Viiolence and Self Defense

I'm sure there may be a few folks out there who are sick of hearing me say how bad and dangerous violence is, but I feel very strongly about it and like to bring the issue back up every once in a while as a constructive reminder. For myself, and for others.

Violence is a social issue. Right up there with Drug Abuse, Crime, and Child Abuse. Violence is also a disease; right up there witth Cancer, AIDS, and the common cold. When others are violent, those surrounding are more prone to violence; violence is contagius. On page two of this Public SSection is a thread by ShowStopper I believe supplying a link to an article discussing how violence is very much so similiar to deadly pathogens. I knew this for a long time though. Back in Utah whenever someone flipped out, other episodes would explode amongst the other patients. But when there weren't any frequent violence, the patients remained more calm. Or, whatever the equivalent of "calm" is in that hellhole.

And there's this nagging notion that violence is okay sometimes; for example, when defending yourself or others. Call me crazy, but that's just simply not true. Self Defensse is defending yourself, defense is defending others. Violence is physically hurting people; there is no "defense" about it. Violence is the hurting of fellow human beings. Defending is preservation and protection. Your fists aren't shields.
I understand though that it's easy to get trapped in that thinking, that violence is necesarry in this world.
And I'd like to share a number of things you can do to hep put an end to violence.

First and foremost: RUN AWAY. Yes, that's right; scream as loud as you can like a little girl and high tail it out of there. I'm serious, have yu ever had someone scream at max volume in your face? It's shocking as hell! While your would-be-opponent is recovering from the shock (it'll take a max of five seconds) you spend that time hightailing it out of their as fast as you possibly can. Fortunately, I can book it pretty darn quickly; years of practicee of running for my life. Also, the act of screaming that loudly will begin activatingg your adrenaline, and if your a trained runner, and have an adrenaline rush, the likelihood of your opponent chasing you and being able to catch you goes down. Take up parkour so that you can clear bstacles quickly and safely.
Screaming is a distraction technique, but in all likelihood, after you've launched into running away, they will instead of chasing you, laugh their butts off at how much of a pussy you look like. They may even be confused and chuckle with their buddies about it later. Tha's the "shock" part taking it's course. When we're shocked, we do a handful of things, one of the most common defense mechanisms is humor. Another possibility is that THEY will run away. Don't stand their long enough for them to do the other reaction: attacking you.
If your not much of a screamer or your balls have dropped too low, spitting in their face and shoving them back then highttailing it out of there is also an acce0table alternative. The spit is a distraction, but not a big enough one, and so the shove is to supplement the distraction with disorientation and unbalance, giving you time to get a nice head start without him getting hurt.

2. Awareness and Avoidance
Swing wide of alleys and door ways and regularily scan your surroundings and pay attention if you get a weird feeling, like you may be in danger, this is your ESP; your eyes have picked up something novel or 9ut of place and is filtering it to your conscious, so turn around and start calmly walkingg the other way just in case. Always trust your gut. Don't ever assume it's just nothing or just a coincidence, because you could be wrong, and that a risk you should not be willing to ake because your life could be on the line.
Say it's too late for awareness though and a couple guys are circling you. Start taking off your clothes so yu're stark naked and then run up to one of them and get them in a hug making sexual noises. They won't want to touch you AT ALL, they will be disgusted by you. They may shove you to the ground and run away. But again, it's that SHOCK. Shock is a very powerful weapon. Do something totally crazy and unexpected; doesn't matter what it is, so loong as it doesn't hurt anyone. Sometimes just laughing and pretending you know one of them is enough to start difffusing a situation.
"Hey...that you smalls?" you ask one of them, "Dude, I remember you! You and that chick were at that part last week!" (if they're the criminal type, they were probaqbly at a party last week, or something that could be called a "party". If he doesn't recognize you (which he very well might just out of subliminal suggestion, but we both know he's a total stranger; you can actually make peoplee think they know you though by implanting false memories; mind control 101)
I once even avoided a conflict by acting a little buzzed because I had my pipe and pot on me and I could see streaks of resin on one guys hand so I knew he was 420 friendly. That would-be-violent encounter ended in us all smoking each other out and now we're all friends.
There's always another way. Sometimes you may not see that other way right off the bat, but it's there. You just have to get good at seeing those oppertunities and stalling as long as you can if you have to. Most of my encounters with potential violence has ended well because I'm just a creative kinda guy. I've made friends who would otherwise now be enemies if I had resorted to violence.
Humans aren't complicated. In order to work peoplee you have to know how people work, once you know that you can begin gathering the cunning and wit needed to get yourself out of some major pickles without hurting anyone and many times without thm even being aware of what you're doing. Getting into drama and acting is a good training area; you need to perfect your poker face. Your poker face is whatever you want others to think you are thinking. Black science 101.
3. Awareness, Avoidance, and Running have all failed, (Note, it's very diffficult for these tactics to fail, unless you don't know what you're doing, so chances are, it will never have to come to this, but if it does...)
NSD, Nonviolent Self Defense. The Un-martial art.
I rreccomended getting the book "Nonviolent Self Defense: The Un-Martial Art" by Kent Howard.
Here's the blog: http://nonviolentselfdefense.blogspot.com/ read that whole page, especially the FAQs.

Awareness, Avoidance, De-escalation, Psychological Warfare, Mind Reading, Mind Control, Invisibility, and NSD will enable you to get through ANY potentially violent encounter without EVER "having" to resort to violence.
Just stop saying that altogether, you NEVER "have" to resort to violence. In my eyes, and I know I'm highly opinionated and a little biased; people who say "I was forced to resort to violence," or "I had to resort to violence, for my own safety!" are just too darn lazy to seek an alternative. I have equiped many individuals with the material to defend themselves on many levels without violence, and yet they still always seem to find some kind of an excuse. I'm so tired of hearing people sayng they HAD to resort to violence. You never "have" to. There is ALWAYS another way.
Stay true. Stay free. Stay safe.

--Hero Boy

I was reading about how many of the great martial artists had creative ways to prevent fights from taking place. I forget the exact name of whoever it was but here's a story I read about how he stopped a fight:

A well-known martial arts master was on a ferry to go to the other side of a river. A ruffian got on board the ferry and saw the martial artist had a sword. He asked him, "What martial art do you know?" The Martial artist replied, "No-sword fighting". "'No-sword fighting?' I want to see how well your 'No-sword fighting' works in a duel against me!", the ruffian challenged, drawing out his sword. "I'd rather wait until we get to that island over there. There are women and children aboard and I don't want to put them in any danger", the martial artist said. When the ferry reached the island, then the ruffian jumped out of the boat and drew out his sword, ready to fight. The martial artist quickly used an oar in the ferry to push the boat away from the island so where the ruffian couldn't get back on board. "That is the art of 'No-sword fighting'!" the martial artist called out.

The best way to win a fight in my opinion is to have the fight never take place at all.

that makes me think of Bruce Lee

Hero Boy,

We believe in the same morals, but our strategies differ here. I don't believe running away preserves safety and protects people. I look not at the simple picture before me but in the idea of sending a message that if they try to attack people, that people will defend themselves.

Sometimes in defending yourself people can hurt themself. In Aikido, you're simply redirecting their strength. If they put a lot in to their attack they are opening themself to be hurt more. There's a deeper philosophical meaning and a lesson to all things. There's a move in Aikido where you got the person on the ground and in a wrist lock. Depending on the way you're standing, if they attempt to pull you down, the only thing that will happen is that they're pulling themselves in and thus you now have them in a tighter and more painful position.

Kind of like there are the 4 aspects of fighting evil, there are the methods which work best for:

A- Self
B- Situation

You know who you are. You have your beliefs that matter to you. I both respect and thank you for sharing your passionate thoughts and beliefs with us. You open lots of good discussion that is stimulating to a deep thinking and philosophical mind.