Not OP but you can be shot or stabbed by someone even if you know what you’re doing. The best option if you want to protect yourself is to run away, be aware of your surroundings, and have a gun.
Learning martial arts is most effective in unarmed fights when you’re not outnumbered or sucker punched. So very little if at all. It’s obviously better to have it than not but 15 minutes at a gun range is probably better than 15 years in martial arts.
most ‘street fights’ are either drunken brawls that could have been easily de-escalated, after which the ‘victor’ will face the worst legal consequences, or are otherwise ambush attacks (likely with weapons and multiple assailants) that you realistically have no chance of defending against since you will never see it coming (source: dad was a bouncer during cocaine days of the 80’s). when the mugger has you at gunpoint it doesnt matter if you know karate, just give him your stuff. if some gang is trying to kill you they will stab/shoot/garrote/kidnap/drug you before you realize you are in any danger, likely with at least 2 or 3 attackers. situational awareness is more useful than knowing how to punch/kick/wrestle 99.99 percent of the time and even in the 0.01 percent that it is slightly useful you will likely still be outnumbered and get your head stomped as you go for that epic takedown you trained for so long.
“could have” is the point. Sometimes even if it “could have” it isn’t. Better to have something that might not need be used than vice versa. OP also isn’t guaranteed to always be alone in situations that can’t be de-escalated (and plenty of fights happen with prior warning, belligerence etc.). It is always better to be able to contribute than not if your friend is attacked or some other thing happens.
And you bringing up mugging is irrelevant, because nobody would ever say that someone who has you at gunpoint in a mugging should be struggled against, martial arts or not. No serious martial arts instructor would ever recommend or even float that as an option. You always give them your shit. That’s not what self-defense is for, fighting back against armed muggers.
Having a gun can help de-escalate through threat if there’s distance and it hasn’t broken out, but if a fight has already started or the distance can be closed before you can access it or even worse after you’ve drawn it but can’t point and fire it, now you’ve added a lethal variable and turned a fight of-some-kind into an almost certainly lethal scenario. And by that point too if you aren’t trained enough to know how to control someone’s limbs in wrestling for the gun, you’re increasingly possibly fucked.
It is very very good to train martial arts, and very very good to train the ability to run away fast, and always hope you can opt for the latter in most cases.
your advice about using guns to de-escalate is literally illegal and dangerous advice, at least in america. see my other comments in this thread.
you should consider reading this article (warning: NSFW, CW: SV, SA), it has a slightly different focus than this conversation but has tangentially relevant insights imo. no one is saying not to train martial arts
The true answer is that martial arts aren’t practical or effective for self-defense
why not?
Not OP but you can be shot or stabbed by someone even if you know what you’re doing. The best option if you want to protect yourself is to run away, be aware of your surroundings, and have a gun.
Learning martial arts is most effective in unarmed fights when you’re not outnumbered or sucker punched. So very little if at all. It’s obviously better to have it than not but 15 minutes at a gun range is probably better than 15 years in martial arts.
most ‘street fights’ are either drunken brawls that could have been easily de-escalated, after which the ‘victor’ will face the worst legal consequences, or are otherwise ambush attacks (likely with weapons and multiple assailants) that you realistically have no chance of defending against since you will never see it coming (source: dad was a bouncer during cocaine days of the 80’s). when the mugger has you at gunpoint it doesnt matter if you know karate, just give him your stuff. if some gang is trying to kill you they will stab/shoot/garrote/kidnap/drug you before you realize you are in any danger, likely with at least 2 or 3 attackers. situational awareness is more useful than knowing how to punch/kick/wrestle 99.99 percent of the time and even in the 0.01 percent that it is slightly useful you will likely still be outnumbered and get your head stomped as you go for that epic takedown you trained for so long.
“could have” is the point. Sometimes even if it “could have” it isn’t. Better to have something that might not need be used than vice versa. OP also isn’t guaranteed to always be alone in situations that can’t be de-escalated (and plenty of fights happen with prior warning, belligerence etc.). It is always better to be able to contribute than not if your friend is attacked or some other thing happens.
And you bringing up mugging is irrelevant, because nobody would ever say that someone who has you at gunpoint in a mugging should be struggled against, martial arts or not. No serious martial arts instructor would ever recommend or even float that as an option. You always give them your shit. That’s not what self-defense is for, fighting back against armed muggers.
Having a gun can help de-escalate through threat if there’s distance and it hasn’t broken out, but if a fight has already started or the distance can be closed before you can access it or even worse after you’ve drawn it but can’t point and fire it, now you’ve added a lethal variable and turned a fight of-some-kind into an almost certainly lethal scenario. And by that point too if you aren’t trained enough to know how to control someone’s limbs in wrestling for the gun, you’re increasingly possibly fucked.
It is very very good to train martial arts, and very very good to train the ability to run away fast, and always hope you can opt for the latter in most cases.
your advice about using guns to de-escalate is literally illegal and dangerous advice, at least in america. see my other comments in this thread.
you should consider reading this article (warning: NSFW, CW: SV, SA), it has a slightly different focus than this conversation but has tangentially relevant insights imo. no one is saying not to train martial arts
another related article