Alive Training For Seniors or Dead Training Cuz Old People Suck

**sidandphil** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 12:18pm

It seems that a lot of people are misunderstanding a comment like "you can't learn to fight without fighting" are not understanding/listening to the argument. The goal of teaching self defense isn't to make the student a person ready to go into fair combat with another athlete but to disable and/or escape using any means necessary. How do you best improve a persons capability to defend his/herself in a short period of time. Having to train in a full martial art is not good self defense because it takes too much time to get good at. Breaking defense down to a few very simple things so that your grandma can learn it and remember it ten years from now is the point, not prepping grandma to step into the ring.

***DerAuslander*** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 2:30pm

You couldn't be more wrong.

**sidandphil** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 2:51pm

Good argument! Realistic self defense isn't about training to fight other fighters but preventing and dealing with assault. You're going to be gouging some stupid thug's eyes out, not having some cagefight.

**foxguitar** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 3:37pm

No but practicing against other fighters teaches you timing and distance and how to take a hit and give a hit.

**TheRuss** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 3:43pm

I found one of Tegner's books in my parents' bookshelves when I was a little kid. I was going to read it, but decided I'd better not in case I got t3h d38dly and killed one of my little brothers.

***DerAuslander*** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 3:51pm

Sidandphil, you're arguing against a strawman. Are you familiar with the term? It means that rather than have a logical discussion, you've created an argument based on what you thought MaverickZ's position was, or rather than what you wanted it to be & then proceeded to argue against it.

Thus, you're basically spewing what we like to call "bullshit". You're unable to contradict him logically.

Try again.

**sidandphil** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 4:50pm

Maybe I put a little bit of words into his mouth, but when your whole argument is one sentence long its tempting to do. I'm trying to respond to the notion that self defense is supposed to be about learning to fight which I think is misguided/bullshit.

***DerAuslander*** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 5:07pm

And you're wrong.

Hand to hand combat, be it in the ring, on the street, or on the battlefield, all require the same attributes. The individual training programs may differ due to different aims, but there will be more that is the same than different.

A few tricks & gouges are less likely to save grandma's life than a progressive, alive training program that addresses all modes of combat, armed, grappling, striking, the clinch, & everything in between.

If you believe otherwise, I recommend leaving this website. You will not convince anyone, as we have all learned from experience that tricks & eye gouges just don't cut it.

**foxguitar** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 5:34pm

How in blazes are you going to know if something is effective or not unless you work it with a live moving resisting opponent.
Obviously you cant eye gouge your training partner but you should be able to approximate it .

If you go your whole martial arts lifetime never being hit or hitting someone . when it comes to time to use it in a real life situation you will be lost because you will relie on your training and instinctively revert back to that.

Case in point in the 60s in california . There was a horrible shoot out involving 4 California Highway Patrolman who were killed by two bad guys.

In the hands of the dead patrolman they found spent shells , you know why ? because they were trained at the academy and at the range to catch their spent shells in their hands thus making it very difficult to reload their revolvers .This was before semi autos became standard issue.

Point is you will respond in a real life situation the way you train.

**sidandphil** · Posted On: 9/27/2008 6:39pm

I will agree with you that a long term training program addressing all kinds of combat situations and lots of sparring and dynamic practice is the ideal method to learning to fight. When I suggest eye gouges and knees I'm not talking about the way that I train, but the way that I think makes the most sense for a self defense class to teach. Simple things, the simpler the better.
The people who go to a self defense class don't want to dedicate a ton of time to this otherwise they would be in a martial art where they learn the stuff you're talking about. So it's different. You're ultimate goal isn't to make them great fighters but to give them a couple of fundamentally sound tools they can actually use without years of practice.