slipping the leash

Teaching self-defense means training behaviors good people have been trained to avoid. From the moment of your birth you have been trained to play nice.

"Don't bite your sister"
"Don't hit - use your words"
"Share your toys"
"Don't look at Tommy's math paper, do your own work"
"Go to school/work/etc."
"Be a good sport"

You all have these. If you parent, the ones you heard as a kid come out of your mouth and maybe you have created your own - interrupting shitty family traditions that just should not be passed along. I recognize this is an assumption and I'm pretty confident that if you are beating your kids or telling them they are stupid little shits, you are probably not reading this. Anyway, moving on.

People well socialized to standard western social constructs are shocked, angry, saddened and offended at the recent attack in Orlando, Florida. It's wrong. It's heinous even. The Threat completely slipped our leash. Our being key, he was doing what he thought was right....different socialization.

Take away the AR and it's capacity to take out dozens of people in one fell swoop* - his actions aren't a whole lot different than what we teach when we teach people to defend themselves. Teaching self-defense is teaching people to slip the leash.

In class last night we worked on defenses against getting stabbed. We trained getting away - disengaging as safely as the situation allows and that includes causing as much damage to the Threat as possible (and is necessary). MR is a 5'0 foot, 100 pound woman. Last night she was up against a 6'3 230 pound attacker, she's going to have play dirty. He can out reach her, out run her, out maneuver her just by his size. If she "assists" him in accidentally stabbing himself, her chances of getting away go up.

If the Target is about the same size, then "giving the knife back" is not self-defense - it's criminal. But for MR? It may be her best way out. I am asking her to slip the leash. Inviting her to get familiar with wounding another human being.  Like our friend with the AR down in Florida, I am asking her to practice behavior our culture punishes.

Violence is violence. It's a tool and we use it because it works. Need to hang a picture? Get a hammer. Need to disable someone? Get violent. Getting a grip on the Orlandos, the San Bernadinos, means getting over ourselves. Stop the Violence! Good luck with that.

Be horrified over Orlando. Be sad. Grieve or be angry. Stop being offended, save your outrage for something else. Instead of being offended - be curious. Curiosity opens up possibility. If you want to do something about terror attacks in your own backyard,  and you choose offended outrage as your response, get this: offense shuts off intelligence.  Stupid, outraged humans are chaotic tantrumming 3 year old's in a big body. If this is you, you are part of the problem, not the solution.

*the AR can't do that by itself, it needs a human.