AWARENESS IS OUR FIRST LINE OF FEMALE SELF DEFENCE

Real self-defence is something more than just learning a set of techniques that will allow someone to escape holds and defend themselves against strikes. It should also include awareness training, threat identification and de-escalation techniques to name just a few of the other aspects.

It is primarily in these areas that female self-defence differs from that which is taught to men e.g. the techniques for defending yourself on the ground are fairly universal however the set of events that lead up to finding yourself in such a position differ for men and women. This is majority of attacks on women are of a sexual nature whereas violence between males is normally driven by a conflict of egos.

Both male and female can experience hidden aggression, where the attacker initially hides their true intention and overt aggression where the attacker displays his/her feelings immediately women are more likely to experience the former. This is often contrary to the picture that the media tries to present concerning sexual violence against women.

The media like to present a very black and white, predator victim, picture of sexual violence e.g. one where a woman is attacked and raped whilst walking home. In reality these types of attack are rare, in fact women are most likely to be attacked in their own homes.

“The statistics for rape tell a very odd story. Women are least safe at home and least safe with friends, acquaintances and family. Statistically speaking, women are better off with strangers and being anywhere but our homes...” Anna C Salter (Author and renowned researcher into sexual predators and predatory activityHowever the true picture of sexual assaults against women asks awkward questions about the majority of victim’s behaviour e.g. why did she let her attacker into the house etc and with the benefit of hindsight and full information people begin to judge make judgements about the victim and their actions.

Anna C Salter’s statement however goes some way to explaining how a victim’s attacker came to be in their home i.e. ‘(women are) least safe with friends, acquaintances and family.’ That is: people women are supposed to trust are most often the perpetrators of these sexual assaults. The unknown assailant who attacks the lone woman walking home alone at night may what most women fear or picture as the reality of rape however these cases are the minority not the majority.With this in mind the threat of sexual assault becomes that much more difficult to identify and so preventing and defending oneself against it becomes that much more complicated.

Identifying sexual predators is extremely difficult. This stands to reason: if they were easy to identify they would be easy to catch. Most are extremely socially adept and very good liars. These individuals spend their lives (100% of their time) fooling people. They are far more practised at convincing us of falsehoods than we are at detecting the truth. Expecting the truth is default behaviour in 99% of people (if it wasn’t just carrying out the most basic interaction would take hours) and so sexual predators have a lead on us before we even start.

There are strategies and techniques to counter all of this and of course there is knowing and being able to defend oneself physically, although it’s far easier and safer to identify and evade than to rely on being able to take control of an assault once it has begun.

In our training we look at: methods of increasing awareness; building scenario-based models, which can be used to compare normal behaviour against predatory behaviour; simple profiling techniques that can be used to assess an individuals risk status; tools and strategies for de-escalating situations that seem to be heading in the wrong direction as well as the old faithful technique of how to knee someone with absolute force in the groin! Our approach to female self defense is a complete and comprehensive one that doesn’t rely purely on physical responses.