Dec
27
Kickboxing Like A Girl
Filed Under Erin Weed's Blog, Girls Fight Back!, In the News, Safety & Self-Defense, Social Entrepreneurship
Today’s article by Paula Span in the Washington Post hit on a big issue for the feminist and women’s safety/self-defense community. (Click here to read it) The writer talks about attending a kickboxing class taught by a woman who uses ‘girly’ language and visualizations when teaching punches and groin strikes. Instead of explaining a right hook to nail someone square in the jaw, she has the class re-enact “clearing off their dresser.” Instead of kneeing a rapist to the groin, she has the class act as if they are “doing yard work and breaking sticks over their knees…so hard that the neighbors look at them funny.” Paula explains most of the class is middle age, none of them too interested in causing pain, disability or death in anyone…possibly not even to someone threatening their personal safety. So this method of teaching kickboxing works for her classmates. They are learning the moves, but not threatening their fragile feminine psyche. <sarcasm> Let me also note: Kickboxing is not self-defense, and should not be confused with training that prepares you to fight back in a truly violent confrontation.
In the women’s self-defense community, we walk a very fine line. Convey the fighting material too lightly, and people don’t take it seriously. You also run the risk of a woman not being emotionally or mentally prepared for a real attack, and then freezes under the adrenal stress in a real situation. Furthermore, as women, can’t we handle a little tough talk? Feminists from the 1970s must be throwing a fit over this article, to insinuate women need such a soft touch in learning life skills. But if you teach too hard-core, you run the risk of turning the women off…and possibly never learning about self-defense again out of fear of taking a class. I’ve seen this many times at countless self-defense courses around the nation. A bad-ass instructor doesn’t mince words, and you can actually see the faces of the women in the audience gloss over and they shut down.
Most instructors in the world will tell you it’s very difficult to make a living teaching personal safety and self-defense. Unless you twist in fitness or black belt achievement, most women simply aren’t interested. How do we make women realize how much they need this training, how important it is to understand intuition and fear, even if it makes you uncomfortable? And after we help women understand this, how do we ensure they act upon it and take a class? That’s the hardest part…the action and then the follow-through. When I owned a self-defense studio in New Jersey, we’d have full classes signed up weeks in advance of the class start date, only for half to cancel the day before the first night of the course. Yeah, life gets crazy. But self-defense seems to always fall to the bottom of our to-do lists for so many personal and emotional reasons too.
There isn’t an easy answer for getting this training to women, but I think the women’s self-defense community has to come together, each of us offering our niche speciaities. For example, at Girls Fight Back we have found a niche of providing one-time, 90 minute, live seminars at high schools and colleges using humor and empowerment. While our seminar is intended to be introductory, our message throughout is to sign up for a class in their geographic area. For free, we supply a vast list of women’s self-defense classes around the nation where our audiences can sign up. Is this system perfect? No. Do I wish we could teach each of the 100,000 women I speak in front of each year true down ‘n dirty instruction that could save their life? You bet. But our niche is connecting with young women, making safety and self-defense appear unthreatening and “cool” within their social norms…then providing them with resources to take the next step. It’s just one tiny piece of the big puzzle. What’s you’re niche? And how can we work together to solve this social issue?
As we develop our vision for 2009, keep this mantra in mind: “Know what you are, know what you’re not.” Regardless of what industry you are in, you can never be all things to all people. What makes you different or special? What do you enjoy? What audiences seem to really connect with you? Who do you connect with? Concentrate on them…they are your niche. Once you find them, start partnering with people in other niches, and that’s when real change starts to happen.
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8 Responses to “Kickboxing Like A Girl”
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Erin,
Thanks for sharing the article and bringing up this subject. I think the whole gamut of fluff to gruff has a place somewhere, but we want to be sure we are on the right part of the spectrum for our particular niche. You may expect the pillow-fluffing analogy from a yoga/kickbox/blessings type of an instructor; tough talk could be jarring in that context. But if you teach “reality self defense,” let’s hope your language reflects the gravity of what your students are working on. And yet there’s no need to get grossly graphic. Detailed blood-and-gore descriptions can traumatize some students and drive them away from learning potentially life-saving skills. If you teach kids, I think it’s irresponsible to describe any bad outcomes–I know of classes where they explain what sodomy is, for example! Just give them the skills in milder situations, and they can apply them as needed. One can turn the verbal heat down for a rape survivors group too without going fru-fru. You described the faces of checked-out students in over-the-top classes, and I’d say that’s the key–get your feedback from your students’ reactions as well as how seriously they take the material. There’s space for fun and laughing w/o serving up “self defense LITE.”
Thanks for the light that you shine on these subjects, Carol Middleton
Great comment from Carol. I agree that if you teach reality self defense you need to keep it real- not fluffy. Otherwise we ARE instilling overconfidence and making self defense sound like a piece of cake. Like real fighting back is easy bake 1-2-3. Fun! (Yeah, right.)
It’s not that simple. Most people know that.
In my opniion, there’s too much of that simple model out there and it gives self defense for women a bad name and rap. This gets talked about on self defense forums and boards a lot.
But humor defintitely helps and things like knees to the groin usually often come with humor- no pun intended. Personally I don’t think women, young and old, want fluff or lite. They DON’T want to be terrified, but they also want what’s real — not a dumbed down cutey version. Too much fear is bad, but soemtimes women need to be scared a little before they wise up.
Who in god’s name would tell kids about sodomy? OMG! That’s horrible! Those poeple should be stopped.
I really liked the article though, and the author is talking about a workout class, not real self defense so i don’t see any problem.
Thanks for bringing this up! Great stuff.
Liz
Erin, I too read this article Saturday evening (must’ve been the wee hours of Sunday morning). Although I can’t call myself a 70s feminist, yes I’m sometimes frustrated in how some (too many) women are so reluctant to consider self-defense as a set of critical life skills (other women have noted the same in other fields, such as personal finance).
However, that’s what is. To paraphrase a famous Seattle band, our students come as they are, not as we want them to be. Our job as self-defense instructors is to increase their awareness of self-defense situations and options. We have to recognize that not all our students will be gung-ho fighters; in fact, virtually none of my students are, and that is my niche. Personally, I think the author, Paula Span (a student in the class), was artificial in overly-stretching the dichotomy of “girly vs. aggressive” while too closely conflating women’s aggression in sports with violent imagery.
My reading of the teacher is that she understands her students. She seems to see herself as a fitness (not self-defense) teacher, and builds on what her students already know to extend the physical skills to the fitness class. This makes for comfortable, effective, good learning. If she’s seeing the appropriate results, great for her.
Now, if she was a self-defense instructor then I feel she’d have to extend. She would have to ask her students to move beyond their comfort level. But by first connecting the physical motions to what her students already may know and can relate to, she’s developing a rapport and trust with them that should make it easier for her to ask them to go past their comfort zones, and they are more likely to follow her to that scary place because of that groundwork.
However, she’s not teaching self-defense. More’s the pity.
Thanks for noting the article, and for your thoughtful comments!
Joane, I have to disagree with one of your points:
You wrote: <>
Not necessarily. if I teach reality self defense my job IS to teach real skills and fighting skills. i feel like i owe it to my students to tell and teach the truth. My job isn’t just to increase thier awareness and options.
if I teach a safety class then that is my job. where this gets dicey is when people teach safety information and awareness methods or a couple of moves and pronoucne that they are teaching self defense. a couple of moves is not self defense. i often meet women who say, oh yeah I did some “self defense” and when i ask what they learned all they can show me is a groin strike (usually not well performed) or to “go for the eyes” or how to knuckle rap the back of a bad guys hand to loosen a grip. they have no grounding in fighting principles, mechanics, timing, strategy, defense versus offfense, context, nothing. or understanding of the stress factors.
which means the chance of them applying it in real self defense is slim to none. to me, this is not real self defenee and it contributes to the old saying that a little knowledge can be a bad thing. yet these women feel they’ve done some self defense and have a reasonable idea how to protect themselves.
I agree with erin’s take on “knowing your niche” it’s just that more and more people seem to want to hang the “I teach self defense” shingle and this lowers the bar.
yes, of course we need to tune into students and create connections, help with fear factors and add in some humor or fun but we shouldn’t treat self defense lightly. That’s part of the problem -that women are still too often taught the quick and easy, lightweight “simple” version.
(My comments have no bearing on the Post article. like we already said, that’s an exercise class taught by a “new age” teacher. they don’t expect to be learning real skills.)
this is just my two cents.
liz
Thanks for bringing the topic to light. Now I wonder, should I be using more “fluff talk” in my kickboxing or self defense classes for comic relief?!? I think I might have puked if the analogies pertained more to being bare-foot & pregnant in the kitchen than to doing yard work. But I’m not sure I could tell a class to throw an uppercut like fluffing up a pillow without cracking up; not to mention that I’ve never fluffed a pillow this way.
Hey, maybe more “fluff” will bring in the crowds? I make major scheduling decisions for my classes three times a year. During those times, I often wrestle with how to get the women in our society over what seems to be a collective “Cinderella Complex” and motivate them to take a proactive approach to their health & safety. Perhaps I should change my class name from “Fundamentals of Self Defense” to “Cinderella Gone Wild.”
On a more serious note, self defense instructors do walk a fine line and should consider their choice of words. Carol is right to emphasize reading the clients and using their feedback to adjust your tone. If a group that I’m teaching appears to be very sensitive, then I will loose them mentally if my word choice is too harsh for their taste. If the client base is of thicker skin, then they will not take me seriously if I talk too “fluffy.” I could even have problems getting their attention and controlling the audience.
But being a from-the-hip shooter (and talker), I tend to say things as they are. Since I have gotten more compliments for my straight-talk than complaints for being to harsh, I will for now continue to talk like I do. And believing that more women should take responsibility for their own safety, I will continue to show one or two self defense applications in my kickboxing classes whether or not my clients expect it or want it. And likewise, I will continue to lighten up some of my self defense classes with a little music & some cardio. Shouldn’t being physically fit make defending yourself easier?
Best wishes for safety, health & happiness,
DiAnn L. Stasik, M.Ed, CI-Ptr
NWMAF, NETA & AWSDA certified
W.O.W. – Women Only Workout, LLC
http://www.womenselfdefense.net
safechi@womenselfdefense.net
fax: 414-423-1884
Liz, thank you for your comment. When I refer to self-defense “options” I am including a large variety of physical skills as options that students can draw upon. Apparently that was not sufficiently clear. I do not take self-defense training lightly, and I trust you were not implying that I do.
Joanne
No no, I was not implying that about you. Not at all, i’m very sorry if that’s how it sounded.
It was just this one comment that threw me. (It didn’t appear on the post, but you figured it out.:-)
“Our job as self defense instructors is to increase their awareness of self defense situations and options.”
My comments about “treating self defnese lightly” are broad comments in further response to the issue erin raised and that carol commented on.
Erin,
Keep up the good fight. People need to hear this.