Fair Fight


Fighting in general is rarely fair, on the street, it never is. There are sanctioned fights where the participants are shielded by rules and protection for different body parts.

The opponent is a known factor, as well as the time and place for the fight. The fighters are usually of similar weight, height and age. Each fight consists of two fighters at a time and one main referee whose purpose is to make sure that the fighters follow the rules and that no-one is severely injured.

This is usually how things are done in a fighting arena, but outside those walls, there are no rules and no protection. The time and place are unknown factors and your opponent hasn't been handpicked according to your physical condition. In many cases, you'll be facing multiple and potentially armed assailants and worst of all; there will not be a referee to stop the fight. Even if you are lucky to have a bystander walk by, the situation will most likely already be over, in one way or another. Before my first fist fight, the closest to a fight I had been, was the kung-fu movies I used to watch. I thought all fights consisted of fifteen minutes of roundhouse kicks and back flips. The truth of the matter is that a fight that lasts longer than three seconds is indeed a long fight. No human-being can take two connecting blows to the chin and walk away as if he were Chuck Norris. It doesn't matter how big you are or how strong you are. If you know how to strike, how to use the environment and have some knowledge in fighting psychology; you have a better chance of getting out of the situation fairly unharmed. Reading this article won't make you a fighter, it may not even help you at all in a situation, but it might give you a better understanding of three vital factors in a fight.

Starting off with the first factor, knowing how to strike. Your whole body is a weapon, if trained right, you can use most parts of it to your advantage. We call these the "natural weapons". The natural weapons are as followed: your hands, your elbows, your knees, your shins, your feet and your head. Your hands for instance can be formed into different weapons for different purposes. A closed fist is the most natural way of using your hand in a fight and its shape does give you a lot of advantages, such as reach and impact severity.

A fist can be used to attack almost all areas of the body. But knowing how to strike isn't sufficient, you also need to know where to strike. Of course a hard blow to any part of the body will bring person to their knees. The human body however, is more fragile in the following places: the temple, the eyes, the nose, the upper lip, the chin, the Adam's apple, the solar plexus, the bottom ribs, the groin and the knees. These are the most basic areas to attack. Punching someone in the temple area is very dangerous and could in most cases lead to a fatality. So would striking the Adam's apple. But then again, if someone would come at you with a knife with the intention of injuring you, strike away. The nose and the upper lip contain a lot of skin-deep nerves, striking these areas will inflict severe pain. Striking the solar plexus will provoke the diaphragm muscle (the muscle that controls the breathing) and change its pace. The receiver of the strike will therefore not be able to breathe for a short amount of time, which will allow you to either continue striking or disperse. The bottom ribs are also called the floating ribs. It takes little force to snap them like toothpicks, a blow to this area will cause any attacker to retreat. The groin and knees are quite vital and fragile as well, especially if you're a guy. Every male, be it man or infant, knows how little it takes to bring a man of any size to his knees and to tears by striking the groin. The knees are a great spot to place your boot, the pain will most likely stop the attacker from running after you. Now to the juicy spot, the chin. It requires some strength, but not much. An accurate horizontal strike will cause the person's brain to do a whole ballet-performance inside his skull and knock him out. I'm really trying to narrow stuff down and avoid getting on too many sidetracks.

But this is a big enough subject for me to write a whole book about, so I'm aware of the fact that I'm not getting everything down on paper, just some bullet points.

Moving on to the second factor, the environment. There are seven types of "common objects" in fighting (note: firearms are not a part of the every-day-use for a civilian and are therefor not listed). Below is the list of the different categories together with examples of objects and the use of them. The seven categories are: shields, sticks, stones, blades, small, fluids and chains. The shield objects are used for warding off attacks and gaining a reach advantage (ex. chair, briefcase, book, purse.) Stick objects can also be used to ward off and to gain some reach from the assailant but can also be used for swinging, sticking and slashing (ex. umbrella, cane, crutch, pipe.) Stone objects have a more offensive use and basically no defensive use, they're usually used for throwing or bashing (ex. ashtray, brick, billiard boll, bottle.) Blade objects are self-explanatory, the use varies depending on the object, but it's usually for stabbing or slashing (ex. knife, screwdriver, credit card, pen.) Small objects are used for distraction and usually cause no direct damage (ex. keys, sand, coins, soda can.)

Fluid objects are also usually used for distraction, with the exception of mace and pepper spray which could cause more permanent damage (ex. alcoholic beverage, hot coffee, hairspray, soda.) Chain objects are mostly used to ensnare or choke with, you could also use them for whipping (ex. tie, sweater, key chain, (seat)belt.) I only listed four of each category, but if you look around you, I promise you that you will find more objects that could fall into one or more of these. You could make a list of all potential objects that you have around your house and have a look at it once or twice a day, so if the day comes where a burglar finds his way to your home, you can spot a weapon in each and every corner of your house.

The third and final vital factor for this article, is your attitude. I've always been told that the best defense is offense and I stand by it. If you ever find yourself in a situation where you feel your or someone else life is at threat; you cannot stand still and let destiny decide the outcome. No matter how bad it seems or how dangerous the assailants look, if you think your life is at threat, you need to make a move. Attack the attacker, be aggressive, don't let him intimidate you, even if you are scared, don't let him see it. Don't give him the satisfaction of seeing you scared. Make a choice and be quick to make it. If you're going to do something about the situation, don't hesitate, do it. This is not something that you will learn by just reading this, this will take years and years of practice to learn. How to snap, explode, go from 0 to 100 in just a blink of an eye. But once you know this, you don't really need to be a heavy-hitter or a martial artist, putting an attacker under pressure like this will suffice to break the inflated ego he once had when entering the fight. This is basically all for now, I feel I should put an end to this article before it gets tiring. I guess I can't really call it an article though, it's more of an informative/educational rant. In which case, I hope it helps you some day.


Submitted by: Commander

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