After a stumble-start last fall, my experiment with a women-only karate class is off to a fantastic new start. The first class was on Tuesday, with seven women in attendance ( Read more... )

So it's been a little less than four months since I swallowed my nervousness and made Seeing Is Understanding publicly accessible.

I've been blown away by its continued visibility. It's a rare day that someone doesn't view it here or over at WordPress. Between the two, it's around 4000 views. And just when I think it's finally trickling off, a ( Read more... )

True or false: “If you have to fight, you’ve already done something wrong.”

If you’re male, or female but educated in self-defense primarily by males, you will say True. If you’re female, aware of the dynamics that most commonly lead to real self-defense situations, you will say False. If you teach self-defense, and want your students to ( Read more... )

I've been blown away by the spread of, and positive response to, my last post. It freaked me out a little at first, seeing the views here and at BMB keep rising. My hope is the folks who read it will find not only something interesting, but reason to look ahead with positive hope.

As much as we (using "we" in the most general sense) like to ( Read more... )

This is about speaking up, creepers, and what good men don’t always see.  Names have been changed.

Some time ago, I was having lunch with a group of friends-four men, one woman, and me.  I’ve known most of the group for five or six years.  We were talking about shared past experiences when one of the men mentioned that he missed Larry.  “Gotta like ( Read more... )

In comments, sartorias asked, "Also, talk about strategies with multiple attackers? You want them in one another's way, of course, or to funnel them if you can, but what if they encircle you ( Read more... )

I was sent a link to a women's magazine article giving five tips for self-defense that were credited to a woman with an advanced rank in karate.

Look: I respect any woman who has trained so long-particularly a woman who began at a time when women weren't much wanted or expected to be in a dojo. That's a woman like one of my own primary instructors ( Read more... )

1.  People accustomed to using strength often have a hard time learning to throw, partly because strength permits them to "cheat" on technique if the majority of their training partners are not as strong. People who are smaller and weaker learn proper technique more quickly because errors in body mechanics are immediately apparent.

2.  Learning to ( Read more... )

People who haven't fought at speed have no idea how fast a fight moves. In the time it takes to count one-Mississippi, you can be struck a few times. There is no moment to come up with a plan. The advantage goes to the one who doesn't need to think about what should be done next. (Critical consideration, since the average 911 response time can be ( Read more... )

This story troubles me greatly.  It's taken me awhile to pinpoint exactly--beyond the obvious--why.  During this morning's karate class, I think I figured it out.  Now to see if I can articulate it.  I'm using a bunch of newbie-author italics and bolds.  Oh, well.

The decision made by the Readercon board says to me that harassment happened, and that ( Read more... )