Bully Countermeasures: When All Else Fails, Try S.P.E.E.D
HOPEFULLY, a bully’s intended victim (Target Child) can avoid fighting through the strategies I advocated in my last posting. In the great majority of instances, projecting self confidence, being assertive and vocal, breathing tactically, appropriate body language (especially the hands) and some old fashioned confident eye contact can and will discourage approximately 95% of these would-be thugs. However, there are those bullies who are so determined to attack that the target-child is going to get grabbed, grappled with or even punched no matter what he or she does. For instance, even though a thug might catch the vibes that the kid he thought was a sissy is not intimidated in the least, and, as a matter of fact, is quite willing to fight back, he may still attack because of an “audience” and/or the fact that he has bragged that he is going to beat the target-child up and simply cannot back down.
THREAT RECOGNITION
Step 1 is recognizing an imminent attack. There exist what I call Signatures of Danger that occur just before any attack. A few of them could be:
· Gut Feelings: Invariably the target-child (TC) will sense a punch coming. Always obey your instincts.
· Boxer Stance: Strong leg drops back, strong hand becomes a fist, usually poised behind rear leg, strong shoulder drops.
· Sprinter Stance: Bully will lean and move forward, will dip his head just before he charges.
· Increased Body Tension:
S.P.E.E.D.
STEP 2 is to use SPEED to avoid a serious fight at the least and to temporarily disable the bully (never permanently injure) the bully.
· Speed. Your first move should be fast. Very fast. Speed is borne out of preparation (have a plan before the bully even approaches/more likely you have been approached by this or another bully before), confidence and determination.
· Power. Whatever your move, speed must be backed up by power. I will give an example or two later in this post and the next.
· Escape. Depending on the setting, your goal should be to escape the bully. Especially in school where there may be a zero-tolerance policy regarding violence.
· Evasion. You may not be able to escape, but evading a major fight through tactics involving distraction, misdirection and balance displacement will allow the TC to deflect the attack long enough to tire out the bully and/or allow help to arrive. I will discuss this more in my next posting. In many instances, I advocate tactical movement, quickly grappling the bully, and then footsweeping him to the ground in order to escape.
· (Go) Dynamic: My SPEED System has escape and evasion as its main objective, however, when all else fails, we are going Dynamic on the bully. In short, Dynamic strategies include the use of personal weapons, such as the head (butt), Palm Heels, elbows, hammer fists, knees and feet versus the bully’s vulnerable targets (nose, chin, torso, inner and outer thighs and lower shin areas). In the next and future postings I will show how to Go Dynamic in serious fighting scenarios, not only for children, but for teenagers, adults, women and seniors.
SPEED IN ACTION
THE FIGHTING ARTS are tough to describe in a post. Self defense after all is dynamic and is impossible to script. However, S.P.E.E.D as a bully countermeasure will sketch out different than in a Self Defense For Women scenario, which, by the way, might have life or death implications. One common bully-scenario looks like the following (this is realistic & repetitive, believe me):
The bully has a child, much smaller than he, up against a wall in the Boy’s Room. He is poking a finger into the kid’s chest - hard - and belittling the boy. Words have had little effect and the Target-Child (TC) cannot move. Suddenly, unexpectedly, the TC moves his right hand to a spot just above the larger boy’s left elbow and powerfully pulls that arm toward his center and then past, as if he is opening a door. The bully is thrown off balance and the TC quickly steps “through the door,” says “I’m late for class. See you later.” And is out the door.
If the bully is somehow prepared for the maneuver, or is too strong to be swung off balance, the TC uses the bully’s size and strength against him, “rotating around the pole,” as I call it. The intended-victim grabs the arm above the elbow and uses the strong arm to allow him (the TC) to rotate to a position behind the bully. My SPEED program teaches the TC to quickly “get out of Dodge,” if he can, but, if he cannot escape or evade further entanglement, I advocate “going Dynamic” by driving a foot downward into the bully’s tibial (at the top of the calf), which should cause the bully’s legs to collapse. The TC can enhance either or both of the above SPEED moves with a quick, powerful Front Kick to the bully’s lower shin, a dynamic distraction technique that almost always drop the thug.
More SPEED Bully Countermeasures in the next posting by Harry Hammer, plus some Dysamic Fighting Arts, all part of the SPEED System.