The best martial arts for self defence

A self defence martial art needs to be direct, aggressive, and most of all effective we all know that showing off does not work in a street fight this is the reason most people prefer Krav Maga because it is the closest martial art to a street fight but in a safe environment. Krav Maga is very effective because it teaches moves that anyone can do yet can cause the most amount of damage to your opponent . However from what I have seen of systema It looks good but never done it myself and is really hard to find in Australia.

(I have trained in Krav)

 

Not boxing ? ( or any other pressure tested art )


Also, self defence is about much more than fighting - situational awareness, reading body language, verbal skills etc. That's why it has it's own forum

 

Krav Maga incorporates knees, elbows, headbutts, kicks, joint locks and throws and disarms boxing has two aspects punching and foot work it's good but I would say a prerequisite to actual self defence Mauy Thai is probably better than boxing for it has knees elbows punches and kicks but again this would be a prerequisite to self defence, Krav Maga does teach you to be well aware of your surroundings this is one of the key aspects just watch any video I would recommend you watch any Itay Gil clip then you will get a better idea of what I'm trying to say.

 

He asked why I don't recommend boxing as a self defence art I do but I think boxing defiantly has it's flaws and it just so happened that I used krav maga as an example of what a self defence art in my opinion should be like.

Yes I agree that there are a lot of good martial arts out there (silat and hapkido are my personal choice) but Krav Maga was the martial art I used as an example and sorry for the poor Grammar I was in a rush.

 

Boxing has many things going for it as a self defense system; to criticize it for only utilizing fists is shallow and ignorant. The utility of a martial art for self defense is not predicated upon how many striking surfaces it uses.

 

The more complete the system, the more complete it is. That should not be contentious or cause for denigration. Boxing is excellent and I would probably not have got my black-belt in KM if I had not gone to boxing classes but MT is more complete and MMA more complete than that.
Then if you add avoidance, defusing, distraction, escape strategies; etc. you continue towards a comprehensive SD system.
But you also have to strike a balance between the time spent learning to do something effectively and its relative use in a fight.

Having said that, the more recent Itay Gil videos I've seen are pretty grim.

 

And too dangerous to show you at full speed or contact.

 

Where I would say boxing is meaningfully lacking in terms of self defense is education on the legal system, soft skills like deescalation, grappling and weapons work. Saying that it's poor for self defense because it doesn't teach kicking is focussing on the wrong variables.

That's kind of my point - if we're really focussing on what boxing is missing it's not kicks and elbows. My guess that if we trained two sets of people in a comprehensive self defense system, one only utilizing boxing techniques in the striking component and one using kickboxing, then ran them through some sort of replicable scenario, we would not see a substantial difference between the two populations.

He looked pretty nice in the videos I saw, but this is the first I've heard of the guy.

 

Boxing and Muay Thai are both lacking the same thing as a physical component of self-defence training: techniques that allow for a continuum of force.

 

While it might be more difficult to utilise boxing against the perennial 'drunken uncle at the bbq' the confidence and physical preparedness might aid verbal de-escalation and restraint. with Muay Thai I think the clinch and throws could be pretty solid options for control and restraint.

Ultimately the individual needs to scale their physical response to what they can articulate and prove to be the level of physical threat. In assaults and predatory attacks most of your physical tools from either boxing or Muay Thai are not going to be seen as excessive providing the pre-fight stuff was handled well. The problem is you won't learn any of that from either.

 

That is making the assumption that assaults and predatory attacks are going to be the most common context in which physical intervention is needed.

That may be true for young people who are at most risk from alcohol-fuelled social violence, but certainly not true for many other demographics, especially once they have their own family. It also isn't true for those who want to augment and pressure test restraining techniques used in their profession (the majority of which do not allow trainers to pressure test in any meaningful way).

Doesn't thinking that Muay Thai clinch and throws could be pretty solid options for control and restraint fall down in the same way that thinking one's kata practice will prepare them for extreme violence? You have to recreate the contexts in which you wish to function as closely as possible.

 

I think boxing and Muay Thai address the physical elements well for civilians who want to protect themselves from social or asocial violence. I do agree that professionals will need more tailored training for a specific set of considerations. So that is definitely a good point.

Regarding my comments on the clinch and throws: I know that they work for restraint because I can control and have been controlled using them. That's nothing like supposing Kata carries over.

When you look at how much the clinch features in the training approaches for law enforcement and security personnel it stands to reason. The ISR matrix is a broad curriculum which deals with all sorts of specifics for violence professionals but their physical management and restraint in basically a thai boxing cover as a flinch, crash to clinch and control.

 

With the kata thing, I was only making the point that you should try to recreate the context in which you wish to function as closely as possible, not that it was directly equivalent.

I also don't deny that boxing is a great base for being handy in a scrap, it's one of the best (I'm sure MT can be too, but I've only seen MT practitioners in any kind of violent situation twice, and it didn't work out well for them, both times trying to trip someone from the clinch actually, so I'll reserve judgment on that).

Are you saying that going to a MT gym is pretty much the same as attending ISR Matrix courses? I'd not heard of ISR Matrix before, but watching a few videos it doesn't look like a similar training environment at all, even if many base skills transfer.

 

No, for sure not saying that! Ha

Just saying that there is a reason the clinch features so heavily in a lot of violence management training. That reason is it is a good place to control from and to either strike or take threat to ground in a dominant position.

I completely agree that either boxing or MT are incomplete for self defence. Just thought that force continuum options do exist and that when considering use of force it's useful to focus on pre-fight awareness and legal ramifications; and if you have that grounding using boxing or MT becomes safer in terms of appropriate levels of force.

 

Fair enough

I've trained with people who've trained in boxing or MT, but never trained in it myself, so I'll defer to your superior knowledge. I am surprised to hear you adamant that they both have solid repertoire for softer subduing skills though.

I was also surprised that you and Philosoraptor didn't mention any grappling systems, particularly BJJ, or BJJ in an MMA context.

 

That's because BJJ doesn't work in a street fight.

 

As far as boxing goes, it doesn't really. Thai boxing gyms don't train to subdue for sure but I have used the clinch to control sparring partners, been controlled by sparring partners and used it to control/restrain violent teenagers safely in an institutional setting as part of my old job. So I know at least that the physical skills/tools are there.

 

Oh yeah; lava

Even with well-meaning people who are relatively well-read in self-defence material, there does still seem to be a propensity to revert back to mainly considering street brawls and stranger rape as the focus of SD. It's a pet peeve of mine.

For young people who like to party, social violence is undoubtably a hazard, and having tools to deal with the more extreme end of the force continuum is undoubtably a good idea. Life can be far more complicated than that for many people though, public violence is the most visible kind (obviously) but I think many people would be surprised at the amount, and variety, of physical altercations that go on behind closed doors, where even if the person in need of training were able to injure their aggressor, psychologically it would not be an option for them.

I've seen, and talked to, people who've trained in all-out-aggression-and-nothing-else RBSD, and some combat sports (including boxing and MT) suffer cognitive dissonance and getting stuck on the "decide" portion of the OODA loop, because the options that came naturally to them from their training were not at all how their character and emotions wanted the situation to be resolved.