[Shorinryu Sensei]

You know chances are as a black belt we're going to jail anyway. Either that or we're bound to get sued.

Still in my mind you use what is necessary and you don't take chances. Worrying about legalities is a convenience you can afford afterwards assuming you are still alive. The term "cheating" implies rules and or codes of conduct in a fight. My first code of conduct is "don't fight". If that code gets broken then the only other relevant code is "survive". Things like "fair", "honor", or "even ground" have no relevance when your goal is to survive.

I disagree (sorry bud). if you "overkill" in a self-defense situation, then yes, you open yourself up to liability, but if you just defend yourself, no, you are OK. I've been there once. The judge talked to witness's and myself and it never went to court.

[Sauzin]

Hey Paul, I'm not advocating overkill here either. What I am advocating is "use what is necessary". And in a way I am implying that the time to really worry about what is overkill and what isn't cannot be during a fight. Let me see if I can explain this more thoroughly and put these comments in perspective.

First of all if a drunken guy in a bar goes to punch me, regardless of whether or not it hits me I leave. I don't fight. If a friend of a friend gets offended and in my face, I leave. If someone is mistreating my girlfriend and being disrespectful, we leave. My view is that just because I'm a martial artist doesn't make me a hero. It's not my job nor my place to get into a physical confrontation if something that I deem "wrong" occurs. My honor means nothing if I risk a fight solely to defend it. To sum it up, what I'm saying is I don't fight unless my life is in danger or the life or womanhood of someone I love is in danger. I don't subscribe to the bar room brawl mentality and if it happened I'd take a few lumps to get out of there.

So this brings me to my second point. If indeed the only time that I will fight is when extreme circumstances force me to what is "overreacting"? If someone was trying to seriously hurt me or kill me and I knew I could stop them without using lethal force then I would. But I'm not going to take any risk in doing so. If there is even a chance that I might get killed trying to spare the life of my attacker then I won't do it. And in a serious confrontation I'm not going to waste time weighing the chances. That in and of itself is too much of a chance when my ability to live is on the line.

Now yes in the courtroom an understanding judge may let the self defense and "what would a reasonable man do" line slide when you could have otherwise gotten out of there. But I've known people here in Boise where that didn't happen specifically because they were a martial artist. For some reason in the court room incidents my friends have been apart of the judge expected some kind of higher standard of the martial artist and when the other party made claims the judge was either indifferent and let the charges stand or assumed that someone who trained in fighting was looking for it. I'm not saying that will always be the case. But if I had to choose between a black eye or a courtroom explanation. I'd take my chances with the black eye.

I hope this puts it into perspective a bit. I'm not avocating that people bring out a knife if a drunken someone pushes them back. What I'm saying is that in almost any non-leathal circumstance I can think of I wouldn't be fighting I'd be leaving. Since all that's left is leathal or worse I can't imagine why someone would be weighing fair or not fair durring a fight. In my mind, at that point, I'm lucky if I can live to see the courtroom.l