My (controversial?) commentary on failings of women's self defense training

[Aquila]

I didn't receive a very good review of my initial work on this subject, but the topic is important to me so I decided to post some of it here. This link is the introduction to my writing on the subject of "Fixing a Paradign that Teaches Women to be Less Safe" - commentary on the failings of current strategies to prevent violence against women, including self defense training: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1gt6Tc4yHnFBZod03S1BtXjzPmGHzTLYabhSa-nDfa4M/edit?usp=sharing

Excerpt:

"A change is required in self-defense philosophy that will overcome the shortcomings of the existing approaches to what I believe is one of the most defining moral disasters in our society. As an instructor of the martial arts and specifically self-defense for women, this is a topic of critical importance to the value of instruction. A woman learning to protect herself has a reasonable expectation that the instructed strategies will be current, relevant and effective. She has a reasonable expectation that the lessons will increase her level of safety and she certainly expects that the lessons will not decrease her level of safety. Yet strategies that are effective in stranger attacks are largely ineffectual and potentially counterproductive when the victim knows the assailant and even less effective against intimate partners. The dynamics of the situation change greatly when the victim may need not only protect herself, but also to protect other potential victims, such as children. It is not always a reasonable option to simply flee from an attack. While a curriculum based on attacks by an assailant unknown to the victim is obviously going to fail in that situation, I hope to be able to make the case that the current curriculum is also ineffectual against perpetrated by strangers".

TLR version:

Most self-defense training for women = #EpicFail

 

[Rukbat]

Most civilian self defense training = #EpicFail, from what I've seen. For women or for men. If's just that most men are more aggressive (but don't underestimate a woman defending her kids).

I've had very good military training (definitely not current techniques) - and at an arthritic 73, can probably still hold my own with someone currently trained - as long as there's mo possibility of a criminal charge.

Looking at it from the other side, my brother was a Tai Chi master for decades. (He's "retired" now.) He's taught many women, over the years, enough to be safe from almost anything. (As he says, if confronted with a firearm from 15 feet away, his "method of defense" is to throw his wallet at the robber. You can't fight a bullet.)

The "current curriculum" is only as good as the instructor. Many people open "self defense" schools without knowing what they're doing, and give their students a false sense of security. I think the problem is that the industry needs some self-policing. The people who know what they're doing should have a way of getting those who don't out of the "fleecing the customer" business.

 

[Aquila]

To be clear, the "current curriculum" that I'm arguing against is R.A.D. - a program taught on campuses across the country.