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Who would you rather pick as a victim? Would you rather try to rob the stumbling drunk guy who doesn't even realize you are closing in on him or the stone cold sober guy who is already alerted to your presence and moving to get better position? Alcohol also lowers people's inhibitions and makes people do things they would not ordinarily do. Having worked as a bouncer in a bar for several years in my 20s, I can tell you for certain that some people are just not physically well adapted to drinking. The world is full of angry drunks and things you'd normally overlook when sober are reasons to fight when intoxicated. We never had to break up fights between sober people in the bar.....

So we can see here where just like the 3 stupids ...[1. Don't go STUPID places.

2. Don't do STUPID things.

3. Don't hang with STUPID people.]

...often overlap, drugs, whores and booze also have a great bit of overlap and often parallel and overlap the three stupids.

Again, I worked in the bar and entertainment industry long enough to see that the three stupids and drugs, whores and booze led to many a confrontation that would otherwise never have happened and often led to violence that both parties would have avoided had they not come together through involvement with those other things. As I often say...."Things like that just don't happen in church". Thus endeth the sermon.

Men are grandiose_they are full of ego_and that's all driven by emotions; it is driven by insecurity;it's driven by feelings of inferiority.

In the martial arts and self defense world we often want to know how to end fights. But scant attention is really paid to avoiding fights. In civilian America there are two most likely scenarios for you to employ armed violence against an aggressor. One will be in your home. The other is being approached on the street by muggers or aggressive panhandlers or maybe by individuals who are "protecting turf".

Now aside from the home robbery scenario our most likely place to be victimized will be on the street after being approached by an unknown person. This could be an aggressive panhandler looking for a handout or it could be a potential mugger sizing us up as victims. This is often referred to as the interview phase. Here the potential assailant is assessing his potential client and determining whether they would make a good target. Some might be familiar with the phenomena of sharks "bumping" prey before they bite it to see if it is in fact edible. The same thing applies here.


In this phase the criminal will likely be feeling you out to see if you are worth the risk. There is no "benefit package" to a job as a street criminal. There is no 401K and there is no medical plan. If you get injured in the process of acquiring resources (robbing someone) then your ability to acquire more resources will be somewhat limited until you can heal. And during that time you will be a more inviting target to other criminals who now may see you as a potential victim.....no honor among thieves.


Another worry is if you show up at the hospital with a stab wound, or worse a gunshot wound, the hospital will call the police and there will be a discussion with the responding officers you'd rather avoid if you are someone making a living victimizing your fellow man. Of course it goes without saying that if there is a catastrophic failure in the victim selection process and you choose a victim that kills you then there is no recovering from that. So what is a criminal to do? Simply make sure you choose victims well.

So if we make a habit of making good decisions regarding lifestyle and we do not work in an occupation that puts us in regular close contact with the criminal element, then we can pretty well limit our exposure to violence.

Now with good decision making on our side our biggest area of vulnerability will be being approached while out in public by persons of unknown intent.

From my own experience this will most likely be in a parking lot or at a gas station in urban areas though it could honestly be anywhere people are milling about.

So I prefer to offer some structure based on sound principles to help mitigate the attendant fear of the unknown and anxiety that can happen when we are approached by an unknown person on the street.

Often we can read the cues that the bad guy is giving off and make reasonable predictions about what is coming next. Unfortunately many people have never been exposed to the cues so they do not know what to look for.

TAPE LOOP/ (Tell them you can't help them or tell them to back off)
The term tape loop refers to having a pre planned response for when people approach you trying to engage you in conversation.

The "Tape Loop" plays on auto pilot without the need for you to have to think of things to say in respnse to the individual that is approaching. A simple "I'm sorry Sir, I can't help you" goes a long way toward heading off further conversation.


Often a criminal will try to engage us in conversation to get closer and gain a positional advantage. During this a key to look for is facial grooming. If they are touching their face, chin, mouth, forehead as they are talking then there is a good chance that they are practicing deception. Watch videos of interrogations.

The guys who are lying will often touch their faces in a "nervous tick" like way. This is usually a sign they are lying or trying to somehow deceive you. If you see this then you need to recognize it for what it is and break contact if possible. "I'm sorry Sir I can't help you" and be on your way if possible.

A key element to this is not having to stop and think about a response to what he is saying. If they can lure you into a conversation with them then they can hold your attention while posssible accomplices manuever up behind you. Even if they are alone you do not want to get bogged down in a discussion with them.

While your conscious mind is occupied thinking of answers to questions you have essentially turned off your ability to quickly respond to an attack. Your accessing areas of your brain to answer the questions slows your ability to access other areas that control the motor movements to react. When do we shoot the hostage taker? While he is answering a question.

This is the point where we are deescalating the situation if possible. If confronted with an agitated contact then maintaining a calm demeanor and making sure you do not instigate a fight may well be your best strategy. Be polite and try to break contact.

We obviously want to avoid a streetfight with no rules if we can. But many victims get sucked into talking far longer than is productive or practical. There is a time to talk. There is a time to act. And there is not a whole lot of overlap between the two. If you need to fight you need to fight. If your attempt at verbal deescalation is going nowhere and he is still manuevering and now reaching for a weapon it is time to stop talking and...


If "I'm sorry Sir I can't help you" does not get the desired result then we may follow it up with something a little less polite like BACK OFF! If that does not send them looking for easier pickings then that is an awful lot of info they are feeding you.

If at this point they have not broken off the encounter we need to ask ourselves "why are they still here?". And we need to move our feet...NOW.

STEP TO 3 OR 9 O'CLOCK/Step off the X and orbit them_

As mentioned before, if we stand still talking to the individual who approaches us it is easy for his cohorts to approach us from behind. A simple solution to this is to step laterally to either 3 or 9 o'clock and continue moving around them in an elliptical motion.

This will expose to you what was previously behind you. I prefer to think of it as orbiting the known threat. If we stand still and turn our head we will be opening ourselves up to a sucker punch or a tackle attempt.

On the other hand if we maintain a squared up posture to the known threat and step off the line of force to 3 o'clock and then step again to 3 o'clock we will not only see what was previously behind us but we will essentially be moving to flank the known threat.

Bad guys will recognize this. It is not the behavior of a good victim. It will often completely change their perception of the situation and kick them back to Observe in the OODA cycle. It is also a good way to keep your feet moving in preparation to get off the X in case the "interview" goes badly.

I use the term "explode" because it plants the seed in your mind that this is a rapid dynamic movement . It is not a shuffle. It is not a waddle. It is not a plodding movement. It is an EXPLOSION off the spot you were previously standing on. If the fight is on, then the blade, bullets or blows that the bad guy will try to deliver are going to be addressed to your last known address. You do not want to be there when they arrive. We certainly do not want to stand rooted in place and play "Rock'em Sock'em Robots" when bullets and blades are involved!



Also if done quickly without warning this will have them reacting to you instead of them just following their "script" of how they assumed this would play out. That buys us time. It buys us the time to take the initiative and counterattack. It helps us to turn the predator into the prey. By exploding off the X we get out of the way of the initial attack and begin our immediate counter attack as we...

Even if it is just getting out of the way of the initial attack that is BETTER position than we previously had. Ideally though we will use our head start we got from stepping to 3 or 9 o'clock to allow us to not only get off the X but to move to flank them. A rapid forward oblique movement not only works to make us harder to hit initially but also gives us better position for a physical counter attack.

This movement makes a firearm based counter attack simpler too since the marksmanship problem just got easier due to us getting farther from his weapon and getting the muzzle of our weapon closer to him at the same time. It also tends to rock them back on their heels and have them reacting to your attack, not carrying out their own attack.

TAKE THE FIGHT TO THEM.

This is really a mindset issue. We can not win a fight by playing defense only. Muhammed Ali may have beaten George Foreman by laying on the ropes and letting Foreman throw punch after punch until he was gassed but that does not work in a street fight with weapons involved.That was a boxing match with rules not a street fight and Foreman was not shanking Ali with a butcher knife for the first 8 rounds.....

If we are to stop them NOW then we need to STOP them now.That requires us to do as much damage in a short amount of time as possible. The only way to do that is ruthless counterattack.

Do not hit them once and look for the result. Hit them until they are out of the fight. Shoot them to the ground. Stab them to the ground. Knee and elbow them to the ground. Whatever you have, use it until they are no longer a threat and make your escape. This is fast and dirty and if you are timid or worried about hurting them they WILL hurt you. You are trying to destroy them as quickly as you can.