Why didn't she run?

[Van Canna]

Excellent post Mike. Something to think about when teaching self defense.

That 'control' factor acts upon survival hope. I like what you said about 'abandoning hope'...

[jorvik]

I think that it's best not to generalise here. I worked with domestic violence cases for a while, and I came to the conclussion that not every woman could be a victim and those that were ( and this will offend some people) chose to become one, those that didn't got out the relationship quickly. Now I'm not saying that they wanted an abusive relationship, but they didn't realise in some strange way that the relationship with the particular person they were with would always be abusive, and if they chose to stay with them, then they chose to be abused. To me they had a certain mindset, a steroe type of what a victim of domestic violence is.
The point that I'm making is that in another case the woman would have run for her life, or maybe tried to scratch his eyes out or screamed like a crazy woman and saved herslef

[Van Canna]

True enough, but it is best to 'train' women along that thinking as Mike Wrote.

[mhosea]

Comparing Amy Lord's experience with domestic violence is like comparing a fission bomb to a fission reactor. Yeah, I see the similarities, but there are some serious differences. Anyway, I don't mean to be blithe. As we all know, "Why didn't she run?" is one of those questions that is quick on the tongue of people who know exactly nothing about violence and how they themselves would react to it. In hindsight we know that she should have done anything and everything to fight or run. Hindsight being 20/20, what non-lethal events should have tipped her off well before the end that she needed to fight or run for her life?

[Stryke]

I think that attributing these attributes to women , rather than everyone is a mistake , many men have the same tendencies and will placate and go to denial rather than confront the real issue.

In fact many males also fall into the opposite trap and Ego often leads them to fail to confront the real issues in a assault/monkey dance and they also fall into denial and role playing and escalation , there is a clear cognitive dissonance between what they want and what is happening and there experience.

I think Debecker covers it well, when he discusses manipulation , things like charm and bargaining , and social conditioning , and how you need not be polite , and you need to realise that manipulation is just that and there is an agenda. Ego is the same if you listen to the story , you are not addressing the problem any more.

It takes some serious introspection and training to deal with these very natural tendencies.

You need a strategy and a process that is ingrained and programmed to not break down under pressure.

Flight, Fight or freeze

Buying time is a strategy but it must be an active considered strategy based on opportunity not hope.

[mhosea]

The only thing sort of specific to women here is the mind control technique that I mentioned. This could work with a man, but you do need a large disparity of force to pull it off.

To answer my own question before, I think the clues that people need to be taught are based on understanding the script of resource predation. The resource predator doesn't want to commit kidnapping. Once the perp tries to move you, then it should be game on.

[Stryke]

Good point , but just for conversation

Its fear not force that is the first weapon, someone able to psychologically escalate and demonstrate capacity beyond the victims experience and comfort, a large percentage will shut down.

often predators pick victims on the capacity and reaction to fear.

I recall a Mike McGuire seminar where he made the point that a vast amount of people could not handle a committed verbal assault let alone a physical one.

I think its quite human to be overwhelmed.

everyone needs tactics/plans to fight this and manage to get active.

[jorvik]

Quote
"The only thing sort of specific to women here is the mind control technique that I mentioned. This could work with a man, but you do need a large disparity of force to pull it off."

This is why I refferred to domestic violence, this is a classic symptom of domestic violence, and that is why I also brought up the point that not all women IMHO can become victims of domestic violence.
This could easily happen to a man, instead of one attacker think 3 or 4 and you have a very similar situation. I think the point that people are overlooking is that everybody thinks that what she did was odd, why the heck didn't she run? we are trying to understand a very strange event,

[Van Canna]

http://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/he ... story.html

[Van Canna]

http://www.timlarkin.com/book.php?inf_c ... e575051420

This should be interesting.

[Van Canna]

http://www.wbur.org/2013/08/01/amy-lord-developments

[mhosea]

I think the point that people are overlooking is that everybody thinks that what she did was odd, why the heck didn't she run? we are trying to understand a very strange event,

People allow themselves to be moved to a secondary crime scene too frequently for me to regard it as a "strange event". That is the key to understanding it. IMHO, "everybody" is a euphemism for a large number of naive people who want to feel safer by telling themselves the story that, had it been them instead of Amy Lord, they would have acted differently. As you say, some percentage actually would have acted differently. Of this I have no doubt! We have examples from the past. However, I'm struggling to see the relevance of this. The victim here is one person, not a percentage of people.

[Stryke]

Its not unusual plane loads of people have been manipulated like this, its dangerous to think it won't happen to us.

Life isn't a movie were everyone springs into action, the primal urge to survive can be manipulated against us

[jorvik]

Quote
"However, I'm struggling to see the relevance of this. The victim here is one person, not a percentage of people."

Well I look at the threat level to women, all women.I mean I am married to one so it is in my interest to see if this is common or not

[Stryke]

Debeckers pre incident indicators

The Unsolicited promise

Forced Teaming. This is when a person implies that he has something in common with his chosen victim, acting as if they have a shared predicament when that isn't really true. Speaking in "we" terms is a mark of this, i.e. "We don't need to talk outside... Let's go in."

Charm and Niceness. This is being polite and friendly to a chosen victim in order to manipulate him or her by disarming their mistrust.

Too many details. If a person is lying they will add excessive details to make themselves sound more credible to their chosen victim.

Typecasting. An insult is used to get a chosen victim who would otherwise ignore one to engage in conversation to counteract the insult. For example: "Oh, I bet you're too stuck-up to talk to a guy like me." The tendency is for the chosen victim to want to prove the insult untrue.
Loan Sharking. Giving unsolicited help to the chosen victim and anticipating they'll feel obliged to extend some reciprocal openness in return.

The Unsolicited Promise. A promise to do (or not do) something when no such promise is asked for; this usually means that such a promise will be broken. For example: an unsolicited, "I promise I'll leave you alone after this," usually means the chosen victim will not be left alone. Similarly, an unsolicited "I promise I won't hurt you" usually means the person intends to hurt their chosen victim.
Discounting the Word "No". Refusing to accept rejection.