Just Kick Him In The Groin

While a graduate student in the Stanford University School of Education in the mid-70s, I set out to develop an effective self-defense course that could be taught to public school students in a standard, two-week PE training module. It had to be relatively comprehensive, capable of preparing students to avoid, deal with, or better survive most of the normal self-defense situations they might find themselves. It had to be easy to learn. And it had to be hard to forget. What I came up with was my trademarked StreetWise Self Defense Program. (I’ll likely talk about StreetWise at some later date.)

While developing my program, I researched everything I could find on how others structured and taught fixed-length self-defense courses. (There was no internet, YouTube, or DVDs at the time, just a few books and a couple of video tapes on the market.) I found some good ideas and a whole bunch of strange ones. The biggest sources of bad or strange ideas came from books written specifically on self-defense for women.

One such book was written by a nun who bragged about having no formal training in any combative system. She was apparently under the impression that if you kicked any man in the groin, he was finished. Every technique in her book ended with a groin kick.

Most men have been kicked in the groin at some point in their lives (or slipped off the pedal on their bikes). Many who immediately go down when kicked in the groin do so because that’s an option. They have the luxury in a given situation of going down. When in a serious fight, however, where going down is not a viable option, most of the men I know will not only continue to fight but will do so with added intensity for as long as their bodies allow. They will try everything within their power for whatever time they’re allowed to make sure the kicker goes down first. So a woman who kicks a man in the groin may well get the exact opposite of what she had been led to believe would be the case.

It’s not that groin kicks aren’t effective. It’s just that there’s no universal result. One of my former students, a major fighter who was well over 200 lbs and very experienced on the street, kicked an attacker in the groin so hard it lifted the man off the ground… and did absolutely nothing. Fortunately, the man had steel testicles but a glass jaw and was dropped with a strong reverse punch to the face.

I also came across a book written by a woman with a PhD who taught self-defense for women at a major university. She too believed kicks and strikes to the groin were the panacea, the game-ender for all possible attacks by men. But she added an interesting technique I had never encountered before or since.

After kicking a male attacker in the groin and him, of course, going down, she advised women to find a large rock or tree limb, put it under one of the downed man’s ankles, and then jump on his knee. It was a hell of a technique but I doubt any man is going to just lie there, twiddling his thumbs while she gathers up and places all the necessary materials.

“You can’t achieve what you can’t conceive.” In my next post, I want to pass on some street situations which I, my students, or martial arts friends actually experienced in order to show the images I have in my mind when I approach the preparation of my students for the street. Please feel free to share yours. Thanks again for reading.