ahead of time.
• If something bad happens, you will need a way out. Knowing your territory gives you an important advantage whenever you need to escape from trouble. This not only means having an awareness of entrances, exits, and avenues for escape, but also a good understanding of your friend’s proclivities as well. Hang out with people who like to cause trouble and it will eventually catch up with not only them but also with you too.
• Restrain impassioned friends. Don’t let your buddy’s big fat mouth write a check that you need to cash. If he insists on behaving immaturely, find someone else to hang out with. The same goes for intimate relations. If your girlfriend thinks that violence in defense of her honor is cool, you are with the wrong type of person. She will not just get you into one fight, but many. Sooner or later, she will get you seriously hurt, maimed, or killed… or thrown in jail and sued for everything you own.
• Violence always has consequences. Know what is worth fighting for and what is not. Dispassionately evaluate your priorities and values before you need to make such judgments in the heat of the moment. It is far better to live to fight another day than to make rash choices you may live to regret.
• No matter how tough you are, there is always someone out there who’s tougher, faster, or just plain better. Do you really want to find out if you have what it takes to tangle with a heavy hitter, a career criminal, mental case, or a seasoned street fighter in a live fire situation? You’re not that good. And even if you are, it doesn’t pay to find out. Claiming turf puts you in a win-lose mentality. It’s yours now, so it cannot be theirs. That type of thinking frequently leads to violence. Do the smart thing and walk away.
• Whenever someone encroaches on our territory or violates our personal space, it generates an emotional response. Oftentimes this leads to a physical response as well. Invading someone’s space almost always guarantees a confrontation, forcing him to either retreat or fight. Know this before you invade someone else’s territory.
• The presence of a knife, something carried by roughly 70 percent of adult males in the United States on a regular basis, changes everything in a fight. Anyone can cripple or kill you quite easily with a blade; it takes no special skill or training. In fact, all forms of armed assaults are far more dangerous to the victim than unarmed ones, about three-and-a-half times as likely to result in serious injuries. Worse yet, some 96 percent of all homicides involve a weapon. Consequently, it is really important to be able to spot hidden weapons before they can be used against you.
• Respect, reputation, and revenge are the hallmarks of gang culture. If you think you are tough enough to take on a gang banger, you are just plain stupid. Mess with one banger and you’ve messed with them all. No disrespect, challenge, or assault will go unanswered. Since most gang members tend to live for the moment and care little for societal norms, nothing is off the table when it comes to avenging any perceived slight.
• Listen to all the little warnings you get, not only around strangers on the street, but also in relationships as well. Little hints become bigger hints; small behaviors turn into larger ones. If you don’t pay attention to the clues, something bad is bound to happen to you. While women are often on the receiving end of domestic abuse, men can be victims as well.
SECTION TWO
During a Violent Encounter
Unfortunately, there are instances when you have no choice but to fight and others where it is prudent to do so. If you’ve gotta fight, you need to know how to do it effectively. This section is about what actually happens during a violent encounter, helping you understand clever things you might want to try and dumb things you should attempt to avoid when things get rough.
If you do have to fight, you must avoid being injured long enough to give yourself a reasonable chance to strike back, so the awareness you have already learned about remains important. It’s pretty hard to battle effectively when you’re disoriented, bleeding, and reeling in agony. Further, to remain safe, your response must at least knock your adversary off his game plan, if not disable him straightaway. Having a variety of reliable techniques to draw from can give you a leg up if your initial response is thwarted by the other guy as it often will be. He’s not going to attack you unless he thinks he can win, so odds are good that he has at least a little experience at doing it right. He will be doing his damnedest to pound your face in, pulling out every dirty trick he can think of in an effort to mess you up.
While this book largely focuses on the principles of violence, we offer a variety of practical applications in this section that you can use to give yourself reasonable odds of surviving a violent encounter. Unfortunately, no book, no matter how well written, can substitute for professional hands-on training when it comes to handling violence. If you are interesting in learning how to defend yourself effectively, we suggest you seriously consider taking up martial arts classes. At the risk of making a crass, commercial statement, our book
Fighting should never be your first choice, but sometimes it’s your only choice to keep yourself or someone you care about safe. In addition to learning some solid fighting techniques, you will discover some important principles that help you understand when you can legally get away with going physical. Unfortunately countervailing force is not a yes/no equation. What you can and cannot do under the eyes of the law can be highly nuanced. Consequently, this section identifies appropriate levels of force that you might be able to employ while keeping yourself out of jail whenever you have to get hands on.
He Who Strikes the First Blow Admits He’s Lost the Argument
