26 posts / 0 new
Last post
Mulberry4000
Mulberry4000's picture
BJJ attacker how would one defend

As  you know we get thugs in all walks of life and how would a person who knows karate deal with such an attacker trained in the above art

best wishes

Darren

Les Bubka
Les Bubka's picture

Hi Darren

Distance and punching, from experiance (sparring only) guys who do just brasilian get bit confused when you add punches to the game.

You have a chance to create space and get up and run, I don't think that someone who is proficient in any martial art would walk around and attack people. Most likly someone who have been few times at the club and thinks he knows bjj, then you have much more chances to get out.

Kind regards

Les

deltabluesman
deltabluesman's picture

I'm on the same page as Les.  I'd say it's very unlikely that you'd be attacked specifically with BJJ techniques in a self-protection scenario.  BJJ is not a great way for a criminal to get what he wants.  The criminal would have to tie up with you, take you down, get a dominant position, and choke you out.  That's a lot of work and there's a lot of risk involved.  Much easier just to grab a kitchen knife (or club or gun or whatever) and demand your money/kill you/kidnap you/whatever.

I’d recommend that pragmatic karateka stick with a basic formula (for general use against any kind of enemy):

routinely train to defend against takedowns (preferably against opponents who are decent at takedowns),

learn to sprawl against an opponent's shot, then leap right back up to your feet and start striking (mobility permitting)

train basic mount and side control escapes until they are instinctual

learn two reliable sweeps from guard, and

practice upkicks from time to time (mobility permitting / example:  https://youtu.be/B8HUjlRV_zA?t=3457 / or here:  https://youtu.be/5CwtihcG3r0)

(more could be said, but I'll cut it off here)

There's also the separate topic of how a karateka would spar against a BJJ guy (assuming MMA rules or something similar).  Beginner BJJ guys tend to suck at takedowns (just the honest truth these days).  So the karateka can probably win the fight by controlling the distance, working angles, and emphasizing that quick in-and-out footwork that karate guys tend to be so good at.  Keep kicks to a minimum.  Keep your jab in the opponent's face any time he tries to get close to you.  (Never get comfortable.  Good grapplers are kind of like rearview mirrors:  the takedown may be closer than it appears.)  In my experience, most advanced BJJ guys (purple belt and up) tend to have a pretty well-rounded skill set.  So of course, once you're dealing with a higher belt level, you're dealing with a much more dangerous fighter, and all bets are off.

Just my initial thoughts on the subject.

Heath White
Heath White's picture

BJJ guys do not fight standing up.  They essentially abandoned all the judo throwing techniques in favor of shooting in, wrestling style.  The defense against that is very basic: the sprawl.  Learn to sprawl, push his head down and away (maybe crossface), add a few strikes to the (back of the) head for good measure, and get up. 

PASmith
PASmith's picture

Carlson Gracie Snr is attributed to have said “Punch a black belt in the face, he becomes a brown belt. Punch him again, purple, etc etc…”. It's a take on Mike Tyson's "Everyone has a plan 'till they get punched in the mouth.". Which in turn is a variation on "no plan survives contact with the enemy".

In other words you have to impact with venom and keep hitting until you've prevailed. Which obviously is easier said than done!

Someone that provided a blue-print for beating grapplers is Mirko "cro-cop". In order to stay standing and employ his favoured strikes he developed...

good lateral footwork to avoid being trapped into a corner and to maintain space

A good sprawl to stuff double leg shot attempts

A defensive guard that stifles ground offense and focused on returning to his feet

A double pronged striking attack. A left high kick and a left straight punch. He'd use them both to create anxiety in the opponent to keep them at bay and worried about closing in.

Maintain good defensive posture on the ground (head and spine straight, arms in (t-rex arms), etc.

IMHO BJJ offers one of the best approaches to a 1 on 1 fight with a single opponent with no weapons or time limits. Crash into a clinch to limit striking on the feet (where even untrained people can hit hard enough to KO or stun), take the fight to the ground (where most people have no clue how to move effectively), obtain a dominant position ( to control and strike) and then "cook" the opponent until they make a mistake and you can submit or strike to a finish, subdue or regain your feet and escape. That is an approach to a fight that has been shown to be effective time and time again in the early UFC's.

However..as the clued up SD people here will realise a 1 on 1 fight with a single opponent with no weapons or time limits is NOT what you should be training for if your focus is self defence, where multiple opponents, weapons and the need to get the job done ASAP are prime concerns that inform everything. BJJ training is absolutely a brilliant "safety net" for when the fight hits the floor, and BJJ people with a fair bit of training (like most grapplers) are usually tough as old boots. Where I have a problem is when BJJ is sold as the prime answer for self defence rather than this support system "safety net" approach.

Leigh Simms
Leigh Simms's picture

I think we are making a false assumption here that an attacker who knows BJJ will use BJJ techniques to attack us.

Also to what gain would the attack be before? The motives of the attacker would be strange if their goal was to use BJJ to achieve their outcome. If they wanted to mug you? Why use BJJ? Surely distraction and deception techniques will prevail? If they wanted to physically harm you, then by the time the psychological and physiological effects are occurring; the BJJ style fighting will likely go out of the window. Also, unless the attacker was well known, how would you know if they were skilled in BJJ in order to know how to defend against it?

Surely by the time they’ve pulled guard and locked you in a triangle it’s likely to late to be thinking “oh damn, I should have used the DefensesAgainstTheBJJAtacker I was taught last Sunday.

PASmith
PASmith's picture

Also, unless the attacker was well known, how would you know if they were skilled in BJJ in order to know how to defend against it?

They smell of Acai and butt scoot towards you? :)

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Leigh Simms wrote:
I think we are making a false assumption here that an attacker who knows BJJ will use BJJ techniques to attack us.

That’s exactly it for me. The huge danger in the question originally posed is falling into the trap of reinventing criminal violence into something more understandable / palatable for martial artists. They don’t appreciate or understand the dynamics of criminal violence so, instead of doing their due diligence, they reinvent violence in their own image i.e. two martial artists duelling.

In my view the question is a flawed question:

Mulberry4000 wrote:
As you know we get thugs in all walks of life and how would a person who knows karate deal with such an attacker trained in the above art

As Leigh as indicated, it would make no sense for a criminal to use duelling methods to achieve their aims. Criminals are best served using surprise, deception, explosive violence, numbers, weapons, etc. It would be hyper dumb of them to try to take you down and seek a submission. Criminals don’t act that way; martial artists do. As Sun Tsu advised, we need to know our enemy. It would make even less sense for a person “attacked” that way to try to negate such an “attack” with their own set of duelling skills. Avoidance, pre-emption, escape skills, etc are the way to go.

The easy way to avoid defeat by a BJJ practitioners is choosing not to spar with them. Don’t go to BJJ gyms. The idea that they are going to seek you out in the real world to force you to fight against your will is not one we need to take seriously. There is not a huge number of BJJ criminals out there whose sole aim is to force you to roll with them!

The bottom line is that BJJ has proven itself to be extremely effective in consensual one-on-one fights. The result is that it has become something of a “boogie man” for practitioners of other arts. I think it would be fair to say that, if we assume comparable skill levels, BJJ folk will normally be able to defeat practitioners of other systems in consensual duels. That is generally why questions like this get asked. However, they are not valid questions in my view. Consensual violence and non-consensual violence are radically different things. We need to be very careful not to blur them together because it is potentially very dangerous.  

This article covers this in more depth: https://iainabernethy.co.uk/article/problems-street-fighting

This podcast also takes about the reinventing violence side of things: https://www.iainabernethy.co.uk/content/reinventing-violence-podcast

All the best,

Iain

PASmith
PASmith's picture

Would a more useful way of looking at this be "How would you defend yourself against someone that is seeking to attack you in a BJJ style?". Someone seeking to close the distance for grappling and control?

For example in the UK that would/could cover a drunk weekend Rugby player that reverts to a tackle and bundling you to the deck as his method of choice? It would also maybe cover a sexual assault situation perhaps?

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

PASmith wrote:
Would a more useful way of looking at this be "How would you defend yourself against someone that is seeking to attack you in a BJJ style?". Someone seeking to close the distance for grappling and control?

I think asking about ways to deal with tackles, various grips, being pinned to the floor is totally valid providing we keep the self-defence context i.e. criminal seeking criminal objectives; not highly skilled grapplers seeking submissions or pins for the win. The adding in of “BJJ” still blends the consensual with the non-consensual and I’m keen to keep a very stark differential there. When we fail to do that – which is extremely common – it leads to both ineffective self-protection training and a devaluing of highly effective consensual fighting skills. When we keep the differential clean, we have the “first aid” of self-defence covered most efficiently, and the “brain surgery” of construal fighting receiving the respect if deserves.

All the best,

Iain

MattG
MattG's picture

My first instinct is to say that this topic probably does not belong in the self defence board. It seems more relevant to consensual violence. But I have heard it argued that enaging in consensual "street" fights could be considered a form of self defence because of the psychological damage one can face from backing down from these challenges (feelings of worthlessness, cowardlyness, etc), or as an attempt to put an end to prolonged bullying. Not the best strategy to address these problemes in my opinion, really they are symptoms of broader cultural problems to do with masculinity.

But that's the only situation I can see this being applied--bjj guy and his idiot friends bullying another kid at school who for whatever reason decides that it is a good decision to actually show up when told "meet me behind the gym after school if ya not chicken." Showing up to fight is pretty stupid. You should be talking to the authorities. But maybe if the authorities aren't helping and you and your friends are being tormented and assaulted repeatedly, I guess I can see why someone would do it. But anyway since the question was asked and I need something to help me procrastinate doing my uni work, here goes:

I've had some training in a few striking styles and bjj, and when I spar with bjj guys with strikes allowed I personally find that trying to fight at a distance is very difficult because when you are moving backwards it pulls the power out of your strikes, and its usually fairly easy for someone who wants to close the distance to do so, especially if they're prepared to eat a punch. Personally, I think your best bet is to fight from the clinch.

Your karate training should have provided you with good limb control/grip fighting skills and hard strikes from close range and the clinch. Bjj guys can have good grip fighting skills too but they have a hard time blending that with strikes or dealing with strikes from the clinch if the striker stays balanced. Honestly, bjj guys are pretty crap at throwing from a judo style clinch because the rules encourage a low, crouching stance. But you'll notice that people in mma dont fight like that because if they did they would make their head vulnerable to strikes. So, if the Bjj guy stays upright in a judo style stance then as long as you can stay balanced and shut down foot sweeps you should be able to hit him harder and more often than he can hit you. If he crouches forward like a wrestler and exposes his head you should control it and create an angle to shut down his shots and open him up to your strikes.

Don't give him space, you need to have some kind of control of him at all times or he will shoot in. Be prepared for rapid attempts to off balance you and explosive takedown attempts. You have to push and pull to disrupt the opponent, and he will be doing the same to you. I realise that this is going against the grain here and this probably works for me because of my body type and training background (muay thai, wing chun, judo/jap jujitsu style throws, very square stance with forward energy, below average height, below average reach).

No matter what you do, you're probably still going to lose. As Iain said, "BJJ has proven itself to be extremely effective in consensual one-on-one fights." Just talk to the cops and get a restraining order. Better than broken bones and/or jail time.

PASmith
PASmith's picture

The (fairly flippant) answer I've started to use to cover these "what if?" questions (and it paraphrases something Iain said at a recent seminar about a iai-jutsu master) is "smash you in the head and neck until you are unconscious on the floor". :)

What about a wrist grab? Smash you in the head and neck until you are unconscious on the floor.

Bear hug? Smash you in the head and neck until you are unconscious on the floor.

There are obviously details and nuance to it but that answer does get to the heart of the matter!

Jr cook
Jr cook's picture

Step 1: Tap out

Step 2: Leave

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

MattG wrote:
But I have heard it argued that engaging in consensual "street" fights could be considered a form of self-defence because of the psychological damage one can face from backing down from these challenges (feelings of worthlessness, cowardliness, etc

“Self-Defence” is, first and foremost, a legal term. It therefore has strict definitions. Consenting to “street fights” to “protect” one’s ego is most definitely NOT self-defence. People can try to argue otherwise, but they will get exactly nowhere if they try to argue that way in court.

Not consenting to something dangerous, illegal and with no upside is smart. No one should feel unmanly, worthless, or cowardly for doing the grown-up and intelligent thing. Unfortunately, some aspects of martial arts culture (and culture at large) can encourage such stupidity. The real world is not the soap opera of pre-match hype and press conference shenanigans. Behave like that in the real world and prison time awaits. We need to guard against having an ego so fragile and easily manipulated that it can see us harm others, get harmed, and be on the wrong side of the law. Self-defence begins with defence against the self. Don’t let your ego encourage you do something you will forever regret.

MattG wrote:
Just talk to the cops and get a restraining order. Better than broken bones and/or jail time.

Exactly. Consenting to a dojo / gym spar can be fun and it is legal. However, anyone who tries to get you to fight against your will is on the wrong side of the law. Don’t join them there by consenting to a “street fight”. If you do then, “win” or “lose”, you will have very serious problems.

All the best,

Iain

Mulberry4000
Mulberry4000's picture

i have seen  a few videos on u tube where some one who knew bjj has taken people down in resturants and on the street etc. So like in karate clubs or elsewhere there are people who have got these skills who will use them on others. I went to a seminar and  the guy who was giving it wanted to fight people who  said they did this style or that in his shop,m - i thought it was a bit daft but  who knows.  So a thug or a criminal is a person who decides to step out side the law and use what he has got, some may use a knife, others may use their skills, just like in karate kid, the bullies were karate people. Its the same in the new series, my post is missing in the general forum for some reason. Any way, people who will use bjj on the streets as thugs can exist, instead of going to the ground of course they can use standing chokes and even though they do not train in standing often they do  do  it. I have seen karate bullies, aikido bullies, judo bullies and some bjj bullies they are all exist in ego and shame themeselves but if they want to do that  in one setting then they can do it another etc.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Mulberry4000 wrote:
people who will use bjj on the streets as thugs can exist

They can exist, but I am yet to see any meaningful evidence that they do. The crime statistics do not show a huge spike in triangle chokes and knee bars since BJJ has risen in popularity.

They key point that’s always in danger of being missed is that fighting skills (consensual violence) only come into play when both people consent. If you don’t agree to fight, then it is non-consensual violence (i.e. a crime) and the best way to deal with it is using the skills and tactics associated with non-consensual violence i.e. de-escalation, pre-emption, escape skills, etc. The person who sought to force their violence onto others will also have legal consequences for their actions.

I see zero evidence of huge numbers of BJJ practitioners who are willing to face jailtime through seeking to impose non-consensual rolls on people! It’s a non-issue.

If we want to improve our consensual grappling skills, then BJJ is arguably the best option out there. However, criminal violence is radically different to a BJJ roll (or any other form of consensual violence) and hence there is no need to get hung up on it when it comes to self-protection.  In doing so, it shows just how wide of the mark we are in understanding the problem we are seeking to address!

BJJ has proven itself to be a highly effective system for one-on-one consensual fights, but practitioners of other arts need to take a deep breath and realise that the “BJJ boogieman” is not hiding in alleyways, under the bed, etc ready to pounce.

When it comes to self-protection, we need to be training for what happens in the vast majority of situations (not wasting trainign time on the theoretical exceptions): we will then be able to deal with what happens the vast majority of the time!

If we get hug up on a non-issue because of a misplaced inadequacy complex, then we end up focusing on a scenario that only really exists in the minds of confused martial artists. This makes us way less effective in self-protection because we anticipated and trained for entirely the wrong thing.

There are way more TKD practitioners than BJJ practitioners, so it’s really those tornado kicks we should be worrying about for self-defence! There must be some TKD people who are criminals right? And what about the huge rise in practitioners of Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA)?! There’s bound to be some criminals who train in HEMA too right? I mean what would you do if one of them came at you with their Ringen methods? Do you know what to do if one of them pulled a broadsword on you in a dark alley? I can’t believe there’s not been discussions around this! It could happen! (End of sarcasm).

The reason we don’t have discussions around the topics in the above paragraph, but we do have them about BJJ, is because BJJ has the “boogieman factor” and other arts don’t. It’s all equally non-sensical though.

For those people who can’t sleep at night due to fear of a BJJ guy tapping them out against their will, the most effective solution is touching base with reality. Criminal violence is criminal violence (very different to all forms of consensual violence). If we want to be able to address that, then train for it as it really is.

All the best,

Iain

PASmith
PASmith's picture

There are way more TKD practitioners than BJJ practitioners, so it’s really those tornado kicks we should be worrying about for self-defence! There must be some TKD people who are criminals right? And what about the huge rise in practitioners of Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA)?! There’s bound to be some criminals who train in HEMA too right? I mean what would you do if one of them came at you with their Ringen methods? Do you know what to do if one of them pulled a broadsword on you in a dark alley? I can’t believe there’s not been discussions around this! It could happen! (End of sarcasm).

The only caveat I'd put on that is that BJJ (ish) techniques and approach (the basic fundamental stuff not the "reverse de la riva flying spider armbar") do represent some of the things that can occur in real violence more closely than tornado kicks and broadsword attacks. Someone is very unlikely to tornado kick you in a real situation. But as I mentioned above someone could quite concievably try to bundle you to the floor, grab your legs in a rudimentary double leg, sit on your chest in mount, etc. Without any BJJ training at all.

So while I agree BJJ is the "boogie man" on the block one reason for that is that it represents a side of fighting/self defence that things like karate and TKD have failed to deal with or account for.

One thing I think BJJ guys like the Gracies understand is how fights often go (not perhaps how we'd like them to go but how they often play out). Wild swinging, grabbing, clinching, falling over, rolling around, one person in a better position than another, etc. Where I think they go wrong (because they are promoting a grappling system rather than a striking one) is they fail to address pre-emption and impact in order to stop that sort of "likely" process from playing out.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

PASmith wrote:
The only caveat I'd put on that is that BJJ (ish) techniques and approach (the basic fundamental stuff not the "reverse de la riva flying spider armbar") do represent some of the things that can occur in real violence more closely than tornado kicks and broadsword attacks.

Primal grappling within a non-consensual context is not “BJJ” though. We could say that someone repeatedly trying to soccer kick your head in is “basic and fundamental TKD kicking”, but we don’t. We could also say that someone trying to repeatedly stab you is “basic and fundamental HEMA dagger work”, but we don’t do that either. It’s criminal violence. We should call it criminal violence.

PASmith wrote:
Someone is very unlikely to tornado kick you in a real situation. But as I mentioned above someone could quite concievably try to bundle you to the floor, grab your legs in a rudimentary double leg, sit on your chest in mount, etc. Without any BJJ training at all.

If the person doing that has no BJJ training, and they are using their violence for criminal objectives, then it is clearly criminal violence. I’m not sure why anyone would label it as “BJJ” or make any connection. It causes problems. It propagates the already highly damaging failure of martial artists to discriminate between duelling each other (consensual violence) and criminal violence (non-consensual violence).

PASmith wrote:
One thing I think BJJ guys like the Gracies understand is how fights often go (not perhaps how we'd like them to go but how they often play out). Wild swinging, grabbing, clinching, falling over, rolling around, one person in a better position than another, etc.

While that’s true, there is also the promotion of the ground being desirable in some cases; as opposed to worst case scenario. There is also the seeking of a win on the floor instead of seeking to get back up ASAP. The risk from third parties being ignored or explained away with faulty logic (as I discuss in this video: https://youtu.be/apahr0ujVJU). This is because they are failing to differentiate between duelling (consensual violence) and criminal violence (non- consensual violence). Most martial artist do this and it’s a HUGE problem.

PASmith wrote:
Where I think they go wrong (because they are promoting a grappling system rather than a striking one) is they fail to address pre-emption and impact in order to stop that sort of "likely" process from playing out.

My own view is that we should look at the realities of criminal violence and devise our self-defence solution from there. If we did this, then all styles would have a common approach to self-protection. The problem, and the problem alone, should shape the solution. The “style” of the practitioner should have nothing to do with it.

There is much unity in approach between those with first-hand experience of criminal violence. It’s really only martial artists who argue about it because they are prone to reinvent criminal violence in the most convenient image for their existing system. That is why there is so much arguing on the issue in martial circles i.e. “my style provides a better solution to my fantasies about crime than yours does; because you fantasise about it differently”.

It would be wonderful if martial artists could be objective on this point and practise a common self-protection solution that actually does what it is supposed to. We can then move on to practise the other areas of the martial arts we personally find valuable without this confusion i.e. all the various forms of consensual fighting, health, fun, fitness, the joy of learning a skill, etc. There’s no need to tie everything back to self-defence. Indeed, trying to do so is both harmful to our self-defence training and it devalues all other aspects.  

This is one of these things that really riles me. If I were to sell a product that promised to keep people safe, but I’d never investigated the problem sufficiently, then I would be criminally negligible if that product failed and people got harmed. If I made a smoke detector without ever seeking to understand the real nature of fire and smoke, and then someone died as a result, I would be facing prosecution. However, martial artists get away with reinventing criminal violence in the most connivant way possible for their existing skill set. It’s immoral and dangerous. It’s all so avoidable too. Just start with understanding the problem of criminal violence and seek to address it as it really is.

All the best,

Iain

Mulberry4000
Mulberry4000's picture

i think statsitcs is a misnomer here as, thugs who want to hurt people do it any where they can. Geoffery Thompson said today's attacker ambushes people. What does he mean by this, well "whats the time mate" etc is one example, another is hiding behind a organistion, this means in work, or in various public venues, it can happen in a club type format, and people turn a blind eye to it. Do the majority of people who do bjj, or any other martial art want to attack/hurt people,  no is the answer.

So here people have thought oh he must have something against bjj guys,  no its was just an example nothing more or less. What i am saying  is if a person who learned the art becomes massively over confident, abuses people, these people do exist in their own context. Here there is an intersting debate on the where MAs are cults and the subject of thugs come up in the BJJ world. https://www.quora.com/Is-Brazilian-jiu-jitsu-cult-likehttps://www.mma-core.com/videos/BJJ_Expert_Literally_Annihilates_Street_Thug_On_The_Subway/10125083. Here is another video, the guy is  idiot for sure, and drunk. Other guy back him off with his bike and some one else comes along and chokes  him out from behind.

I remember when i was at a judo club, and a bjj guy was trainning. We got talking i said to him bjj sport is no good for self defence,  nor is karate etc as it taught today. (in fact neither is Judo ) He laughed and said bjj was and was desparging of karate. You know what he did - he offered me out for a fight right in front of my judo techer. I told him to go  away and it was left at that. 

To put in context i have done judo (met lots of thugs in that style, and karate etc ) now training in BJJ and karate. I find the club of bjj the most open of them all, they are very friendly and not closed minded to different styles. Most of them do other MAs and the bjj intructor teaches kick boxing as well. Are there idiots in the class,  sure there are but not many. 

To say they do not exist because  its a marital art and it gets people out of that - is like putting your head in the sand. If you mention BJJ in some judo and karate circles is like you have, broke a sacred vow or something.  I am sure there are BJJ clubs who are like that as well. 

I do not see every attacker having a bjj back ground or believe in  bjj boogie man troupe. I was just thinking at the end of a bjj class what if an attacker had this skill set. Also even though the intructor does kickboxing, i am not sure if he cares or just sees it as a way of training people in the arts, and is not bothered about link it to bjj which he teaches afterwards. What i mean is one can do a striking art with bjj or judo etc but there is not link between the two.  You could say there is  MISSING LINK excuse the pun, and the linkage is the transition from striking to grappling etc. I hope you understand what i mean 

I was a great pains to explain a young lad at bjj club - do not go on the ground in a fight, but he said all fights go to the ground and i said again do not do it. you do  not know if he/she has a knife or mates, or just passer byes  wanting to get a good dig in. The above video is  perefect example of a passer bye who got involved when he was not threatened. 

How do i know passer byes get involved? i have seen it, been a victim of it. I have  been a victim of violence a lot and i have been attacked on the streets and seen street fights, etc. 

The best place is not to be there, and if you are there, try to talk your way out of it, if  you cannot and he or they attack - screem blue murder, SHOUT HELP HELP HELP,  run if you can. If not fight like mad, use anything or everything to get away.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Mulberry4000 wrote:
i think statsitcs is a misnomer here as, thugs who want to hurt people do it any where they can.

Not sure what you mean? The statistics are based on actual crime and hence provide the best overview of the way that crime is happening. They are collected to help governments set policy on police targets, victim support, public safety initiatives, etc. They are also very useful to self-protection instructors because they inform us of what we should be training for. There has been no spike in kneebars, tringle chokes, and armbars since BJJ has risen in popularity. Criminals are largely using violence in the same way they always have … because that’s the most effective way for them to act.

In the last 20 years, the way martial arts fight each other has changed a lot due to new competitive formats and the evolution of existing ones. This has led to some assuming that criminal violence must have changed loads too (it hasn’t).

This faulty assumption has arisen because most martial artists never trouble themselves to look at the true nature of violent crime. They don’t understand the problem, so any “solution” they propose is sure to be way off the mark. Consensual violence and non-consensual violence are not the same and we have to be very careful not to “mush” them together because of fuzzy thinking, lack of information, putting love of style over safety of students, etc.

Once again, there is no evidence to support the notion of large numbers of BJJ practitioners forcing people to roll against their will. If we shift focus to addressing the way BJJ practitioners fight, we are no longer focused on the reality of self-defence. We will make ourselves less effective because we anticipate something highly unlikely to happen. “How to deal with a BJJ fighter” is a fighting question. Not a self-protection one.

Learning to fight other martial artists in a consensual fight can be a huge amount of fun and very beneficial, but it is not the same as self-protection. We need to keep the demarcation sharp and clear if we are to address the realities of self-protection, and if we are to be able to explore the various forms of consensual fighting whilst recognising their own inherent value.

Mulberry4000 wrote:
I remember when i was at a judo club, and a bjj guy was trainning. We got talking i said to him bjj sport is no good for self defence,  nor is karate etc as it taught today. (in fact neither is Judo ) He laughed and said bjj was and was desparging of karate. You know what he did - he offered me out for a fight right in front of my judo techer. I told him to go away and it was left at that.

If we want to address self-defence properly, then we need to acknowledge it is its own unique field of study. We can’t train art or sport and believe we have it all covered. Sport does not cover personal security, home security, travel security, awareness, crime stats, law, verbal de-escalation, escape skills, etc. However, these are vital parts of self-protection AND they are way more important than the physical skills of last resort.

Conversely, self-protection training should not cover feints (falsely triggering trained reactions), closing the gap, back and forth footwork, passing guard, knee bars, ankle locks, escaping advanced submission attempts, etc. These are needed for fighting though (assuming the format permits them).

You are 100% right to say that sport is not good for self-defence, but that does not mean there is anything wrong with sport! This is why we need to keep them separate. Sport and consensual fighting have their own inherent value. As said previously, when we are not clear on the distinction our self-protection training is ineffective and consensual fighting skills get devalued. Neither should happen. I wrote this article on that point: https://iainabernethy.co.uk/article/defence-combat-sports

In the situation you describe, had the BJJ guy pushed the fight, and you did not consent, then it would be an assault. It needs to be addressed as such i.e. a crime. You responded by leaving … which is good self-protection. You used the right skillset for the scenario. Had he got angry and demanded a fight (thus putting himself in danger of jail time) good self-protection would have us pre-empt, escape, shout for help, etc. Worst case scenario, other club members would hopefully come to your aid; perhaps even call the police. As it was, you dealt with the situation by not consenting to the fight.

It’s also worth mentioning that the BJJ guy in the story clearly does not appreciate the differences between consensual and non-consensual violence. If you had consented to the fight, then, win or lose, nothing has been demonstrated about the relevance of BJJ to non-consensual violence because it would have been a consensual fight. As it was, you showed him the difference by not consenting and leaving. That is self-protection. Staying to fight is fighting. They are radically different. This is why it is so vital we keep that distinction clear.

All the best,

Iain

Anf
Anf's picture

Mulberry4000 wrote:
How would a karate person defend themselves against a thug trained in BJJ?

Tap him on the leg a couple of times then restomp the groin when he let's go.

But jokes aside, here we have an age old confusion. We often think that when someone is trained in a particular style, then they only use that style when they fight. A thug trained in BJJ is first and foremost a thug, and if he didn't have any BJJ he'd still have his inate natural fighting ability, whatever that may look like. Likewise the karateka is unlike to just stop when it goes to the ground because karate hasn't prepared him well for that, he will still do whatever instinct drives him to do. So to ask how a karateka would defend themselves against a BJJ trained thug, I don't think there can be an answer, because there are far too many variables to come up with a single solution. Of course we could narrow it down by taking it off the street and into formal competition, with rules and refs and coaches and no broken bottles and nobody gathered round in a circle stamping on and kicking anything that looks vaguely human shaped on the floor.

deltabluesman
deltabluesman's picture

I think this thread has almost run its course, but I do want to add one more comment.  Some of the comments here are too critical of sport BJJ.   I completely agree that if a person wants to train for self-protection, it would be a mistake to train exclusively in sport BJJ.  Sport BJJ is much different than self-protection and the two arenas have entirely different goals.  They are apples and oranges.  Agree.  But on the other hand, we go too far if we say that sport BJJ is "no good for self-protection" (if that means that it has no carry-over to the self-protection arena).  

There are some sport BJJ practitioners who:

don't want to train in striking (either because they think it's too hard on the body, or because they don't like it, or because they don't think it's necessary)

believe that it's not much use to train against multiple opponents or to train against weapons (because they think that it's a waste of time since there are no good ways to handle such situations), and

believe that a technique is useless unless it can be trained frequently against high levels of resistance

So they compromise (as they see it) and focus all of their energy on BJJ.  BJJ becomes their self-protection system.  Most of the time, these instructors will just tell students to run away from dangerous situations when they can, and if they can't run away, to use BJJ.  

Do I 100% agree with that approach?  No.  But I can understand why people believe that and I wouldn't say that it makes their art "no good" for self-defense.  Plus, sport BJJ has a lot of aspects that do carry over beneficially for self-protection:

it forces you to apply your techniques under a lot of pressure against someone who is dead set on defeating you

if you compete in tournaments, it gets you accustomed to applying techniques when adrenaline is high

almost all decent sport BJJ guys are in excellent shape

since the match starts standing up, almost all sport BJJ guys have some awareness of how to defend takedowns and practice it routinely

because sport BJJ guys excel at controlling opponents, they will have some tools available if a knife is drawn during the fight

Is that ideal?  No.  But if we're grading on a curve, it's head and shoulders above what a lot of people are doing.  

Otherwise, I agree with much of what's been said.  And maybe I got the wrong impression or misunderstood what was said.  But I just don't want people to come away from the thread thinking that sport BJJ is no good for self-protection.  Or for sport BJJ guys to read this and think that the strengths of their art aren't being appreciated.

And based on what I've read so far, I'd advise people that the best way to avoid attackers trained in BJJ is this:  don't go to BJJ gyms and tell everyone that their art is no good for self-defense.  (I'm joking.)    

Just my perspective . . .

-J

(A few edits to clarify what I'm saying.) 

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

deltabluesman wrote:
But on the other hand, we go too far if we say that sport BJJ is "no good for self-protection" (if that means that it has no carry-over to the self-protection arena).

This is what my friend calls the “by-product myth” i.e. we train for one thing under the illusion that it will, by default, somehow give you all the skills needed for something else.

I don’t think anyone here has said there is no crossover / carry-over from BJJ practise to self-protection; there obviously is. However, BJJ training is not self-protection training. It does not cover things like awareness, avoidance, verbal de-escalation, pre-emption, law, home security, travel security, etc. Martial artists have a bad habit of solely focusing on the physical aspects and that’s primarily why I say that martial arts instructors are often the worst self-protection instructors.

Even if we zero in on the physical, BJJ (generally speaking) does not cover striking, multiple enemies, weapons, etc. Just as significantly, BJJ does cover a great many things that are not relevant to self-protection either i.e. submissions, countering skilled submissions, etc.

BJJ has significant cross-over when it comes to things like escaping from the floor, avoiding being taken down, etc. However, that alone is not enough. When viewed from a self-protection prospective, the training is incomplete (does not cover the topics listed above) and it is focused on the wrong goal (wining a fight as opposed to avoiding harm from criminal actions). This makes for incomplete and inefficient training if the stated goal is self-protection. It’s therefore right to say such training is not “good” if self-protection is the objective.

TO BE CLEAR, THE SAME CAN BE SAID OF ANY CONSENSUAL FIGHTING SKILL SET! This would include the skills we karateka use to fight each other too i.e. back and forth footwork, feints, closing the gap, advanced kicking, etc. I train that stuff, but I know what it is to be used for. As said in prior posts, we don’t need to cram everything into the self-protection box.

As always, context is key. BJJ is arguably supreme when it comes to open consensual exchanges. However, ONLY dedicated and focused self-protection training is GOOD self-protection training. Therefore, doing BJJ with the focus on submitting another martial artist is not good self-protection training. Same applies when boxers, karateka, judoka, Thai-boxers, etc train to fight each other too. No slight is present here. Just a simple statement that training needs to be specific to be “good”.  

All the best,

Iain

Paul_D
Paul_D's picture

Mulberry4000 wrote:

Geoffery Thompson said today's attacker ambushes people. What does he mean by this, well "whats the time mate" etc is one example

He also said “If you have to be physical the pre-emptive strike is the only consistently effective technique.”

So I think we are looking at this in slightly the wrong way, in that we are assuming that he is going to be given that chance to use his (insert name of martial art) skills here.  

I don’t care what he does, I don’t care if he’s a striker or a kicker or a grappler.  It’s a recipe for disaster to start training counters for every possibility in the hope you can deal with it. Instead it is better to understand the rituals of violence (whether it be someone trying to start a fight, or someone using deception “What’s the time mate?”) so that you know when you have gotten to the point where you need to act.

It’s not fool proof of course, nothing is, but I think it’s a better solution than trying to learn the all the counters to all the arts, and train them to the point of being able to make them work in a live situation against skilled martial artists.

deltabluesman
deltabluesman's picture

Iain,

Yes, I see what you mean.  I'm in complete agreement with everything that you have said.  I think I just prefer a different way of framing the message.  There are arts that are genuinely useless for self-protection, there are arts that are incomplete/flawed for self-protection but which have some percentage of cross-over, and then there are arts that are (approximately) complete self-protection systems.  As I see it, sport BJJ falls into the "incomplete/flawed" category, rather than the "useless category."  

If we want to point people towards a better way of self-protection training (assuming that's their goal), I think it's better to say:  "Your art has a lot of good aspects, but it's incomplete.  Here are some things you might want to think about to adapt it for self-protection."  Rather than, "Your art is no good for self-protection" (which, in my humble opinion, implies the art is closer to the useless category and will make people defensive/standoffish).    

Other than that (minor?) difference in approach, I agree with everything you've written.  Thanks for the response.

--J

(Edit:  as I reread your post, I think we're saying pretty much the same thing, it's just an accident of how things were worded earlier in the thread.)

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

deltabluesman wrote:
If we want to point people towards a better way of self-protection training (assuming that's their goal), I think it's better to say:  "Your art has a lot of good aspects, but it's incomplete.  Here are some things you might want to think about to adapt it for self-protection."  Rather than, "Your art is no good for self-protection" (which, in my humble opinion, implies the art is closer to the useless category and will make people defensive/standoffish).

I’d fully agree with that. “Communicating” like a jackass is unlikely to help get our point across. The balance is that there does need to be objectivity and honesty too. Explaining that self-protection is not fighting (certainly not “street fighting”!) is an important base to have such conversations from. That confusion can take some getting around because most martial artists don’t see the distinction.

When the demarcation is established, we can then explain that ALL “fighting systems” are lacking when it comes to self-protection. We can also, from that base, acknowledge the validity of fighting skills when it comes to outfighting another martial artist (even though much of those skills will be inappropriate for escaping criminal activity).

This way there is no blanket assertions or assumed inference of “ineffectiveness”, but instead a focused conversation on incompleteness and inappropriateness for the specific context of addressing violent crime.

That’s for the posts. I think they’ve helped out draw out some nuanced and important points.

All the best,

Iain