Absolutely.



Thats not what I said. Besides which, no professional boxer was born with the natural resiliance to punishment, the biomechanics ingrained to punch with that power, nor the fitness to do it round after round. Plenty of men and women use training, familiarisation with the stresses and contact of fighting, to completely transform their reactions and instincts in a physical encounter.

My point was how when we believe we react accurately to the situation before us, we seldom do, as the whole situation can never be known, and what we do see, we do not see in a neutral light. That is the same for men, women, attackers and victims.

Again, i'm confused, this seems to speak to her argument, not yours. Seems like you are agreeing that we are limited in our perspective by who we are and forced to act on that, like it or not.



So the solution is for women to become boxers? Seriously, if the answer were as easy as "just become a great fighter, male or female"..we wouldn't be sitting here having this conversation. Sure, training can do alot to broaden how you will react. In the context of the conversation, i'm not sure how meaningful that is..she was asking about "normal people" (I think)..not professional combat athletes.

Again, i'm not how any of this points towards this being a gender neutral issue, it seems to point to the opposite.

Again, THIS. IS. NOT. WHAT. I. SAID. OR. MEANT.

For clarity:

The original argument is that women and men have fundamentaly different reasons for, and thought processes during intervention. That males think more about the domination of the transgressor than the safety of the victim, and that women are less likely to let ego influence how they approach the intervention.
Nove then expounded on that by suggesting that the presumed more cautious approach to intervention by a female (and in her personal experience), is not due to not wishing to be more aggressive, but due to lacking the confidence in their tools for escalating to a potentialy physical confrontation.

My position is simply that men who intervene inherently feel the EXACT SAME fear, doubt in their abilities, and reticence to put themselves in danger. That, by virtue simply of being a man, we are not inured to terror, pain, or a sense of helplessness in circumstances that could turn violent. We also, have no better idea of how to fight in our 'instincts', and require just as much training in the physical and psychological stresses of fighting to become effective at it.



Gross oversimplification of my point, but lets run with it. 2 different women walking home seperately in different towns on a given friday night.

Woman A is completely untrained in any form of fighting whatsoever.

Woman B takes Muay Thai classes 2 times a week, including sparring sessions.

Both women are attacked by a sexual predator, who accosts them, grabs them and gropes them, with a goal of penetrating them with his digit/s.

Of the above 2 women, which is more likely to fight off and discourage their assailant into fleeing in failure?




And my point here would be that professional combat athletes are 'normal people'. They would not be fearless in the event of attack (sexual or otherwise). They have the same hardwired physiological responses to danger, they feel pain, and they can, by defintion be 'beaten' or bested. They bleed, fart, pick their noses, laugh at dirty jokes, and if they see a crazy guy threaten a woman on a street corner, would have the same inherent FEAR of the uncontrolled and unknown. Its how they may be able to channel and deal with that emotional cocktail that differs, and seperates them from the untrained. And that is a learned skillset, available to both sexes.



I hope that this post makes things clearer for you.

Goodness,

Cord your story is moving. The fact that you have been big and srong and able most your life and faced a time of weakness and were able to rethink where your strength actually came from, I suspect, is rare. To understand that your perceptions and judgement and non-physical confrontation ability were as, if not more, powerful than your body or training in physical fighting and then to decide to continue in your line of work with this new understanding, is commendable. One could even say heroic, if one were a novelist and given to heroic journey sorts of language. But let's just keep it all real and let me say that, I think, your reassessment of your strenghts probably serves those you safeguard better than you could have before you'd suffered and lost and reasessed.

I wonder if the heart of the disagreement here is more about where folks are focusing. You speak of the sameness of a fear reaction in men and women in an intervention; you speak of the same ability to be hurt. Yes, agreed. Men and women probably equally experience fear and open themselves to pain and possible death, even, when they intervene.

I think, perhaps, I failed to adequately explain myself, and once again I failed in writing even my personal confrontation scenes. (Let alone my fictional ones. So this is good for me.) I have not once felt FEAR when I initially reacted to some situation. The FEAR has always come after I've stuck myself in the way and had that oh-sh1t moment. Perhaps I have bad genes or something went off in my upbringing, but whatever cocktail of areneline and whatever else, for me, has, thus far, left the thinking side of my brain coming to while running across a parking lot or a beach or a neighbor's yard. My FEAR instincts make me attack; whatever is still capable in my brain, then, tries to figure out what to do with the headlong rush.

I don't mean to be this way. I'm quite a fearful person -- when I have time to think. I SCUBA dive all over the lakes in our area, but when I had the opportunity to dive in Hawaii last year, I chickened out because I'm [censored]-my-bikini afraid of sharks. When I backcountry camp in bear country, I have to have four loaded BIG GUNS ready at each side of the tent because you never know which side the griz will attack from. I'm a fraidy-cat. When I have time to think -- and think poorly. When I don't have time to think, I don't, and I just get myself in pickles.

It seems to me that you are more focused on initial response. You seem to think this is a trained reaction. While I'm sure that one can train oneself to some degree, I also think that some of this is simply in the genes -- or hormonal response. So one person experiences a dump of adreneline as a freeze; another as a flee; another as an attack. I was intending to write that, for me, I'm pretty sure that I've just got bad genes. The sort that propel me forward when I've got an adreneline dump. But, now, my husband is here with me and I've read him this section of the thread, and he said, "No, wait. Think about it. Perhaps there is more of a nuture compenent to your reactions." He reminded me that I grew up commercial fishing in dangerous Alaskan waters, where one minute I was retching off the side and the next minute, in full raingear, I had to jump off the heaving bow with a line onto a heaving dock and loop a cleat in 20knot winds and eight-foot seas. I said, "Well, that wasn't about overcoming fear -- or barfing -- that was just about getting done what had to be done." He said, "Exactly." He has now inumerated numerous other incidences involving bears and guns and collaspsing old mines and shifting shipwrecks, and PMS (I don't count that), that are part of my upbringing. "See," he said, "you were probably just raised wrong."

Anyway, I've told him it was HIM that was raised wrong and he's insisted it was me, and we're two bottles of wine in and still not sure how to get to the crux of the disagreement.

But, after he smacked me around -- in an entirely verbal sense, which he can't go three round with me -- he said that you were telling a tale of how you changed up what you put your trust in, based on your physical limitations. I said, "Like most women would from the get-go, no torn ligaments necessary?

Yes, but it is not learned identically by any two people, much less learned, utilized, viewed the same by different sexes, walks of life, dispositions, experiences what have you.

There are plenty of people with really good, valid, hard training who have had it fail miserably in real life. There are also plenty of completely untrained, "weak" people who end up successfully fending off attackers twice their size.

This really seems like reductionist argument to me, there is so much going with reaction to violence that has nothing to do with martial arts training. 99.9% of martial arts training out there seems to totally ignore all that stuff anyway, and treats it as if it exists in parallel universe to the real world.

If training is unable to address these kinds of questions, then I would argue it is not anywhere the kind of safety net you seem to think it is with your example of the untrained vs. trained women, or more appropriately, I would say there is a mental piece there that might have little to do with the martial arts training itself. If every time I walk into the dojo as "Dojo Zach", and over time I start to think that Dojo Zach will be who I am when someone is really trying to hurt me, I am setting myself up for disaster, the element of who I actually am in the real world is inseparable from how I will fight, and that goes alot deeper than just the stuff i've trained in.

So without going off on any more of a tangent, I have to say i'm still pretty unconvinced by the argument that this stuff is the same for both sexes. It certainly isn't about women being somehow "weaker" though. Violence is a big "if" question, preparation to it, reaction to it isn't something that can be as simple "well just train and you'll be fine, it's the same for everyone".

IMO big part of training with regard to hopefully gaining some skills applicable in the real world is coming to an understanding of who you are, what you are and are not willing to do, what you think you are and are not capable of. I assume that someone's sex HAS to play a big role in that.

Sorry if i'm moving to far away from the subject Novelgirl, I'm just finding the conversation interesting, and I figured that even if i'm veering off course a bit it would be worth putting it out there.

Yes it is. The human species has a universal ability to adapt to environment. Its why there are 6 billion of us spread across every extreme of climate and terrain on earth.



You have answered your own argument for me there. Lets extrapolate from your above statement: Many who take martial arts training for many years, find they lack the tools to defend themselves in a real incident, but you also observe that the vast majority of martial arts training available does not provide the tools and skills to deal with violence.

I couldnt agree more. Novegirl herself has made comments about 'learning moves' or 'techniques' in the past, but not how to apply them in an uncontrolled environment of aggression. That means she hasnt learnt them. Not really.

There is a reason in my example, (a real one by the way, based on the current serial sex attacker active in Cambridge UK - 8 attacks across the city, one woman fought him off, and she had low level competetive fight experience), cited Muay Thai as the skillset, and why I stipulated she sparred regularly.

The big differences between a fighting gym and a martial arts club/class, are the atmosphere and the intensity. Time and again, you will hear criticisms about 'arrogant' or 'intimidating' environment in a gym that produces competetive, full contact fighters. Muay Thai, q-bury rules boxing, MMA, all such places feel scary to a newcomer. There are old blood stains on the flooring, and the sound of hard striking all around. Its not the 'womens self defence day course' that runs in the church hall, nor is it 'Black Lotus academy of Martial arts- lose weight, gain confidence, learn to defend yourself' . Its a place where people learn to inflict, and absorb violence. To have someone stood in front of you that wishes to dominate you, and you have to negate that threat and impose yourself upon them.

Of course it feels intimidating to many people- it should. But those who feel most uncomfortable in that environment, are those that need it most. But they will go to the nice, relaxed, welcoming class twice a week, where they run through endless technique drills, get belts for hard work, and may spar, but never too hard.

They have built a false self confidence, and they have learned NOTHING applicable to deal with the intensity and ferocity of a real attack.

So its not that training is unable to address these kinds of questions, its that most training out there gives the wrong answers.



We have a uniform physiological response to danger. That is nature. How we deal with it, and channel it is nurture, but it is NOT gender based. Novegirl has already clearly stated that her instinct is to meet agression with agression. That could be seen as a male stereotype reaction to violence. Many men will not hit back, will not speak up/intervene in a situation, hamstrung by a feeling of helplessness - this fullfills a negative female stereotype. So if both sexes have the ability of fight AND flight, then how can gender be the deciding factor over experience? and if experience includes familiarity with dealing with violence, how can that not help you when under attack?

I pretty much entirely agree with Cord - the sexes on stereotype are different physically and mentally but the physiological response to danger is the same in both sexes.

As I also consider physical confrontation to be the same for both sexes - saying that women on average are weaker is a strawman some men are weaker than other men or even women by physical strength and ability.

In self defense the mentality is the most important part. Most people regardless of gender are rightly terrified of violence INCLUDING men.

And most people have 0 physical talent for fighting, not to mention the mentality.

The mentality to be a predator and defend yourself is actually the same an attacker also feels fear which is part the reason of why he picks out targets that seem weaker than he is.

Self defense is a lot of things the preventive measures are awareness and avoidance but once the self defense becomes physical it all relies on turning fear into a weapon - as my Sensei once said it isn't about technique it's about the willpower/spirit to drive your attack through like a wild beast.

That's a sort of simplification but I agree with it based on my own experiences that have been very real and threatening..

Much of the reason we humans have been able to adapt to even extreme environments is because we have done so as cultures that are very reliant on division of labor. The folks who are good at building shelters, build a lot of shelters and get even better at building shelters. Same with hunting or farming or taming falcons. We divide up the work based on ability. Age then sex are the two most universal and first divisions.

These divisions of labor occur all the time in regular life. Last Father's Day my husband wanted my son and I to go river kayaking. We had an accident. I was in the lead when I swept around a corner and saw a mess of deadwood. I yelled back to my son and husband, who were able to get to shore. But it was too late for me. I went over, ended up losing my kayak, stranded on the opposide side of the river and all scraped and freezing. My husband divided the labor. He sat the boy down on the bank around the bend, an age division, at 11, he decided the boy would be the most help by staying put. He went after my kayak, dumped his own, came back to tell me that the very expensive paddle I'd borrowed from a friend was stuck in a sweeper downriver. He'd tried to get it, but the sweeper wasn't holding his weight. It held mine and I got the paddle. He handled getting my kayak, which was waterfilled and wedged under a log, and his kayak, which had shot up into a tree, free. I couldn't have got those kayaks loose. All I had to do then was get back across the river. I found a downed spruce that stretched two-thirds of the way across, crawled out as far as I could, jumped, and swam as hard as I could. He went downriver to catch me if I couldn't make it. I did. He had bruises all over; I had scratches all over; the boy was scared but fine. We divided the labor according to our strengths, which here were very much about age and sex.


It just seems ludicrous to maintain that training is learned identically by any two people. I'm pretty sure that you aren't really saying this and that I'm misunderstanding you. To take it outside the male/female realm, we had a young man at our dojo who had frequent stupor seizures -- sometimes several during a class. Of course he trained differently.

It also seems that, when it comes to fighting, the tool you have is your body and all bodies are not equal. My husband is tall and his reach is longer than mine. I have to get closer to him to hit him. This is just biomechanics. I can't train a longer arm. The kid with seizures can't train himself out of them, although he did get on the right mix of medications and doesn't have them so frequently.

I'm not sure I agree with your postulate that a woman who has done MA training is necessarily going to fight back more readily during a sexaul attack than a woman who hasn't. I would assume that the woman who had training may fight more effectively. This is just based on antecotal evidence, but I've seen folks who just freeze up in hairy situations and folks who don't. Much of these responses seem more hardwired than conditioned. I do think a person can do the sort of training that tries to mimic stress, fear, exhaution responses, but that's a whole level that most folks don't either need or want to tackle.

I even think that some training can result in a woman (or anyone, I suppose) being less likely to fight. This example only goes so far because it's not about an attack, but perhaps it makes part of the point.

When I was 20, I was working as a cocktail waitress at very rough bar in a commercial fishing town in Alaska. At the end of the night, one of my tasks was to stand by the door and make sure no one left with bar glasses. One guy refused to give me his glass and he was kind of out in the parking lot, taunting me about it. Of course, I took out after him. I chased him. It wasn't until we were way down the beach that I even realized he was playing with me, staying just ahead of me. I probably chased him a quarter mile away from town before it hit me that this was probably stupid for a bar glass. I ran back. Today, I would have stopped chasing him at the end of the parking lot, because I have better judgement, partly from running through scenerios in MA classes, especially those women's self-defense classes. They love to run you through scenerios in those classes. So I think that sometimes training can mean that you fight less because you judge better. If that makes sense.

I have heard from a source I trust that it is how a person carries him or herself that can be most important in an encounter. Walk like a victim, you are perceived as a victim. Walk with relaxed confidence, encounters tend not to happen.

Just want to comment on part of the discussion that occured while I was gone. This stuff about domestic violence and male/female violence stats.

I did a series of newspaper articles years ago on violence against the disabled and so spent some time with U.S. FBI crime stats. Overwhelmingly, most violent acts are perpetrated by men AGAINST men. I can't remember the rates and this was years ago and for the U.S. But I bet the stats remain pretty much the same. Men are victims of violence FAR more than women. When you start breaking down the numbers by the catagory of crime, I'm sure rape is one of the catagories that goes the other way. I think Cord is right, though, that male rape is even less reported than the notorious under-reporting of rape in general. (I did a bunch of research on prison rape in the U.S. for a book and was shocked by its prevalence and how little anyone is doing about it. Then if you've been keeping up on the torture tecniques used in places like Egypt and Syria -- my gosh -- it's just appauling how prevalent male-male sodomy stuff is used.

All that to say that I agree that men are more in danger of physical violence than women as a general rule. (Another aside, I studied some archeology and anthropology for a book and interviewed an archologist who wrote a book that theorized that through most of human pre-history, an average of 1/3 of males died in violent clashes -- war, skirmishes. About the same number of women died in childbirth. Perhaps neither here nor there other than evidence that men have always been more at risk for violent confrontation.)

All that said, I make a thick, dark line between emotional and pysical domestic abuse. In intimate relationships, whether between husband and wife, sisters, friends, we are always more able to hurt each other emotionally. And we do. But the victim is free to leave. In the midst of a physcial attack, the attacked person is not free to leave...well, I guess I should say that the weaker attacked person is not free to leave. Most often in male/female relationships, this is the woman. Sure, we could say that the next day, when he's gone off to work or to the bar, the woman is as free to leave as the victim of emotional abuse is. But in the moment of physical abuse, the victim is NOT free to make choices. And the ultimate threat in these situations is that the abuser could kill the victim. This is just not the same level of threat as emotional abuse, where the threat is the attacker will make you feel even worse about yourself. Right?

Anyway, all my cents on the subject.