fearing violence…

[Spartacus Maximus]

Most people including trained martial artists who have never had the misfortune of physical confrontation often do not understand or appreciate how easily a human body can be damaged.

Normal law-abiding people would much rather avoid all the legal, ethical and mental consequences of using force. 

All it takes to cripple or end a life is one strike or fall, even without intent. There are countless instances of people falling badly and getting very serious or fatal injuries that were not intentional. Most of these involve untrained people. 

Despite this, this is rarely discussed in martial arts schools. It is by far the best reason to avoid playing with MA outside the dojo/school or using it unless absolutely forced to defend oneself. 

Young men and teenagers (especially)who train would do well to listen and hear this warning. One bad judgment and a stupid fight(they are all stupid unless defending yours or another’s life/limb) can and will ruin your life, your future and perhaps your sanity. 

Am I prepared to deal with the authorities and the legal system?

Do I really want to go through the mental consequences of having permanently crippled another human or caused their death?

These are the questions to ponder. As a personal cautionary true story, I keep a newspaper article about a former classmate who has been disowned by his parents and serving 25 years. He had no training whatsoever but killed another fellow with one punch causing the other 18year old kid to fall and fracture his skull open on the pavement.

 

 

[Nidan Melbourne]

I've had a few times where I had to physically defend myself where my Verbal Ninjitsu didn't work. Fortunately for me, I didn't have to go through the legal system having to prove Self-Defence. As each time I did it was on security camera where the entire incident was on 2 two different cameras, and had multiple witnesses to it. 

Both times, I did have to move and react with intent to defend myself. Each time I did react, I continued to verbalise that continuing to put me in fear and attacking will led to someone getting hurt or possibly die. 

From a lot of cases that i've heard about where self-defence was used and the perpertrator passed away, where the trauma was either from some concussive force unleashed something else or some form of trauma to the skull and brain.

[ryanryu]

Yes, I definitely feel this way. I haven’t been in any real confrontations to speak of (and I don’t intend to be), but if I was, I would be afraid of delivering more damage than I intend to. It’s trying to have control over something wild and chaotic and unpredictable.  

What is extra sobering to me is that while a lot of advanced techniques are clearly dangerous, some of the most basic ones can still do serious damage. I’m thinking of all the videos I’ve seen of a reverse punch/cross knocking someone out cold… and then they faceplant into the pavement. Or a leg sweep like osoto gari, a basic judo throw, can really mess someone up. Same with the knee-joint kicks in Goju.

You are learning powerful techniques in karate and that needs to be tempered with self-control and wisdom. We would talk about this from time to time in my old dojo, but I’ve tried to introduce it up front with my students to get that seed planted… probably before they’re even capable of doing the techniques effectively. But I think it helps foster an appropriate mindset for the training.