Category Archives: Hock’s Blogs

Pre-Fight? What About Pre-Crime?

“Keep your ‘scene’ just a ‘scene,’ and not a crime scene, baby.” – Kojak

There has been much ado these last years in training/seminar circuit about pre-fight indicators. Instructors present a list that has actually been around since the 1970s. So new? No. Just new to new people, that is. Through those early years the list rarely filtered down into the local “kuraty” clubs, so to speak, so its arrival decades later, was big and big business for some. It is shocking to me that so many martial veterans were unaware of these set-ups.

It seems that most pre-fight indicator lists, and their courses, however have been mostly about “boys in bars fighting.” Not about criminals and crime. NOT a pre-crime confrontation list! The pre-assault advice covered is usually  what an angry person does just before he or she hits you. Which is a crime, but not always a premeditated criminal plan-ambush. Not that these emotional “sucker punches” aren’t important too, and  criminals about to attack you also have biological symptoms too. So for the record, we list are the classic tips.

What are Some Tip-Offs He May Attack You? This info was first taught to me in the 1970s at military and Texas police academies. I’ve collected it all, adding some, and the list is in my teaching outlines since the 1990s and in Fightin’ Words book. My Training Mission One book is all about hand, stick, knife and gun Stop 1 “collisions,” that is, all the things that happen before physical contact from sniper range to stand-offs. Since you are not reading those now, you are reading this, here are some of those trouble-tips.

Now, I do not want you to over-emphasize this information as some kind of cure. Just read over the list and keep them in mind. The list was created and repeated here because these tips/events have happened. I have seen them many of them when dealing with people for decades in this upset and angry, drugged or drunk “people business” called police work.

When a person becomes stressed, angry and aggressive, his or her body might react, not always, but sometimes demonstrates some changes. Here are some of these changes that research, history and experience may induce a sudden attack/leap upon you. Many people suggest that in a real fight situation, a person has no time to read these clues. Sometimes, yes, I agree. But, this is not always true. Sometimes there are confrontations and people do have the time to see these tip-offs. Every professional and every citizen needs to read this list and at least become aware of these points.

Obviously the clues vary from situation to situation and person to person. But, better to know these on the list, than not, or to ignore they even exist. I have seen them unfold myself on police calls and arrests.

  • His eyes bulge.
  • He has that 1,000 yard stare.
  • He suddenly seems to ignore you.
  • He squints.
  • He assesses your body parts and gear as potential targets.
  • His mouth becomes dry, creating odd lip and jaw movements.
  • His teeth clench.
  • His voice changes.
  • He actually, clearly voices violent intentions.
  • His words become spastic and distracted.
  • He twitches.
  • His nostrils flare.
  • His breathing increases.
  • He takes one big sudden breath.
  • His face color changes, maybe reddens or pales.
  • His veins bulge.
  • His chin tightens, or drops.
  • His neck tightens.
  • His jaw juts (dumb but he still does it).
  • He babbles as though his thoughts are not guiding his voice.
  • He doesn’t babble and actually vocalizes his plans of attack.
  • He actually tells you his plans! “Why I’m gonna…”
  • His arms swing, maybe with body turns (a big deal and easy cover for a sucker attack).
  • His fingers and fists clench (blood leaving those extremities).
  • His fingers drum surface tops.
  • His hands shake.
  • He extends a hand to shake yours. Could be a trick.
  • Hands go to weapon, carry sites on the body (previously listed)
  • He turns away (critical sucker punch set-up).
  • His hands and arms travel to near obvious pre-fight postures and positions. He positions his hands high on his chest, neck, chin or head. Raises up to  seemingly innocent, high positions as in a fake head scratch, like a yawn or a stretch.
  • He strikes a pre-fight posture, such as a boxer.
  • He raises from a seated position.
  • He tries to wander.
  • He bends slightly at the knees. (A sporty-like body crouch is never a good sign. I want to say in my experience that I have found one of the biggest tip-offs to trouble is a crouch! Bending at the knees. When the other person crouches. This is a springboard to athleticism. Not only might they attack you, or run off, but in the mixed weapon world we live in, people have a tendency to crouch and draw knives and guns.)
  • He gets too close.
  • His body blades away from you.
  • He suddenly takes off his shirt, jacket or watch.
  • He “expands” his chest.
  • Heel and toe tapping.
  • Positioning near potential improvised weapons.
  • Shirt lift about his belt line (this is NEVER a good thing).
  • Keep adding to this list.

Pre-Crime. But, what of pre-crime indicators? Planned criminals can display none of the signs. They can smile, act and approach with a trick, gimmick or question. I am not sure that the average Joe and Joan grasp the fact that the thrilling, pre-fight indicator list can be quite different than the pre-crime indicator list. Oh, and I can hear the snoring already beginning because this now reads like…“crime prevention.” BORING! Huh? Crime prevention is often cluttered with “locking your doors,” and “putting up outdoor lights,” and…and…still awake? Still reading?

How does one…pre-crime? How do you detect an ambush crime? Pre-crime studies are different than pre-fight studies. And I believe that while many virgin schools and virgin seminar attendees are so happy to hear about all the “fist clenching” and “1000 yard stares,” that the presenter and attendees miss the crime prevention aspects.

Collecting criminal intelligence in general and in your area in important. Stopping rapes, robberies, abductions/kidnappings, home invasions and murders. Who, what, where, when, how and why do you get ambushed into a crime? Sometimes there’s a little overlap between the two categories, sure. But pre-crime is different and diverse. For example, there are usually little if any pre-fight indicators in a criminal ambush. Many criminals just ambush you from behind. The element of surprise has defeated the greatest militaries of the world and it can defeat you too. 

What can we do to make pre-crime sexy again? It’s hard. Publishers use to create a fair amount of crime prevention books years ago. They were quickly rendered onto the Dollar Sale table. No sales? No more books.

People do somewhat remember The Gift of Fear. Why? The stories, that’s why. Years ago, Gavin Debecker wrote that entertaining book, The Gift of Fear. First editions really promoted an ESP-ish, Spidey-Sense as the gift. Neuro science developments in the 2000s proved otherwise – that it wasn’t magic, rather we react from learned behavior. Your “gut” instinct is almost completely a trained mind from vast sources. The Gift stories were thrilling (psychology has already proven that stories and “war-stories” are the best, longer-lasting teacher). But take out the cool stories? And what’s left, the skeleton of advice? Strip out the tales and you have a BORING crime prevention hand-out from your local police department. “Lock your doors.” “Put up lights.” “Watch out for strangers.” “Watch out for dark places.” Etc. Yawn.

The routine crime prevention pamphlet can leave something to be desired. It usually lacks a certain first-person, in-the-moment advice from…stories. Whereas watching a news story about an unlocked door, and a sobbing crime victim, is a better teacher than a McGruff pamphlet.

Geography, plus architecture, plus criminal mind. For one example of a study area for pre-crime in the “where” category, I wrote about this in my book Fightin’ Words. I worked a rape once by a bus stop. In the daytime, this ¾ enclosed bus stop looked normal and safe. A curved sidewalk ran behind the little clear, plastic edifice. In the middle of the walkway, beside the curve was a small grassy area, then tall fences of an apartment complex. This area had a gigantic bush-looking tree next to the sidewalk. Looks safe and normal. In the daylight. But at night? It was a trap. Poorly lit. A college girl walked by and was snatched by a thug from behind this bush. When called out to the case, I saw this scene at night and could see what a trap it was, from a criminal mind perspective. Daytime? No. Night time, yes.

An equation for trouble. Who, what, when, where, how and why? These questions can be investigated with good intel, research, experience, and an adequate mind, to predict crime scenes. With the “who, what, where, when, how and why” questions.

  • Who are you as a victim? Study victimology.
  • What crime could occur?
  • Where are you most or partially vulnerable to crime?
  • When are you most or partially vulnerable to crime?
  • How will the criminal approach?
  • Why are you there? Why are you still there?
  • This is just the beginning of the exam…

Hey, I let’s make crime prevention interesting again! I mean, doesn’t “Pre-Crime” sound cooler than “Crime Prevention?” We can do this.

“Keep your “scene” just a “scene” and not a crime scene…baby.”

(Just a side story about the crouch. Years ago I attended at Simunitions course alongside some police officers, some military and some gun instructors. Long story short, I shot a man with a camera. The suited-up trainer stood before us and did or did not do something. We students didn’t know what he planned. The guy’s hands were behind his back. He put a hand up front and held an old an old school camera and I drew and shot him in the chest. One-handed. The other attendees hemmed and hawed, “Hock shot a cameraman!”

The training was filmed and at the end of the day we watched and commented. My cameraman/death part came up and I squirmed a bit in my chair. But then we saw why I drew and shot? The trainer crouched. Deeply. His hand came out like a fast pistol draw. His hand on the way, twisted into a vertical looking grip. His eyes inside his face shield went wide.

This all happened so fast, I nor anyone caught this to comment on at the moment. But on the film, we got to see why I drew and shot. “No wonder he got shot,” One said. The trainer had completely replicated a pistol quick draw but produced a camera instead. This is not how a person, when questioned, would show he held a camera in his hand. But…I still shot an innocent person. At least it was in training. Gun people in training need to have humans in front of them doing things like this. (The crouch is almost always a  real sign of pending trouble.)

___________

Hock’s email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

Get the book Fightin’ Words, paperback or ebook, click here

Who Do We Fight? Drunk Uncles, Criminals and Enemy Soldiers!

 

I worry about the “who, what, where, when, how and why” questions.  In my courses and should be in your courses  too, part of the “Who Question  is “who do we fight?” Well, we fight three “enemies.” 

  1. Your “drunk uncle”
  2. Criminals
  3. Enemy soldiers

1: Who? Drunk Uncles:  “Drunk uncle” is a metaphor that means all your relatives, near and dear, near and far. Kin folk or those close enough to be. It is very common in life to fight people that you do not wish to really hurt. Like your drunk buddy or uncle/relative. In police work we are also expected to fight but not really hurt people unless things get really “out-of-hand” and the situation escalates. But in person-to-person, poke your buddy’s eye out, bite off his ear, hammer-fist his throat or neck, smash his face, break bones, shatter his knee, and then see what happens to you. Usually, often, jail and lawsuits. Lots of money and problems. There is a whole lot of domestic violence out there, and violence on, and from, “who you know” is a big problem. (Remember, there are many intricacies in the complex laws of family violence, lest of all assaults and self defense.) 

2: Who? Criminals: Essentially speaking, a stranger, (or for that matter even a friend, uncle or not, officially becomes a criminal when they assault you. You could just lump your uncle into this category once in a while too.  But, what crime is being committed? Who, what where, when, how and why? The level of crime, the exact situation takes the exact temperature of your hot, lukewarm or cold response. Crime by the way often starts out with a trick ambush, which is a deep dive study also into the “what, where, when and “how” questions.

3: Who? Enemy soldiers: We know what those are. We usually like to kill them from as far away as possible, but often can’t do that either. Consider the military “rules of engagement.”

Civil law, criminal law and the Geneva Convention, as well as human ethics – look at fighting these three “bad guys” categories differently. Our responses and solutions confronting  said “uncles, criminals and enemy soldiers” are very situational and may be:

  1. Surrender.
  2. Bargain (talk, show weapon, etc.).
  3. Escape (orderly retreat – you leave or he leaves).
  4. Hurt, on up to maim.
  5. Kill.
  6. Detain, arrest and-or take prisoner.

Of course, not necessarily in that order. All are worth exploring in training through the “who, what, where, when, how and why” questions. All have happened and will happen. I make it a point to cover all of the above in the Force Necessary courses. 

Since we are Force Necessary and not Force UNnecessary, I have done sports and arts for decades. I investigate sports and arts. I only borrow and raid from sports and arts for practical applications to solve these “uncles, criminals and enemy soldier” problems. Sports and arts are great laboratories, but it takes constant vigilance to know where to draw the line between art-sports and survival.

*****

Hock’s email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

Get the book about all this and more, Fightin’ Words, click here

You Who’s on Fire!

Our tenement apartment building was ravaged by a fire two days before Christmas way back in the 1950s. This put us homeless on the streets of Union City, New Jersey. I was about five years old. Our apartment had been two rooms, a kitchen and a living room. No walls. One big open area. My parents opened a couch into a bed, a “hide-a-bed” as they called it, right in the kitchen-dining room area to sleep. I had some kind of small fold-away bed, too. The apartment was one small open area with a bathroom about three or four stories up. Millionaires had elevators. We had creaky stairs. My grandparents lived upstairs.

The fire was one of my earliest memories. My mother, grandmother, and a wee, small boy (me) were walking up Bergenline Avenue when my mother spotted thick smoke in the late afternoon sky ahead of us.“Look, Momma, look at that smoke!” my mother said to my grandmother.“Oh, I hope it’s not our place!” my grandmother said. I heard that. I remember that. I saw the smoke clouds too. I remember that because it was indeed our building. Within minutes, as we got closer and closer, we knew it was.

My grandfather had been napping upstairs on his couch. The fire-truck sirens woke him up; and he ran upstairs to the sixth floor, broke down a locked door, and rescued a crazy old invalid lady. He threw her over his back and ran down the stairs. Firemen saw this and helped him at about the second floor. They said she screamed and grabbed at all the banisters along the way down.

Then he spent the rest of the time helping firemen with the hoses on the fire trucks behind the building. I still vaguely remember seeing him in one of those white tank top, muscle shirts and dress pants, covered in soot, and helping the firemen. His t-shirt was tucked in. He wore a dress belt. Even at 5, I was impressed with my grandfather that day. A rescuer. A helper in an emergency. He was a hero at least that day. He was pretty much a loser in life, an ignorant, unemployed, or poorly employed drunkard in fact, but not that afternoon. The inconsistency of heroism. According to Julius Caesar, “All glory is fleeting.”

The building was quickly gutted. An old tinderbox. We lost everything. We retreated to the nearest safe street corner with the rubberneckers. And another first memory of mine was seeing my father walking down a side street to us. He got the call about the fire at his factory job, and they let him off work. He took the bus up Hudson Boulevard from Jersey City. It was dark by then. Flames, sparks, and smoke curved over the side street. He was just a silhouette on the city sidewalk under this blazing red overhead show, but I recognized his walk.

An Italian guy owned a furniture store on that corner. He and his wife let us wait outside the store in the vestibule after my dad got there. My mother was typically hysterical. My dad, ever the WW II vet used to the slog of life, was calm. I remember his crouching down to a squat and lighting a cigarette with his big, heavy lighter, the flames and smoke in the distance. Years later I saw a photo of him in his scrapbook down in that same squat at a calm moment at the Battle of the Bulge. His forearm was resting on his knee, the ever-present Camel cigarette dangling in his open hand.

The fire raged on, and we couldn’t leave. We didn’t own cars! And we didn’t have anywhere to go if we did. Our relatives lived miles away; and they were also poor folks in small, tiny, shared apartments. The store owner and my dad towed some old used furniture out of the store and into the dirty hallway outside it.

That night after the fire was extinguished, we slept out there on two or three used couches under some mover’s blankets. The owner had to eventually lock up the store and go home. Unable to fall sleep on a small couch, I saw my dad pee in the street in the middle of the night. Later, I did the same. I lay there on the couch looking out at the dead-of-the-midnight street. I guess a sense of fleeting detachment stuck with me from that moment. Plus, I saw the calm of my father. The heroics of my grandfather. My hysterical mother. My first real memories of life came from that night.

They took up a collection at the can factory for us. I remember that. We begged and borrowed for a week or two here and there, much of which I can’t remember except for feeling like a refugee. It was a moving blur. You know, there weren’t many hotels back then, not like there are today. And I don’t know what we did that actual Christmas Day. Where did we go? There was no official Christmas that year. My parents cobbled it all together and got another apartment on a street closer to the Hudson River in a small city called West New York.

They are all dead now. Only I remain. I think about that fire just about every Christmas. Not every Christmas, but many, especially as I get older. I did this time. I think about sleeping in that dirty hallway of the furniture store. I learned that things could go to hell in a minute, blow up, burn up, and disappear. Best not cling too dearly to things. Best not.

Everyone is dead now, but me. I think about that fire just about every Christmas. Not every Christmas, but many, especially as I get older. I did this time. I think about sleeping in that dirty hallway of the furniture store. I learned that things could go to hell in a minute, blow up, burn up, and disappear. Best not cling too dearly to things. Best not.

I learned that you could look up in the sky and see smoke and then look down and realize that it might just be you who’s on fire.

Hock’s email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

This story appears in Hock memoirs/police books. Get the paperbacks or ebook downloads, or collect the beautiful hardcover. Click here:

WHAT are you Wearing?

WHAT ARE YOU WEARING?

(Or how I learned to not wear a baseball uniform when practicing Tennis…)

(If you are happy camper doing classic martial arts in classic uniforms? Gis. Barefoot? You are just drawn to the idea? Then ignore me. What do you care what I think? This is just a personal rant.)

I was invited by some folks to a big reunion in the Philippines the other day, and I had to gracefully back out again. Because…because I just don’t go to such things. I am kind of a puzzle piece that doesn’t fit well in most places. When they asked why, one of my rambling answers was, “…yeah and you know,” this…that…“and I would have to wear a uniform, and…” 

Wearing the martial arts uniform. How many times have I dodged events through the years partially because I might be, I would be expected to wear a uniform? Thinking about it, I have not worn a gi of any system in probably in some 20 or so  years. Wow. I don’t have THAT uniform anymore. Nor any uniform. No black belts shoved in a corner. There are all long gone. I don’t recall throwing them away, but they are simply gone from my closets. And I’ve had many a gi since 1972. Kenpo. Karate. Kempo. Jujitsu (old school, not just wrestling). Aiki-Jitsu. Modern Arnis. Arnis de Mano. Not counting Thai shorts. All…gone.

I did show up, non-uniform, at a few events many years ago. One time in the 90s, I taught at a big event in San Francisco alongside Wally Jay and Uncle Bill de Thouars. There was about 300 people there.  ALL in gis except me and Dean Goldade. We wore t-shirts, blue jeans and shoes. We really stuck out like sore thumbs. Like disrespectful bums. I hear now that t-shirts and gi pants or sweat pants are acceptable in some big events and gatherings. Which may get me back in circulation?

Being a “60’s, redneck-hippy,” I kind of rebel against uniforms. I had to wear an Army uniform and a police uniform. And I was detective for a long time, and had to wear a suit and tie for many years, and that is kind of a uniform in a way, but a step aside a regular uniform. On special assignments we wore only the smartest, tactical of clothing for what we were doing. The ultimate goal, I think. Which is getting to my point about playing dress up…

But I am a little twisted. Decades ago, I didn’t get into the martial arts to be a “martial artist.” I just wanted to learn all the …you know…the secrets…of fighting. And, through those decades, where else could you go to learn such things? I started in Parker Kenpo in 1972 and the classes were draped and adorned in classic uniforms. I mindlessly accepted this policy as an annoyance. Terrible, huh? Then, in police training in 1973, I noticed that when attending the – what has become defensive tactics – classes, police showed up in sweat pants, athletic shoes, t-shirt and usually brought along their pistol belts.  At least they wore shoes for God’s sake. At least they brought their belts, but many times they did not wear the belts unless the training switched to gun-related stuff. And what’s with the sweat pants? The clothing question remained for me since 1972.  Why are we not training in the clothes that we will probably be fighting in?

I’ve always analyzed stuff through the “who, what, where, when, how and why” questions?  

  • WHO am I to be wearing a uniform? WHO is he?
  • WHAT exactly am I wearing? WHAT is he wearing?  What gear?
  • WHERE will I be fighting? In terms of smart and,or common clothing for the location?
  • WHEN will I be fighting? In terms of clothing? Season? Night? Day?
  • HOW will I fight in these clothes?
  • WHY am I REALLY dressing in training this way, anyway?

WHAT ARE YOU WEARING? (and why?)

In my classes, in my school I operated years ago in north Texas, there were no uniform requirements. People could wear whatever they wanted. Several of my students were cops and they would show up for class in their actual uniforms, which I encouraged. I know this is not good for school sales and the school-money-systems set up by the franchise programs today. I sold and still sell t-shirts, but they are not required. I understand the requirement though. The whole group-thing, and the martial uniform is supposed to create all kinds of group psychological “unity,” – yeah – I know, but I didn’t care about all that sales structure stuff. I mean we are not preparing a military unit where such group/unit psychologies really shine. 

Through the years I have seen all kinds of “fashions.” Some random notes on the fashion subject…

  • The old Jeet Kune Do guys and gals were often seen in the 80s and 90s in tank tops and really short, shorty-shorts. I did that too. That changed through time. Thank goodness. I was tired of trimming my pubic hairs.
  • The US Army, for example, did do much of their new combatives courses in an Army uniform, sure, but…a lot of it barefoot! (The whole “save-the-mats,” forever thing.) And the real sin – mostly WITHOUT standard gear like helmets, belts and backpacks, etc.  
  • The newer looks of Krav Maga dodge the classic uniforms, but many if not most, require you to wear their sweat pants with stripes and THEIR t-shirt. The whole sales/branding thing of businesses. (I get it! I understand the process. Do you as a student understand the process?)
  • Some of the BJJ gis look to me like walking, color billboards. Huge swaths of colors. How about those checker pattern ones from Korea? Warning! Watching them in motion might cause seizures! (As an aside, as a clothing anecdote, I noticed  that there are a number of BJJ guys who slip on blue jeans and have instantly/suddenly become hand, stick, knife, gun masters. The martial, underground call these people, “BJJ in Blue Jeans.”)
  • Then there is the “no-gi” “BJJ-ish” crowd. Sounds smart, I mean who wears all those pajamas “in the street” when they wrestle? Yet, they seem to be tossing aside the classic uniforms for modernity, but have instead switched over to like…rubber, skin-tight, Spiderman suits (what colors and designs!) and they are still…barefoot. It’s like they said, “Hey, let’s trade in that silly old, gi, bulky, uniform idea,” (for yet another silly, skin tight, but yet rubberized one.) You end up with the same abstract problem for “the street.”
  • One of my friends is an ex-ninjitsu player, with many trips to Japan under his belt. He told me that the Japanese people are mystified as to why Americans (or anyone) still dresses up like a ninja. He said they feel the same way as most Americans feel in general about people dressing up in Civil War clothes. Then imagine if Japanese people came to the USA and dressed up in Civil War clothes. (I personally don’t care about this at all, I just find this observation amusing.)
  • Some Sambo uniforms are interesting, with the typical gi top and tight shorts underneath. I think Sambo is great but at first glance, don’t you look and think they forgot their pants? Then after a bit, you get use to the idea.
  • How about those extremely, cumbersome Aikido outfits? Kilts gone wild.
  • In the 1980s, I once attended a “Plain-Clothes” Shooting course, for detectives, put on by retired FBI agents.  We wore what we wore, which at the time for most of us was suits and ties. It was actually very informative, full of great “cop” tips” and very much to the point.
  • The group pictures where everyone is dressed the same sure look nice.
  • If you are training to fight in a Thai boxing match, and you train in Thai shorts? BINGO! If you are training to fight in a Judo meet, and you train in a Judo gi? Bingo! And so on down the list. But what if you take, say… like, Kung Fu to learn to fight an urban rapist or an urban attacker? (What about “rural” attackers?)  It’s still abstract dressing and I think some bingo numbers are missing off your board.

In seminars, I ask attendees to wear street clothes and shoes. We need pockets and belts. Even if they wear “street short pants” they still have pockets and a belt. A shirt over your gun is important, as is a holster. Don’t just show up with a rubber gun and no holster (and belt.) If you have a fixed-blade training knife, you need a sheath to draw it from, else you probably would not have a fixed blade knife with you, walking around the farm or downtown. (This is a BIG disconnect in training schools. A zillion, rubber, fixed-blade knives and no sheaths.)

And, no need to overdress in my seminars as though one is being dropped into Cambodia for two weeks (unless, of course, you are actually being dropped into Cambodia for two weeks). I always wear mat shoes, as I hope every attendee will too, because we often don’t know where I will be teaching and if there is a “no-shoes-mat-rule? We respect that. I, at least will then wear socks because I must hide my horrible Amazonian Jungle, Toe Fungus. Believe me I know CDC is happy that I am not passing this strain around on your mats, around the world. (I know of a system that actually sells socks with their logo on it.)

As a so-called, “self defense instructor,” or whatever it is exactly that I am, I have made a rule for myself I always hope I can remember and consider when drawing up outlines, books and teaching – “reduce the abstract.” This is not easy challenge, given the circumstances of your school or your training grounds.  I have fallen short of this self-imposed standard many times, but I try.  But please consider the phrase, reduce the abstract. And one way of reduction, is to dress right for the who, what, where, when, how and why of your perceived fight. Now, we cannot create 10 or 12 movie sets with a group of improv actors to make everything seem ever-so-real to a student, but we can at least… at very least… dress appropriately.

You don’t find tennis players in practice wearing baseball uniforms. Baseball players are not practicing in football uniforms. Army soldiers do not practice in scuba suits. Know your goal, your mission and dress accordingly. I know people love to belong, love immersing themselves into groups. They love clubs. Tribes. Teams. And showing their pride. This usually means outfits and outfitting the outfits. I get it! I really do. Again, If you are happy camper doing classic martial arts barefoot, in classic uniforms? You are just drawn to the idea? And you understand the questions I am asking? Then ignore me. Ignore this. This is just a personal rant. Who cares what I think anyway? Doing any of the aforementioned things is better than sitting on the couch. I only ask that you at least kick around this idea, understand it and can articulate your opinion on these types of fashion choices.

So…WHAT ARE YOU WEARING!!!! And why?

Signed, The Perennial Outsider

********

Hock’s email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

Get the paperback, Get the ebook, click here

Harvey, Give Me the Shotgun, Or Else!

“Harvey … give me the shotgun, or ELSE!” (and other Harvey tales.)

That was the time when cops usually got killed, I reminded myself, looking at an angry Harvey Wilson with a 12-gauge pump aimed at me. But I thought since I knew him, I could talk him down … I thought….


The first time I met Harvey Wilson, he was drunk riding a horse. Not too unusual since, after all, it was Texas. It was a bitter cold winter night, about 2 a.m. back in the 1970s; and Garry Burns and I were on patrol when we spotted Harvey slumped over the saddle. Harvey had a barn on the back of his one-acre lot with a house in the city limits, and apparently this horse didn’t know the way home to the barn. Or it was on a walk, and Harvey was just there bouncing along for the ride. We coasted up beside the horse and rider.
“Harvey!” Garry shouted.
No answer.
I pulled up far enough ahead that we both could get out.
The old horse walked up to us. We grabbed the reins and stopped the gelding.
“WHAT?” Harvey snapped awake when the horse stopped. “What!” and then started kicking at us.

Harvey was a hard-working stout, black man in his late 50s at the time, living alone in a neighborhood of welfare cases, drug addicts, screw-ups, and fuck-offs. Harvey was a little rowdy and tended to “pull the cork”; but despite the whiskey, he was always at work the next day. That night he fussed and kicked at us enough that Garry decided Harvey needed to spend four hours in our urine-and puke-stained, stinking drunk tank. In other words, he was arrested for “drunk in public.”
We hauled him off the horse and cuffed him in a frisky little wrestling match, all under the big eyes of his calm horse. I put Harvey in the front seat; back then in the pre-cage days, that was where we transported prisoners so we could watch them as we drove. Garry got in the driver’s seat, and I climbed up into the saddle. I rode the horse to the city animal pound while the dispatcher paged out the on-call animal pound worker to meet me there.

Not six months later and alone this time, I repeated the whole drunk-on-a-horse affair again with a smashed and frisky Harvey. If you looked at Harvey’s file, you’d find multiple drunk-in-public arrests. Still, he never seemed to hold a grudge and always held down a job. On weekends you’d drive by his small wooden house; and he would be painting, or cementing, or fixing something. Salt of the Earth. Every once in a while when I was on Saturday or Sunday day shift, I would pull over and get out to talk with him for a few minutes.
“Whatcha’ doing, Harvey?”
“Ohh … oh, fixin’ to clean out my septic tank lines,” he would say softly and breathlessly and rest on a shovel and tell me the symptoms and cure for his latest housing ailment. When he was sober, he was just a fine person.

Then I happened to notice a fairly new red Camaro started appearing; it was parked on the street outside Harvey’s house. One day I saw a very attractive black girl, say in her late 20s or early 30s, pulling up in it and walking into Harvey’s house with her arms full of shopping bags. She entered without knocking. The car remained there night after night. I asked Marvin Hayes, a retired postal worker and a neighbor down the street, about this mystery car and curvy girl.

“Harvey’s got him a girlfriend. YaHeah! And I means to say girl! Young! She’s a sweet young thing, too. From Dallas. I don’t know how they met. And I don’t know how he keeps her. But he bought her dat dere car, you know?”
“NO!” I declared. “The Camaro?”
“Yes, he did. Bought her dat car and, and jewelry, and, and I don’t know what all. YaHeah! I hopes he knows what he is a doin’. Cause you know, this kind of business don’t end well.”

You can say that again. I ran the license plate of the car in the hopes of getting her name and seeing if she had a criminal history. The plate was still registered to a car dealership in Dallas. Back then it used to take a while, maybe even a few weeks, to catch registrations up on NCIC.

In our squad meetings, the sergeant read us the daily blotter each day, the list and quick summary of the events since we left the day before. Over a period of three weeks, there were several domestic disturbance calls at Harvey Wilson’s house. There was already trouble in paradise. I never caught a single one of those domestic calls at Harvey’s house until one Saturday afternoon.

Neighbors reported another fight. When I pulled up, that girl was almost through packing her Camaro. She looked up and smirked at me and continued yelling over her shoulder at Harvey, who was up the small hill of his front yard and by his front porch. When I climbed the small incline, I got my first full, look at Harvey. He was holding a pump shotgun at port arms. His eyes were red and wet, and the veins and muscles in his neck bulged. I knew if I drew my pistol, that action could be a catalyst for him to react and shoot me or her, or both of us. I could just tell. And that is how many, if not most, cops are killed in domestics. Thinking about these things. Feeling them. It’s a gamble.

“I’ll kill her!” he yelled.
“Harvey. Put down the gun. You can’t kill anybody,” I said.
“BITCH! I’ll kill you, BITCH!” he yelled. He was barely paying attention to me and watching her pick up her suitcases from the lawn.
“I bought that car!” he said.
“It is in my name, mutha-fucka!” she yelled.
He pointed his gun at her. My thumb undid the snap of my holster, and I grabbed a handful of my pistol handle. I did not draw the gun yet.
“Harvey. Harvey. Harvey,” I repeated calmly. “You can’t kill her. You can’t kill her over a car. You know that. Give it up man. You can’t be doing that. Put the barrel down. Let her go. You shoot her, and your life is over. She ain’t worth it!”

I inched closer and closer, and he got madder and madder. He was losing it. He waved the gun over to me, inches from fully lifting the stock to his cheek and shooting.
He glared and gritted his teeth, and I could see his fingers moving in waves on the gun. The barrel wandered from me to the girl, then to no one, and back again. During a wander, I got close enough to lunge out and grab the weapon with both my hands and pulled the barrel up and the stock down. With a motion not unlike rowing a double oar of a canoe, I ripped and rolled the gun from his grip.
The girl slammed the car door and burned rubber down the street. Harvey’s little temporary paradise … was gone.
I ran the pump up and down, which spit out the shells across the manicured lawn. When it was empty, I laid it against a porch railing. Harvey sat on the stairs of the porch. I sat down next to him. Marvin had witnessed the whole thing from next door and walked over. He was probably the one who called us.
“Man! Fuck!” Harvey said. “Did I get fucked?”
“She was no good,” Marvin said. And I agreed.

We sat there on the steps for about 10 minutes talking. My backup squad car drove up and stopped. I waved him off, signaling it was all over and everything was okay.
I got up after a bit and said, “Harvey, I am gonna take this shotgun in with me for 24 hours.” I saw Marvin nod his head at me. “You can come down to the station and get it tomorrow.” I picked up the ejected rounds on the manicured grass.
“You got him, Marvin?” I asked.
“I got him. I got him,” Marvin said.

We used to have a policy where we would extract guns from a hot situation where there might be more violence or suicide and lock them up at the police department. Just a local practice. The owner would have to go see the police chief and talk to him and retrieve the gun. And, Ol’ Harvey did just that. He picked up his gun the next day after Chief Hugh Lynch had a word of advice or two for him. Harvey remained quiet and behaved himself with the ladies from then on.

One morning some 10 years later, when I was a detective; and we got a call of a body found near some undeveloped land in the southeast part of town. A cable man and a railroad agent were surveying land to bury some lines near a run of tracks when they stumbled upon a body not that far from the road. It was not uncommon to instinctively dispatch an ambulance to a body like this, and the dispatcher did.
When I got there though, I was surprised to find EMTs feverishly at work at the scene. The railroad man walked up to me and said, “He wasn’t dead! We thought he was dead, but he wasn’t.”
I walked past the agent and to the action. The techs were working on Harvey Wilson! Harvey was dressed up in a suit and looked like he was pulverized to a pulp. He was whisked to the hospital and lay there in intensive care for days in a coma.

I went to Harvey’s house, and Marvin and I tried to reconstruct his last healthy day. One thing for sure, Harvey’s pickup was missing; and I put out a “BOLO” on the truck. We searched his house and found his insurance papers; and through a local agent, we confirmed the license plate number. I was frozen stuck in a bad, violent case with no leads, conjuring a range of hypotheses, and hoping the truck would show up somewhere, or Harvey would just wake up.

The hospital called days later. A nurse said Harvey was up and trying to eat. You know where I went, straightaway.
“What happened, Harvey?” I asked him.
“John Wayne Williams. He asked me for a ride. Then he pulled a gun on me. That skunk fuck. He made me stop the truck out there on Morse Street. He beat me up with his gun and robbed me. Left me for dead meat in the woods. I thought I was gonna die.”

John Wayne Williams. Local gangster. We’d gotten word of his recent parole, and you could bet how long before he would be in violent trouble again. It was that inevitable. And he was indeed a skunk fuck. I got a probable-cause, arrest warrant for Williams, and Danny McCormick and I hunted around day and night, and found him in about two days. He was a muscular, 6 feet 6 inches of smartass ex-con; and when we spotted him in a housing project, parking lot, we both drew down on him with our .45s in case he still had that pistola and to avoid going hand-to-hand with that big bastard. We ordered him on his knees with his hands up and cuffed him quick. He did have a pistol on him. Instant legal trouble for a parolee.

At the station Danny and I interrogated him. He played dumb. We never found that truck. In those days, vehicles were easily stripped and sold for parts in chop shops either out in the county or in Dallas or Ft Worth. But with Harvey’s testimony, I sent him up for the “big bitch (life,)” as this was his third felony. Third time was a bad charm In Texas.

Harvey was never quite the same after that near-death beating. Within a year thereafter, he died of natural causes. Heart attack. One of his kids drove in from Oklahoma and sold the house. New folks lived there quickly. Then Marvin, the old postman died too. After awhile, when you work in a city, so many houses, street corners and buildings, whatever, where ever, you have a memory attached to them when you see them. Places. People. Usually bad memories. I try not to visit my old city anymore, for that reason. Way, way too many bad memories.

***************

Hock’s email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

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Calm Down About Calming Down!

I wonder…has the de-escalation fad sort of died down?

It seems like it was all the rage a while back. Everyone was preaching it in seminars like they were doctors of psychology (you just need to be a doorman, right? Who needs a psychology degree if you were a…doorman?). That subject, and the secret tip-offs subject of “Pre-Fight Indicators,” – as some now call it now, were all the fads.

If you hear all about it once, maybe twice in seminars, how many more times do you need to hear it? But in these seminars, there are always new people mixed in with you. And new people need to hear this stuff at least once. Or, once in awhile. There are new people attending all the time that need to hear this stuff. So, you’re stuck, bubba! And, what’s wrong with a little review anyway? So, you hear the one about “calming down?” As the comedians would say, “have you heard the one about…”

Maybe not? I do realize with the rabid, total invasion of BBJ and MMA, perhaps a whole lot of training these days is just about sport fighting, sport wrestling and exercise/fitness and not much about talking and survival. Some Kravs cover this topic. But, there’s not much on de-escalation in the sporty world, is there? Why should there be?  Yet, despite the gap, the fad seems fading? Me, not being in any of those officially, I’ve covered that stuff for decades as part and parcel of my courses. Stop 1 of my Stop 6 course covers this, though one must continue to communicate throughout the Stop 6, throughout the whole fight if needed.

Decades? Is this advice decades old? In policing this stuff is, as they say, “old hat.” The first list of fight pre-cursors …er …I mean…”indicators…I saw was in the military police academy in 1973. (How’s that for new?)  And the list hasn’t really changed much. My collection/list is in a chapter in my Fightin’ Words book for all “rookies” to see and vets to review. And in police work, we have been, and are, all… about… de-escalation. I attended my first police, “Verbal Judo” class in the 1981. It has always been vitally important in police work to have a “way with words.” I like to say that if I were involved in hiring new police officers, I would seriously examine how “charming” they can be. How witty. How improvisational. How…calm. Charm and calm can go along way in the world, in policing, in arguments. Then sometimes…not. The gambling outcomes, should not cripple you.

So, I myself yawn when I hear people clamor about this-or-that, Joe Blow’s seminar on de-escalation and…”oh, oh my GOD! “And…did you should hear the fight precursor tips!!!! Joe Blow is like Moses!” Folks, those tablets came down from the mountaintop decades and decades ago.

And many of the people who teach this material are really good people, smart and mean well. There’s a good chance they have never been in a fight themselves. Or a victim of a crime? (It is hard to de-escalate a guy with a knife or a gun, who just wants your watch. Think about it. De-escalate by…giving him your watch.) These de-escalating instructors are usually masters of the art of regurgitation. Repeating the words of “elder” others over and over. Hey, that’s the education system. So what of this advice about telling people to “calm down?”

After all, we need these pieces of advice and the masters of communication, because the internet says, “Verbal Deescalation is what we use during a potentially dangerous, or threatening, situation in an attempt to prevent a person from causing harm to us, themselves or others. Without specialized training, we should never consider the use of physical force.” I might add here that there are “third party” de-escalators and times when you are one of the “one versus one.”  

So then, have you heard the one about…calming down? Speaking of regurgitation from the masters… I heard yet again about an attendee of such training. He said, that they said – the instructors that is – that one thing you should NEVER say to de-escalate a situation, NEVER, EVER, NEVER, is to say “calm down.” This ALWAYS makes matters far, far worse, they proclaim. This advice always gets the surprise gasp and laugh from the crowd.  

“Ooohs.” and “Ahhhs.”

But, this is often an inexperienced, regurgitater, trying to sound all…”insider-ish,” veteran and cool. I just don’t believe this is always true. Here’s why.

First off, I have been dispatched to a whole lot of domestic disturbances, arguments and fight calls. And also, when damage was done, I had to investigate them. A whole lot in 26 years. I want to tell you that “situations” are different. They are different. And at some points in various situations, using the term,  “hey, let’s all calm down here,” and variations thereof, does not ALWAYS create World War Three. It depends so much upon (did I already say situation?) the old “Ws and H.” Most of you know by now, I always analyze the world through the Who, What, Where, When, How and WHY recipe.

“And at some points in various situations, using the term,  ‘hey, let’s all calm down here,’ and variations thereof, does not ALWAYS create World War Three.”

Who? Who are you dealing with? A guy who wants to fight every Saturday night and it’s getting near midnight? Who are the onlookers – are we in a show of some sort, where people cannot back down? Who are you anyway? Someone with any speech finesse? A bit of a negotiator? 

What? What is this confrontation about anyway? What are your personality skills to handle it? What are your physical skills to handle things if they go south?

Where? Where is this happening? Private? Public? Again, are his or her “friends” around watching and the loudmouth must put on a show of some sort?

When? Has this confrontation gone way beyond asking for the classic “calm down?”

How? How can you calm this down? Separation? Your tone? YOUR calmness? How else can you say “calm down?”

Why? Why should any party in this mess calm down? Why do you care? If it’s about you? You’re involved? Why are you still there?

Keep asking the “Ws and H” questions about this subject and you’ll think of even more.

One of the worst ways and types of “calm downers,” is when a verbally, skill-less person, obnoxiously shouts, “CALM DOWN!” Almost like a bully or disliked boss would. If that kind of jerk says just about anything it might never work anyway. And therein lies the real problem. Are the two words “calm down” the real culprit to peace? Is it the messenger too? The message or the messenger? There is a lot more going on here than just two “taboo” words.

I think much of our interactions in life are scripted. The script of life. Just about everything does have a script. A script at a fast food window. A script when you enter your office or job. A script at dinner. Your skill at improv, at going “off-script” is important. So, at worst, what are some of the typical, scripted responses to your “Let’s all calm down” proclamation.

  • “Don’t tell ME to calm down.”
  • “YOU calm down, I….”
  • “Calm down?! Why should I calm down?!”

“Line! ?”  The actors whisper on stage when they forget their next line. What’s your next line in this script? Better write one or two ahead of time.

But in summary, I just hate to see people and the police completely stripped of this “calm down” term and idea completely. It is not so taboo. This phrase has and will work. I’ve done it. I’ve used it. I know, I know, I know, a couple of you out there will have some “calm-down-failure” stories. Sure. Probably because of the “who, what where, when, how and why,” and not just the phrase itself. And sometimes because some numb-nuts out there just wants to fight you or them and was drumming up an excuse to do so. He might just want your watch? In that case, anything you say will be over-ridden.

But the term has and will work in some situations, I just hate to see it completely erased from your options.

Okay, now calm down, I’m just telling you the truth about calming down.

*****

Hock’s email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

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Remy Presas and Ernesto Presas – It’s a Macho Brother Thing

“It’s a Brother Thing?” 
There was and is always a lot of talk about the various feuds between Remy and Ernesto through the years. How friendly were they? Could they work together? We have covered some of these stories on the Facebook Presas Tribute page, But, I can write about what I think was one of their last interactions. A final phone call?

In the 1990’s Remy married Canada’s Yvette Wong. She was a terrific girl and a Tai Chi instructor who had a Tai Chi video distributed by Walmart. Many of us met her in the 1990s and we all were very impressed with her. I know I was. Soon he had kids with her! (I can still picture Remy pushing a baby carriage.)

Then…then…disturbing…he suddenly picked up with a Dallas area woman that was, frankly…a mere shadow of a woman compared to Yvette. WHAT? We all asked ourselves. HER!? Really? And he wound up living at her house very near to where I lived. Near the DFW airport. We all felt sad for Yvette and the kids up in Vancouver. I had Remy’s new phone number with this Dallas girl, and while it was nice to have him nearby, but jeez you know? Yvette!

Ernesto came through the USA. It was about…1998? And once again stayed with me for a while for our seminar as well as passing through to some of the others. On this trip he mentioned Remy a few times and how much he missed him and wished he could talk with him. Ernesto was really a “true-blue” family/loyalty kind of guy. Well, hell…I had Remy’s local phone number and he wasn’t that far way. I told Ernesto-

“I have his number. He lives now in the next city from here.” (they might even…meet?)

He wanted to talk to him. Hmmm, this is tricky for me to be in the middle of this. But, I got the number out and dialed it. I got Remy on the phone. Ernesto stood looking out the balcony. Nervous. Waiting.

“Remy…hello…yes…hey, I have Ernesto here in my apartment. He says, he says he really wants to talk to you.”
“Ern…esto?” Remy said.
“Yes.”
“Ahhh, is something wrong?”
“No. He just wants to talk with you.”
“Ahhh, okay.

Whew! I handed Ernesto the phone and he sat at my kitchen table and they talked. I tried to make myself busy around the apartment. From what I could hear from Ernesto’s part, it was going very, VERY well. I was feeling good about this. This call lasted about 20 to 25 minutes, during which Ernesto told Remy that he was his brother and he loved him. The phone call started winding down. It was going so, so well!

Then…then…Ernesto asked.
“Can you…can you helpa me, become more pamous?”

Crap. I knew instantly that was not good. This was not what Remy wanted to hear. And from Ernesto’s face, I knew that asking that question was a mistake. Remy immediately got mad. It almost seemed like that request was the real secret reason for wanting to talk with him. Which it wasn’t. I guess the conversation was going so well, Ernesto just asked. The decades old, sort of rivalry they had reared up again. The whole, younger brother vs older brother thing, doing the same business thing.

Ernesto hung up after that request and shook his head. I don’t know what Remy said but it was not good.

“It was good to talk to him.” Ernesto said. “But, he becomes mad at me at the end.”

Yeah. You have to think that Remy spent his whole life slowly developing contacts and having seminars and working, working, working to establish this…list. The hard way. The “original” way. A path-blazing way. Very few people were doing seminars back then. He and just a few others kind of “invented” the path. And to…to give it away or give a portion away, is very difficult.

Many of us use to think how cool it would have been to have at least one big, Presas Brothers weekend seminar. If I were involved, I could have organized it in Kansas City, center of the country for all to get to. But it would and could never happen. I do believe if Ernesto had not asked that final question, while things would have been so friendly and so fine, and a good memory of what I think was maybe their last conversation (?) Remy still would NOT actively help him or do something with him like a seminar.

In the end I don’t think that Ernesto needed the help anyway. He was doing fine. What would a Remy and Ernesto seminar be like? Look like? Would Ernesto people like to delve so deeply into Tapi-Tapi? Would Remy people like to get back into longer-range, head-banging?  Would something happen, or be said and the two would stop talking?  It’s just a….a macho brother-thing of two macho brothers trying to do the macho “seminar” thing.

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Hock’s Email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

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Binge and Purge – The Martial Arts – Or, How I Learned…

Binge and Purge – The Martial Arts – Or, How I Learned Not to Need Subsection 3B of the Ukulele Islands Miasma Fighting System

I was watching medical doctors discussing things in a lecture and one said, “Remember back in med school? They told us that 50% of what we are learning will be disproved in ten years.” The board of doctors all nodded. 50% is a lot. In a way, in all fields, the sands can shift under your feet too.  Psychology, medicine, science, athletic performance. Fighting. Acne removal. Shoe polishing…prepare to be wrong.

There is a usual amount of talk about the evolution of the martial arts through the centuries and in recent years. The islands of Hawaii were a filtering point for many martial methods as they passed from Asia to the USA. Bruce Lee publicized the barrier-breaking ideas of Jeet Kune Do. MMA (with ground n pound) has evolved to maximize success in sports fights. MMA fights are great laboratories.

I am known for confessing that I am not in love with martial arts per say, nor am I addicted to any one, two or more of them. Per say. I seem to have other odd motivations. These motives have somehow caused me to travel and teach. People say to me,

“It must be great to travel around and do what you love.”

Well, I…I don’t love this. No. Teaching is just a job. A job I got in and evolved in a very odd way from my…my odd “disorders.” Basically, I learned a lot of stuff. Then people learned that I learned a lot of stuff. As a result, people wanted to learn what I learned. I slowly started teaching on the road in the 1990s. Things slowly grew.

Why did I learn a lot of stuff? What motives? I have a very odd, sickness or obsession about tactics, since I was a kid. I don’t care where it comes from, but rather how valuable they are. I am not a historian, pigeon-holing methods into period pieces. If I know that history stuff, it’s just by accident. I suffer from a neurosis that has no name? Martial Syndrome? Martialitis?

I am not a copy machine, replicator of old stuff for the sake of hero- worship, or system-worship.  I want to evolve or even de-evolve if need be. So, like the doctors mentioned above that some things are fixable/replaceable? Smarter, better? Replace it. Since I don’t care about martial arts…per say…I don’t really care about collecting a dead (or living) guy’s subsections of subsections.

After years in “Kuratey-jujitsu” since 1972 and military and police tactics, some sort of sickness then switched on in my head way back in 1986 when I saw the Inosanto/Bruce Lee approach. I can honestly say that not a single day since 1986 has my mind not thought about, or wandered to, some kind of martial subject. Obsessive thoughts. Pervasive thoughts. It’s unhealthy.  I don’t know why. I could collect baseball cards or stamps or bowl like the Dude Lebowski. Instead I collect…hand, stick, knife, gun tactics. Are there any drugs for this malady?

And in pursuit of this collection, I have a peculiar paranoia. Not a typical paranoia, like a fear of “the streets” and being “attacked.” Not a paranoia of what is lurking behind every corner. Not that kind. Not that those things don’t cross my mind, but rather I have a serious fear of…”missing something worthy.”

WHAT am I missing , I fear? Who is teaching what? What do they know that I don’t know? How far am I falling behind? What’s that move? That drill? After all these decades, I do understand that most martial things for me are redundant and repetitive, and there is a lot of repetitive bilge. But maybe not sometimes? When you suffer from this malady, the desire to collect and fear of missing something,  you have to keep eating – and you can’t help yourself –  but…but…eat and purge. Eat, eat, eat and then purge.

You know that bad news about eating/binging and purging. People can die! It rots your pipes! But many people don’t die. In the process they seem to retain enough vitamins/mineral/nutrients to stay alive!

New for the sake of new…is not new. This has been going on a long time for marketing and business. And the grass is always greener. People fall for the esoteric just because of mystique. In the USA, the new “pain rub” medicine must come from Australia. In Australia, it must come the USA. You need to have an educated eye to see through this manipulative crappola.

After these last forty-odd years of odd study, working with smart people, sparring with and without weapons, shooting sims, arresting hundreds of people and working assault, aggravated assault, rape, robbery, attempted murder and murder cases. I have an “eye.” While I am deficient in so many, many things and ways, and I cannot do many things, I do have an evolved eye for fighting things. I can dissect them. And now more than ever I see the vast number  of tactics and techniques on all these video clips. I can instantly spot the esoteric, flashy unnecessary moves people do. And sadly I can see the salivating onlookers, so naively impressed. They often fall into cult-like hypnosis and hero worship over “new-that-ain’t-new,” or some fall into utter nonsense. Often what I see them do what they do, I can cut in half, even thirds, but what’s left ain’t sexy or cool.

 

 

(The…ahhh….sexy “Turban Defense,” as in over-wrapping your head, way too often because…because… ahhhh….well….) 

 

 

I hope this sort of time and grade maturity reaches the salivating masses someday? But I also want everyone to be happy, to pursue their hobbies too. If you know you are addicted to the artsy  esoterica? Then fine. Just know you are.

And so, my paranoia. My paranoia. Am I missing something? I will always be looking around, feeling inadequate. And I will go with you to see Miasma Swami Jo-Jo Lukahn teach his subsection 3-A and B from the Ukulele Islands. I’ll fool around with it a bit. Sure. But, I will most likely purge it later as redundant and unnecessary.

Binge. Question. Purge. Binge. Question. Purge.

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Hock’s email is HockHochheim@ForceNecessary.com

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Ben Mangels, African Commando

Ben Mangels died in 2015. Age 78. I lost touch with him about 2013. His wife got sick and he kind of dropped off the grid, so to speak. If you’ve been to some of my seminars his name comes up periodically as important to me. He left South Africa decades ago for several reasons and wound up, oddly, in north Texas. He started training police (mid-to-late 80s and early 90s) when the McKinney, TX police department stumbled upon him, and that was when I first met him. They initiated a series if seminars with him.
 

The seminars were great but when I enrolled in his regular Dallas area classes, they were were, more or less classical Jujitsu in a gi (and not this new, BJJ, Brazilian wrestling Jujitsu, they were old school). But, I got a lot of Jitz up where I lived already and in my martial arts associations, minus the truly horrendous Dallas, rush hours-long traffic to get down there and see him, and the drive back on week nights. I did a three-month contract and me and my family-kids, and police hours, couldn’t stand the rush hour schedule.

So instead, I stuck with the frequent seminars, which was a mix of so-called military and police combatives that was his blend of karate, boxing and jujitsu (and knife fighting). The seminars were great! (The mix. 1980s! And young people today think they are inventing stuff. HA!) I have to say, his approach was very inspirational.

For several reasons I won’t publicly detail here, he eventually left Dallas for the northwest USA. Had too. (But in a very quick summary I think you will enjoy, his 70-year-old self then, bare-handed, beat up a way younger idiot attacker pretty badly, in a few seconds, in a road rage incident caused by the young idiot. How many angry idiots think that they can beat up any “old man”…who happened to be…a freakin’ Rhodesian and South African killer-commando? Oh-oops!) 

He moved to the northwest. Had to! Later, his daughter married a gun range guy ( – in… Michigan? – I can’t remember where) and the son-in-law smartly tried to get him to teach there sometimes. But that attempt burned out when his wife got sick. So he stayed home with her.

His experiences in Africa would fill books. But, his public martial arts instructor persona would not allow for these violent experiences. But in the police survival, combatives training he let it all out. Wow. We would hear the stories. This guy did a lot. And you won’t read about it in the “proper” web bios. You won’t read about his Rhodesian times on the last, vanishing, remaining webpage comments about him.

Some of it is very bad. Yes. He told me once he was very troubled with very bad memories and nightmares (his Rhodesian experiences and the South African “rebel,” “bush wars” are all missing from his politically correct bios.)  He told us that in those, what was deemed race wars, they were also fighting the Communist Cuban Army too and they were in fear that S.A. would become communist. In the end, he ended up in the South African Military Police. Mängels became an officer in the South African Police. He was at times the chief Close Quarters Combat (CQB) instructor to elite special forces units, including the South African Army Commandos, South African Naval Marines, and British Special Air Service (SAS).

The last time we talked on the phone….2010? 2011?…he asked me if I would produce a series of videos with him. Of course I would. He complained-worried that he was old. But I said in such films, he would coordinate-teach and younger guys would actually fight on film. Then in our discussion, he asked me “could I be sued?” You know, if he showed something on film and somebody misused it. I said, “welllll…I guess it’s possible…but….” And that was all he needed to hear and he didn’t want to make any video series. That would have been a great series.

Ben warned us that “unarmed combat does not make someone unbeatable. If thrown overboard, you might not be a strong swimmer capable of swimming to shore, but if you have had some basic swimming training you might be able to hold out until rescued, With some training, your odds of surviving are better than if you had no training at all.”

I was essentially a regular Mangels seminar attendee other than those 3 month, few nights a week, stint at his classical jujitsu class.  His biggest influence on me was his seminar “rough and tumble attitude” and his knife material, as I tell people in seminars. It made me cut out a bunch of unnecessary martial arts knife material cluttering up my mind.

There was no one quite like Ben Mangels. When he moved, I was able to “send/introduce” two of “our guys” who lived up northwest to train locally with him. One actually got a jujitsu black belt from him.

Years ago. And here in Dallas, our regular student Kelly Redfive lived near him and attended those Dallas classes. Kelly has great memories of him. We had to swap notes as he was in that regular jujitsu class but  Kelly, not being a cop, could not attend those police seminars. It was a rough, simple jujitsu.

Adios Captain. Totsiens. You left your mark! 

________________________________

Hock’s email is HockHochheim@SurvivalCentrix.com

Footwork and Maneuvering book for the citizen, cop and soldier, standing to ground, hand, stick, knife, gun. Click here

The Equal Opportunity Stabber, Saber or Reverse Grip?

The Equal Opportunity Stabber. Saber or Reverse Grip?

I am an “equal opportunity stabber.” Sound weird? Hear me out. I’ve heard the knife whisper. Have you? About the secret “best grip tip.” You know the one, “If you see a guy hold a knife like this (reverse grip) watch out! He really knows what he is doing.” 

Now for the novice reading this, real quick, the saber grip is the most popular nickname for holding the knife like a sword with the blade sticking out the top of the hand. The reverse of that, the reverse grip has the knife blade sticking out the bottom of the hand. Both are quite natural grabs. New or experienced, young, old, whatever, the knife is a great equalizer and both can deliver bloody devastation.

Ahhh, but “the reverse grip is best,” so whisper the tipsters who know nothing, learned from yet another tipster who knew nothing. I have heard that “insider reverse grip tip” numerous times through the years. One example-

“I was at a seminar once where an “expert” told us that if we see a man using a knife in that grip to “Run! That man is a professional!” – Carl Flume    (So you don’t run if the robber has a saber grip?)

I have nothing against the reverse grip. I teach it too. But, how many times have you heard or been told, or taught the reverse grip is the only grip to use? Because there were and are some popular courses out there preaching this idea. Mindless followers will whisper and argue that:

  • “Well, the reverse grip is the Filipino way.”
  • “The reverse grip is the Pekiti Tirsia way.”
  • “Ex-super-copper Pete Smith says the reverse grip is the best.”
  • The Marine whisperer claim.

People! People….people. FMA does BOTH grips. Pekiti Tirsia also teaches tons of saber grip material. And Pete Smith? He is just, flat-out, wrong-headed about this. He is not as smart as you think. He’s not as smart as he thinks. The whisperer? Let’s explore that now.

Knife Confusion. I am often both depressed and fascinated by the paths, choices and ideas of various knife courses. Some obsess about dueling. Some appear to me like death cults, others have what seems to be oddball, incomplete conclusions. Most never cover legal issues and just cut and stab away. No knife ground fighting. No knife versus unarmed or mixed weapons. Some way over-emphasize Filipino Sumbrada patterns. Some have only three or four stabs with zero concerns about the before during and after, the old “just sticking the “pointy end” in. How about those little rounded-handle knives that can turn easily in your hand? I could go on. Another, probably big dichotomy is this grip thing and the various obsessions with the one, bestus’, mandatory, knife grip.

In the 1980s, I was at a Dan Inosanto seminar and Dan said. “there is no one perfect knife grip, just the best one for the moment.”  Wow! That little phrase stuck with me forever as a baseline. With my Force Necessary: Knife course, I insist that a practitioner learn and experience BOTH the saber and reverse grips standing through ground, right and left handed. Then after much COMPLETE study, they choose what their favorite grip is, based on the “who, what, where, when and how and why” of situations and their lives. I never tell them to automatically favor any one grip. Make it an EDUCATED choice (and not follow a whisper tip). 

How Favoritism Gets Started? Here’s one example. The first time I received any training with a knife was in a Parker Kenpo class in about 1972 when that day they received a package of Kenpo knives and dull trainers from Gil Hibben. The knife was designed to be held in a reverse grip and used in a kickboxing format. There, me as a yellow belt rookie, we were allowed to fool around with the newly arrived tools. This initiation, this design I think caused decades of Kenpo-ists to hold their knives in a reverse grip as though Moses, not Gil Hibbens, had handed them knives from the mountaintop.

Did Ed Parker demand the knife and all subsequent training be in a reverse grip? I don’t know. It is widely reported that in 1968 Gil designed the Kenpo Knife (sometimes called the Ed Parker Fighting Knife) for his black belt thesis on knife fighting using Kenpo tactics. These tactics are conducive to karate-kickboxing. Maybe some historian reading this will know and tell us. But the reverse grip stuck.

In the late 1990s I was teaching in a multi-instructor camp and a old Parker Kenpo black belt was there with his imported group. I was covering saber grip material and he would horde his people over into a corner after each demo and show them the “proper, reverse grip way” to fix what I was doing saber style. Which by the way his was more complicated and somewhat awkward than the simple saber applications I was covering.  

Finally he just had to approach me and said, “you know, the reverse grip is the superior grip.” I said, “No it isn’t.” He glared at me. I added, “You can do just as much or even more with a saber grip, often simpler, with more reach.

Well, he stormed off – his 7th dan “master” self, all upset that someone younger in blue jeans and a polo shirt told him flat-out, no. (Oh, did I mention that he also makes and sells reverse-grip-only knives?) My next session by the way, I covered some reverse grip material, as I am…as I said…an equal opportunity stabber.

People pick grips for odd reasons too. I read from a guy writing about his grip choice. He said he once saw someone with a training knife, saber grip, stab a mitt and the guy’s hand slipped up on the blade. This made him pick the reverse grip. Really? That? Because if you don’t have a good guard, saber or reverse your hand can slip onto the blade.  As a detective who has investigated knife crime for decades, I can tell you such slippage happens with BOTH saber AND reverse grips without a guard. I have solved attempted murders and murders when the attacker’s hand slipped up on the blade and he himself bled on the weapon, the victim and, or surroundings. We “ran” the blood, and in today’s world, the DNA of today works greater wonders. 

Let’s talk Marine whispering. Once I was told this reverse-grip-only tip by a civilian who had never been in the Marines, but heard this tip from the ubiquitous “Marine friend.” The irony was at the time, 1990s, I was in a Triangle, VA. hotel restaurant next to the Marine base Quantico, where I was teaching Marines in their Hand to Hand combatives, “Train the trainers” school, teaching “knife,” among other topics. Some of it was saber grip knife, some reverse grip. They didn’t care what grip we did. They were fully open to both.  (Quick note: old school military holds that “hand-to-hand” training does not fully mean unarmed, it refers to close-up fighting, with or without weapons.)

And saber grips survived. Take it from the Sandboxx article by Marine Travis Pike in 2021, “…your blade is always pointing at the bad guy…”

While in the Middle East or “Southwest Asia” as they like to call it, while in several PXs (military stores), I saw walls of all kinds of fixed blade or folder knives for sale. It seems everyone smartly has all kinds of issued or purchased knives, carried all over their bodies and who knows how they hold them. Fortunately about 99.9% of the time they are used for chores. A rare, rare few get any knife training. Some a small bit.

Some military units around the world like to watch-spy and imitate each other, and sometimes this jump innocently does replicate faults. In the mid-to-late 2010s and 2020s, some worldly units started copying other units by spending copious amounts of money buying vests, sheaths for knife carry in or near the center of the chest, along with a knife that has a ring atop it to run one’s pointy finger through and draw. The double-edged knife and sheath come in different sizes. This set-up forces troops into a reverse grip, whether they like it or not. The center staging does allow for right or left handed access. (If the knife hung upside down with a solid sheath and minus the ring, one could draw right or left handed to a saber grip. Just saying. But too late now! $$$$)

The Inside Edge Only Miasma. And on this subject, I will go you one more crazy level with a reverse grip oddity that’s worse. There is a small, knife sub-culture out there that wants you to fight reverse grip, with a single edge knife, and with the one sharp side, “inside,” as in facing back into your body. Not edge out to the outside world where the enemy is attacking you. The edge is aimed back at you, Dull side, flat edge out facing the enemy. This is its own unique thinking disorder. The world you are fighting is OUT there, not in your armpit. This is essentially a one-trick pony.

The reverse grip, edge-OUT offers a slashing possibility, an ADVANTAGE that might diminish or end the opponent alone. And a double-edged, or 1/4 or 1/2  or 3/4s or full sharp edge on the outer side is ALWAYS going to be a doctrine advantage. Maximize your survival with the most versatile knife. Reverse grip, edge-in? This is like only putting 2 rounds in a six gun.

 

Reverse grip tip in accidents. When the Samurai commit suicide – seppuku – they do it with a reverse grip. There’s a reason for this. It’s easier. The tip is already aimed inward  at you. (Incidentally, the helper that will kill him if he fails? Holds a saber grip.) This “easy-tip-inward” is one more point no one seems to consider when raving about reverse grips. The tip is often aimed back at you. About once every 4 weeks on the nightly reruns of the “Cops” TV show you can see a reverse grip knifer get tackled by cops. When they turn the suspect over? He or she was – “self-stabbed” in the grapple. One of our main lesson plans with the reverse grip is self-awareness of these maneuvering and grappling realities.

I cover dropping to the ground and we see people stab their thighs, and when tackled or shoved against the wall, we see the same “Cops” incident of the accidental self-stabbing. Tell people to practice falling-rolling while holding a reverse grip knife and watch the accidents. If people are running and holding a reverse grip knife, and they trip and fall? Watch out! There are more reverse grip “selfie” accidents than saber grip ones. Just be aware of this.

Years ago I was grappling with my training partner and had a wooden training knife in the reverse grip. Long story short, we went to the ground and I fell on the training knife and caught the tip in the ribs. That definitely made my eyes water. Since then I’m very iffy whether I’d ever use that grip with a live blade in a real situation. I still train both grips but I much prefer the saber grip due to the added reach, maneuverability, and the sharp end isn’t pointing back at me most of the time.” – Neil Ferguson, USA

A Summary. I think by now we might have dispelled the caustic “Reverse Grip Marine Whisperer.” Still, there are many pros and cons for each grip. I HAVE MUCH TO SAY FOR THE REVERSE GRIP. I teach it also and I believe better and more comprehensive and thoughtful than most others…or I wouldn’t bother. I just don’t like the blind acceptance, the secret whisper about which grip is the best and which is to be mandated and or ignored. And It bothers me that people thoughtlessly accept courses about these main things. Question everything. Get educated with both. Then pick a knife and a grip you need in situations. I even hate to tell you my favorites because I don’t want to influence yours. 

The knife is a very forgiving weapon, in that you can do a whole lot of screwed-up, stupid shit with a knife and it will work. This is not an excuse to stay stupid. You have to think beyond that to create a comprehensive program and promote real knowledge.

I can’t shake the fact that people essentially eat with a saber grip and most may well reflexively grab and use any knife in this manner. Look, I really don’t care what grip you use as long as it is an EDUCATED, informed choice, and not some mindless, mandate from some thinking disorder and, or brainwashed person, or from that ignorant knife whisperer who knows somebody, who knew somebody else, who…

Having written my extensive and popular knife book, which took years, studying crime, war and forensic medicine, working cases and the streets, I am an equal opportunity stabber. And I will only leave you with what Dan Inosanto said decades ago, – “there is no one perfect knife grip, just the best one for the moment.”

*****

Hock’s email is Hock@Survival Centrix.com

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