Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Children and Self Defense

As a father I want nothing more than the safety and well being of my family. As someone heavily immersed ins the subject of self defense I NEED for my kids to be able to take care of themselves.

The idea of my kid being able to "man handle" an adult, determined attacker is a fantasy. There is no martial arts system in the world that will enable a child to defeat an adult or adolescent attacker. But we can teach them to escape, evade and avoid.

In module 5 methods of escape an evasion we focus on those physical methods. All of the tatics show you how to create a diversion for escape. This is excellent for ANYONE who is interested in base line, foundation personal protection. But our job begins BEFORE we get to the point of physical contact.

Al kids must know how to spot danger, listen to their instincts and communicate their feelings to an adult.

They must also be taught to locate "SAFE STRANGERS" Police officers, people with children of their own. In a crisis, you must play the percenages. A uniformed cop is a good bet, a single, white, male in street clothes, not so good.

In the family safe training we show kids how to escape, question adults and stay with their group. When they get older, we make them aware of more sohpisitcated tactics. For example, a man who appears to be injured offers you $20 to load boxes in his van. While any 12 year old kid may jump at the chance, we teach our children to spot the potential issues.

we alos teach them not to go with ANYONE without an adult. Even if the person in question apears to be in Law Enforcement. There's not a cop I know that wouldn't want to locate a parent or guardian before taking a child into custody.

There are always exceptions to the rule, but these methods increase chances of survival and develop kid's street smarts.

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