The Chest Bump (tribal posturing)


This is what I theorize as an important issue with folks being on the receiving end of an elbow or other attack that knocks them out. In Win Demeere's recent blog posts he has one about Russian bouncers beating folks up where a couple of the scenes both combatants get to close and because the one taking the hit has his arms down by his side is unable to defend against the attack.

I believe this happens because of the monkey dance, those posturing we tend to do that take us through the stages until we actually take some action. Marc MacYoung on the No Nonsense Self-Defense web site calls this inter-tribal violence and intra-tribal violence. The flow is something like loud language exchange, getting closer, bumping chests and at some point finally doing a haymaker. 

It seems that when an individual gets into a conflict without the knowledge and proper realistic training tends to fall into this tribal mode so getting up close to them as a legitimate threat who has no fear of actually applying violence which the Russian bouncer film displays so well. 

This is why I would advocate a distance rule regardless of whether you feel it is a legitimate conflict vs. a posturing violence avoidance model. When you get up close and personal and don't have your defenses set properly then you too can be knocked out quickly and all your training is for naught.

If you live and train and practice proper kamae or proper posture and don't allow anyone, regardless, within striking range without automatically setting a defense model then this type of thing can be defended or avoided - mostly. 

Think awareness; think defense; think distance; think zones of kamae, etc. Knowledge is power, right? Applying knowledge is defensive, right? Knowledge is also avoidance, right?

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