WHAT ARE YOU REALLY UP AGAINST?

 By Phillip Starr

Although we, as martial arts practitioners, constantly train to be able to effectively defend ourselves, very few of us truly understand what we could very easily be up against when it comes to the paved jungles in which we live and strive to survive. We hear and talk about “the street fighter” without necessarily knowing much of anything about these creatures.

To begin with, these animals aren't stupid or clumsy. They're smart and very tough s.o.b.'s. Many of them have a smattering of martial arts skill, just enough to make them really dangerous. They HAVE to be tough to survive on the streets. They're not compliant, foolhardy, dimwitted wimps. Not at all. And should you ever be accosted by one, you'll only get one shot. And it had better count...it must cause some serious damage because if it just causes a bit of pain, it'll just make him real unhappy with you.

For a time many years ago, I worked inside the walls of a state penitentiary. If you really want to know what a true “badass” is, this is the place to look! I remember one inmate nicknamed “Shorty” (you can guess how large he was). He looked like a human Coke machine and it was all muscle...no fat at all. He lifted weights daily and had a hair-trigger temper. If a guy like this ever got hold of you, you'd be looking at a real serious problem! It scared ME (none of us carried any weapons at all...nothing), so I trained extra hard every day to sharpen my skills.

And there many others like Shorty...not as big, but very strong and tough. The idea of fighting just a single assailant on the street is an error (a very serious one), Lone wolves don't survive for long and most thugs travel in packs. So the idea of spending a lot of time thumping just one guy is a bad mistake...let alone taking him to the ground and wrestling around with him in the mud and the blood and the beer...and gravel, broken glass, and whatever else is on the ground. You can bet that his buddies are in the wings and watching. They'll happily step forward and quickly turn you into a very icky wet spot on the concrete while you're engaged in your makeshift wrestling bout.

And anyway, the odds of a street thug who accosts you being armed with something is pretty close to 100% nowadays. If your defensive tactics/techniques against weapons aren't up to snuff, you'll quickly become a statistic.

Don't take your ability to effectively defend yourself for granted. Train hard, get fit. The bad guys are.