Session 6 Drugs Affecting Body Defences: Fill & Download for Free

………………The header Question has been through several changes, due to edits and merges. It may no longer precisely reflect the question answered here because I can’t keep going back to my 5,000+ answers on Quora and rewriting them to reflect a new version of the question - or even, in some cases, a completely different question.So far this Question has been through several versions including:"What is a better choice for real life combat, Muay Thai or Wing Chun?""What is a better choice for getting better at real life combat, Muay Thai or Krav Maga?""Which martial art is better in a real-world scenario: Muay Thai or Krav Maga?"I do my best…………………SummaryIf you want to be any good at fighting, you have to do it. We don’t noticeably improve at things we do not do.Self-defence might involve dealing with a stumbling drunk who can hardly stand up; or coming back to your car at night, in a dark carpark, to find a couple of guys jacking the wheels - and when you object, one comes at you with a wheelbrace and then there is a click behind you as another opens a folding knife. You have three to deal with, they’re all bigger than you, two are armed, you can’t run because you’re with your partner; and now they are going to cave your skull in, cut your guts out, then start on your partner. What are you going to do now, pal? This is going to be a hard fight: a fight for your life.Self-defence can therefore be an easy walk in the park or a desperate fight for your life. Don’t ever make the mistake of thinking it’s not about fighting.Fighting at some point involves grappling (a generic term: any kind of wrestling or similar) + hitting (any kind of striking they use on you or you hit them with) + weapons + multiple opponents. If you live somewhere nice, the most you might ever have to deal with is a single unarmed opponent on some soft turf. Other places they start with a pocket knife to the back of your neck while some other dude punches you in the face. It’s entirely up to you which version you train for.You can treat self-defence as dealing with a stroppy kid, or a fight for your life against tough odds out the back end of a dark car park on a rainy night. Up to you.For a tough situation where your life is threatened, the obvious answer is always simple: draw your compact 9mm and put two shots into the face of the first assailant*; then line up on the second guy and see what he does next; while ensuring nobody gets behind you, and taking cover if they in turn start shooting. But in most of the world we cannot get a CCW so that’s out.* Bob Stasch was a US undercover police officer who survived 14 gunfights, several of them point-blank events. He reports cases in which both he and his partner drilled assailants in the chest with multiple rounds of .44 mag (his partner’s gun) and .45 (his choice), with no effect on the assailant’s ability to keep fighting. And so after 14 gunfights, he says shoot them in the head - that works. (The infamous Sgt Grammins case says the same.)Stasch also says: learn to shoot one-handed because your offhand will be doing something else: fending off an attacker, hanging on to cover, pulling more ammo, whatever.Go ahead and argue with him, why don’t you? Maybe you know better.Most places we can’t get a CCW so you employ the equivalent in your area of putting two shots into the face of the nearest assailant. Is that clear? If it’s not that kind of self-defence then you should be walking away or whatever.So in the end it depends on what you think self-defence is. Some places are nice and it won’t amount to much anyway. Walk away if you can. When you can’t, then you’d better have some background in fighting not dreaming.Factors applicable to street survivalIf you’re talking about street survival then these are the factors that apply - but please see the postscript, at the end - it outlines the basic environment my answers address:Experience in proper fights.Ability with multiple opponents and weapons.The person involved.The teachers.The gyms.The systems used.The systems used is the last item, to make the point it’s only one factor among many.The original question was: “Which is better for real life combat, muay Thai or Wing Chun?”. It has been edited to be MT vs Krav, but luckily that doesn’t make a lot of difference to this response.1. Experience in fightsThe best fighters are those who have had many fights. You can see the difference between non-fighters, new fighters and experienced fighters - and that difference in skill was not achieved in the gym.Immediately that presents us with a problem, as systems that don’t have a proper fight testing system have no real way to improve student’s fighting ability. Sparring in the gym is not fighting. Fighting is where the opponent/s do not come from your gym, and intend to kill you or do as much harm as they can. They must at least be able to punch to the head and/or throw and choke, and nobody can really say they’ve covered all the options until they’ve had a knife or weapon fight of some kind outside of any contest environment.You can get further down the road with fighting ability in a wrestling type of system as it’s possible to go harder, and visit other gyms to spar at 100% - but this doesn’t help you with multiple opponent and weapon situations. If all you have is wrestling or BJJ and there are 3 opponents, at least one with a knife (which is not shown by anyone experienced until it’s being used), then the outlook is not good for you - as all multiple opponent scenarios are best survived by strike and move tactics until maybe the last opponent (and then, it’s a problem if you put on an RNC and then they pull their knife - you lose at least one femoral artery and leg motor nerve before he goes under).What fights give youSome systems with an excellent technical base for street defence - RBSD methods for example - have no fight testing system (e.g. contests against people not from your gym, where there are a minimum of rules, and where they are doing their best to KO / slam / choke you, with nothing preventing them from doing so). Krav is a typical example of this. They have a pressure testing system against multiple opponents - which is good - but it’s sparring, or hard sparring, not fighting. Every gym that reckons to teach street survival capability does multiple opponent high-pressure sparring, but it’s still not fighting. It gives you some tools for a mob battle but it is still not for real.We did mob fight training in my boxing gym: we got as many as would fit to get in the ring and go at it with no rules. We called it the Bundle (London slang for a mob brawl). The best tactics for this high-pressure environment turns out to be punch and throw. Anyone who goes to the floor is stomped by everyone still standing - so you absolutely do not go to the ground intentionally, and you get off the floor at lightning speed, and expect to be kneed in the head while getting up. Of course everyone gets thrown even if they are 250 pounds, it’s almost impossible to avoid it in that situation as half of the fight is chaos, not some kind of planned or trainable formal type of situation. People gang up on others, someone holds you while another two hit you, you get pushed backward over a body, or whatever. The Bundle is a realistic way to spar for multi-opponent situations; it was a necessity in the location of my gym in south London as street encounters would almost always involve multiple assailants. Sometimes they start with one but it doesn’t stay that way.Formality versus chaosOne of the valuable skills it teaches is survival in chaos, because formal training of any kind encourages a rigid mindset, which is a major handicap in chaos. Even the most freestyle of methods is way too formal for street brawls. We used to do this on the boxing clock, with rounds, or battles if you prefer, of 3 minutes - then 1 minute until the next group went in. Our gym used to get a lot of visitors from the local karate schools, amateur boxing gyms, pro boxers and so on. It was funny looking at the expressions on their faces as they waited their turn to go in, they’d never seen anything like it - the wince as someone got thrown hard over another couple of bodies and bangs into the floor; or people on the ground getting kicked or stood on; or people knocked down and still woozy being pulled out under the bottom rope.It was the right training for the location though. You soon learn the reality of fighting in a mob battle - no silly duels (one-on-one scenarios are nice for people who like rules), no impossibly impractical ‘I’ll take you down and win easy’ tactic (no pal, you’ll die, your face will be stomped through the concrete and then you’ll get stabbed as you’re a sitting duck), no ridiculous belief in formalised training (it’s chaos out there, and a formal mindset gets you flattened), no standing your ground: you can’t, against three attackers - the only way to survive is to move.No ineffective moves survive it - the best tactics are punch, throw, and use other stuff like a front thrust kick to stop him hard, a jump knee to hit someone in the head who ducks under a punch from another, and as needed. You learn very fast that you must be able to stop an attacker hard, as running puts you in contact with others who will flatten you before you know it; most people have no idea what’s behind them; sport boxers are dead easy to throw; karate people fold up under a blitz of hard punches in the face; grappling-based fighters are lost as soon as there is more than one opponent, they take a big punch in the head while they’re tied up with the first guy. And so on.But: at the end of the day you need fights under your belt to be a skilled fighter, even tough gym training can only give you some tools to develop in fights. There’s just no way around that. That’s why it is best to develop your fighting skills in a system that has a fight testing method in which the student can get punched out or choked out or kicked to crap by others if they go down. It’s not a fight otherwise, it’s just disneyland.Plus: every novice fighter makes a ton of mistakes, they just aren’t that good at it, so it’s best to do that learning when there’s a referee in there too.Training to fight dummies - or good fightersAny training helps you beat dummies. Almost literally anything will work. Going up against decent fighters is a whole different prospect.Any/all martial arts training probably helps to survive against some dummy. It works because you get basic fitness, basic technique to use, and a basic plan - when before you had nothing.To beat good fighters is another matter. You have to be a better fighter than them. Knowing some tricks won’t cut it, they have experience.If you had to bet on one of two opponents: an expert contest fighter who got their experience in proper fights where they would get seriously hurt or die if the ref didn’t step in to save the loser, versus someone who knows a ton of street technique and sparred with it but never had any real or realistic fight (this means against people who they never saw before and intended to put them away or worse) - then you bet on the experienced fighter every time. RBSD systems mostly don’t turn out competent fighters as they have no system for doing that. The experienced fighter has been poked in the eyes and kicked in the groin so many times they regard it as normal. Sometimes you are going to lose your money due to personal factors in such a fight - but you’ll win the bet 8 times out of 10, or more.Fighters win fights and that includes where they are fighting for their life in a street attack.Many sport contests are too restricted to be directly transferable to street defence - they have too many gaping holes in them for practical use. Not all. All skills must be adjusted / adapted / re-trained, to suit a different environment. The environment is king.2. Ability with multiple opponents and weapons.Self-defence has to include tough situations where you are fighting for your life.Basic training is done with one partner but you have to move on from there. Some places have about zero single-person assaults.Weapons are used routinely on the street. Some places they have restricted access to guns and so the street weapons will be knives, chef’s choppers, bats, tyre irons and the like.As a Manchester UK police detective stated in a TV documentary on violent death: “People are being murdered on the street all the time”. Go argue with him if you think you know better.It’s up to you how you define self-defence, and how you want to train for it. In some cases it will be a fight for your life against very tough odds. Where I lived and my gym was, the local paper regularly reported the stabbings, beatings, people in a coma, deaths, mob attacks, and drug street gang fights. There were 11,000 assaults reported to police there last year. It’s not sunny Burbank. It tends to affect how you think of street survival because it sure is not about a single-opponent unarmed tussle.3. The person involvedSome people have the genetic tools to be good at fighting and some don’t. You can always improve on your current situation, but the best of the best are born with that capability and others aren’t.Generally we have to talk in terms of averages, for that reason.The average person is not interested in learning to fight. A small percentage are interested in doing some fight training, but not entering any kind of contest where they can get better at fighting but also risk being KO’d. A tiny fraction of the population are interested in fight training and competing - maybe 0.00001% or something like that.People’s ability at and potential for fighting, assuming they get the right training and experience, varies tremendously. Between two men who have no fight training at all and who attend the same gym and started at the same time: a bricklayer weighing 180 pounds who regularly plays rugby, and a data entry clerk who weighs 140 and mostly plays chess and video games, I’d bet on the first guy to win 99 out of 100 times. In a fight between a 180 man and a 130 woman, all else roughly equal, I bet on the man. I still bet on the man if it’s at the same weight. You lose your money sometimes but in the end the odds prevail.There are a hundred factors in any personal measurement method that will help weigh up someone’s fight winning potential (assuming this is without weapons). And another set you could use if it’s with weapons. So the person involved is crucially important. Nothing makes any sense unless you factor that in.Example: I knew a young girl about 15 who took up kickboxing to defend her younger brother, about 13, who was being badly beaten and having his cash stolen by others, mostly outside of school but sometimes on the premises. The school would do nothing about it, and were the typical mix of useless, incompetent and negligent, hiding behind the usual policies, statements and get-outs. She was tough, capable, and highly motivated. She could take on and beat a boy her brother’s age but not several of them, so she got into kickboxing, worked out a bit and solved the problem that nobody else would look at. She needed no contest fights to work up her skills as she was doing it every other day at the bus stop, outside the school gates and down the estate back streets. She was naturally highly able, and had all sorts of tools that many other girls her age are clearly lacking - like the motivation and ability to punch out bullies two at a time, and with a lot of pent-up anger at the adults’ general uselessness that drove her to work out hard. Choose another girl in this scenario and the result would have been very different - so the individual is critical.In any final tally of how good someone might potentially be at fighting for real, we start, then, by evaluating how their natural tools stack up and how many fights they had (assuming they won more than they lost).4. The teachersIt’s not ‘the instructor’ in the singular: a capable fighter always combines several combat systems. That’s the way it’s been since the year dot.In order to become really efficient, a combat system has to have a narrow scope, and that means it will have holes in it. Thai boxing is a pretty good stand-up combat system (well, it proved unbeatable for stand-up no-rules fights at under 130 pounds, of course, until the modern era when many others borrowed the techniques and training methods) but if you take the fighter down they’re finished. BJJ is really good on the ground, and on average it tends to win against other grappling systems perhaps because the training opportunities and standard of coaching are better; and a good BJJ fighter will beat many stand-up only fighters - but it’s not much use with more than one opponent, so as a street method it has a serious limitation.No single method works across all situations. Therefore you’ll have more than one teacher if you’re a practical fighter.Your coach is a crucial part of your combat ability for any kind of practical application, since they can be a good all-rounder or blind to the fact the students need practical, all-round capability as well as ability in whatever their system mostly addresses. An amateur boxing club coach who can only see amateur contests as the goal is the same as a karate instructor who spends a lot of time on kata when this has no effect on a student’s self-defence ability. This is the most common type of training though: the system has become more important than the student’s needs; but the student will always need to be able to survive on the street. A myopic teacher is no use for practical considerations.So now we need to tally up the person’s relative natural ability, their experience in proper fights, their talent with multiple opponent and/or weapons, and their teachers.5. The gymsWhere you train has a big influence on the end result. An excellent combat system can be ruined by a bad gym. A system that otherwise has little apparent potential can turn out good fighters because the gym is good at doing just that.So you can get a situation where someone with a good 9mm auto gets killed because they were useless with it since their training was crap: they couldn’t draw and fire in time to avoid getting stabbed or shot, or they couldn’t hit the target when under fire; and conversely where a really effective judo exponent wins fights that a thousand other judokas wouldn’t in the same situation, because their gym was great at turning out people who could fight, not just people who could follow a grading syllabus and do regular judo-rules sparring.It’s a little hard to separate the teacher and the gym, as one tends to be a reflection of the other - but just in case someone wants to make it all about the instructor, or all about the environment, I’ll chuck them both in there as there is a difference - then you’ll be happy.How can you differentiate between gym and teacher? Here’s a good example: you can train a boxing-based combat system in an empty hall, or a small boxing gym, or a large and comprehensively-equipped equipped boxing gym. As a teacher, you’ll know that the sessions in each have to be completely different due to the environment. The end result will be different, as a result. If it wasn’t different, then why would you want a specific type of gym or facilities?And: what if the gym membership is entirely male but you’re female? Or vice-versa? What if the membership are all 120 pounds and you’re 190? What if they’re all over 160 and you’re 110?So a given gym turns out a different fighter to another, irrespective of who/what the teacher or system is; and that result can be different according to who the student is.As you are a practical fighter, you’ll be training at more than one gym during the course of your life - so it’s gyms in the plural.And now our tally includes a person’s relative natural ability, their experience in proper fights including with multiple opponent and/or weapons, and their teachers and gym.6. The systems usedI put your question topic last - the methods used - to make it clearer that it’s just one factor among many.The final tally includes a person’s relative natural ability, their experience in proper fights, their talent with multiple opponent and/or weapons, their teachers and gym, and the combat systems they use.You could wreck any one of those and that person would lose every fight.Some winnersOK, it’s fairly obvious that some systems are good at turning out fighters and some aren’t. At least that will give you a head start.As stated I’m not a fan of single-method solutions, there are always too many holes - unless the instructor is very open-minded. Formalised systems don’t breed open-minded teachers though. There are dozens of possible combinations that would give you a really good base.It’s probable that your natural talents, physiology and preferences ought to figure in how you choose your options. A big guy who isn’t a great puncher could go with sombo, krav and some boxing in order to know how to defend; a lightweight woman could try muay Thai (purist Thai boxing) + BJJ - for example.What you choose needs to optimise your own physical tools, and your goals. We spent a lot of time in the 1960’s and 70’s doing stuff that had no real gains for practical fighting ability, as we just didn’t know any better - we bought into that martial arts kool-aid wholesale. Nowadays you have no excuse for doing that - you can see what works in fights, so do that as your main pursuit and consider anything else as ‘reading around the topic’. I won’t say that all my time in taekwon and karate as trained back then (ultra formal, not much emphasis on street survival) was wasted, because it wasn’t - but it sure wasn’t efficient, is all. You can do better because global fighting capability is way better than it was 40 or 50 years ago due to TV, communications and a new reality paradigm. But take note:Train in a localised system, not a purist one from the other side of the world, as in its native form it most likely won’t suit you. For example Dutch Thai boxing is a westernised form of Thai boxing that is perfect for larger people who prefer punching to kicking. BJJ is a westernised form of jujutsu that mixes in some English catch wrestling and judo. Sombo is a Russian mix of judo and wrestling; combat sombo mixes in some boxing and other stuff - you can call it a ‘westernised’ system as for all practical purposes it is.Get your fights in. Contests develop fighters, which isn’t possible without fights. All the training in the world doesn’t make you a great fighter - fighting does.Mix stand-up, groundwork, and weapons-based systems or you don’t have it all covered. That’s 3 areas to cover. Miss one and you have a gaping hole.Add multi-opponent training. It can’t be self-defence if you don’t do that.Genuine combat systems all tend to gravitate toward making their contest results better, which does have benefits for practical fighting ability - but there is a downside: it will start to include things that can’t be used outside of the contest.Example: modern sport boxing is high risk for street use as it is easy to break the hands if you box like today’s ring fights. Traditional boxing is way better for fighting: there is an order of magnitude less risk of breaking the hand.Example: modern roll or nothing BJJ is no use for street fights in my location as there are simply too many bystanders who join in on the other side; it has no use whatsoever in the mob fights common here.Example: US kickboxing is a good basic combat method as long as you add plenty of other stuff - it has nothing at all for close in, or groundwork, or grappling, or weapons defence; and it’s got so many rules it’s more like amateur boxing than anything else.Example: amateur boxing is designed for fast point scoring with effective hand protection; it falls down badly when you’ve broken your hand using modern technique but without the gloves that technique is based on, and it’s got nothing for grappling etc. (as for kickboxing).And so on.Finally: what is likely to work well. Deliberately left till last, as you can see, to make sure you understand it’s just a part of the whole. And always remember the system has to suit you: I don’t see sombo + boxing as being suitable for a 110 pound person: Thai boxing + krav is better.In the following list, krav maga is used as a synonym for self-defence and knife training, there are plenty of ways to go about it. Maybe if you’re lucky one of your stand-up or groundwork teachers will do some work on this anyway.Boxing + wrestling: the original Big Two for fighting. Still a very strong combo. Has some gaps, like most 2-method solutions: weapons, kicks, etc.Sombo + boxing + krav (or any street/knife method)Thai boxing + wrestling + knife workBJJ + boxing + knife fightingBJJ + Thai boxing + knife defenceBoxing + military CQCBoxing + judo + FMA knifeStreet boxing + knife trainingKyokushin karate + boxing + wrestlingAnd so on. Dozens and dozens of options. Basically you need proof that the method you choose actually works in fights - that proof comes from people being successful with it against all-comers in public. So:# Do the core method/s have a contest program with proper fights?# Did you pick at least 2 systems - three if neither of your A and B picks have knife work/weapons at that gym?# Does the primary method suit you personally in every way (it needs to be different if you’re 100 or 200 pounds; if you can’t punch, or if you can’t kick; if you’re fast or if you’re slow) - and there is no way around that.Your specific questionYou did ask about two specific systems, Thai boxing and Wing Chun. I hope that you can see that the gym and the person are probably more important than the system chosen, as any system can be wrecked or improved drastically. However, the basic situation is:Thai boxing: the good and badThe basic system was originally proven as the world’s best system for stand-up fighting with no rules, for sub-130 pound fighters. Basically, no one beat the Thais at sub-130 in the past, on average, in a Thai ring and therefore with no rules except keep it standing, and no gloves (the Thais kept their gloves on as it allows hitting harder with less risk). Today this is not still valid, as many others took the technique and the same road and did a good job with it.The vast bulk of Thais fighting are under 130 pounds and so that is where you have to test the system: it developed specifically for small people fighting with few rules in stand-up fights, and is the best in the world for that exact and specific environment, since anything that worked better would have been assimilated (and was).Over 130, and for Westerners, things are different. You’ll need to box more, and probably forget about all those round kicks in a street fight. In my gym we found that round kicks are easy to walk through or catch, by a strong opponent.The Thais are still on average the best short-range fighters in the world, at their weight of course - but they have no ground game at all. On the floor they lose to a wrestler.All that kicking is (a) no use for the average Westerner, and (b) a really bad idea at the heavier weights, on the street. It works for the Thais because punching is the weakest of all techniques at that bodyweight: at 120 lbs everything hits harder or more effectively than a punch. At 160 and up it’s a whole different ballgame and you need to recognise that.Thai boxing is the world’s best developed stand-up fighting system, no question - at sub-130. It has no ground game, no weapons work in the typical gym (but is OK at some amateur / muay boran gyms though), and is not suitable for heavier Western fighters in the pure Thai form - certainly as regards street work.You’ll need more boxing, less kicking, better stand-up wrestling than is taught these days, some ground work, and some street weapons work.Anything works against a single unskilled opponent and it’s fair to say many if not most streetfights in some locations will be just that: knocking over a dummy. Any old stuff will do, even from a mcdojo karate studio maybe. I don’t normally address this kind of ‘street fight’ - it’s not a fight, it’s a massacre. What I’m concerned with is situations with capable opponents and/or multiple opponents.Wing Chun: the good and badWing Chun doesn’t have a rep for being any use in fights, apart from the typical martial arts kool-aid. You won’t find many (if any) examples of it being used as a core method by top fighters.As far as we can see, it doesn’t have a fight circuit where fighting skills can be developed. This means it is highly unlikely to have any realistic practical use: people can only get to be good at fighting by having plenty of fights.If you want to make a statement like for example, “This is the same situation as Krav Maga: it’s really good for fighting but we can’t use it in contests as it’s too deadly” then I’m afraid we will fall about laughing. Krav has some good moves, because they are selected from boxing, jujutsu, wrestling, Thai boxing and so on. That’s where the moves come from. They take 1% of Thai boxing, 1% of BJJ, and so on, to create Krav - so we know that the moves came from proven systems. The idea you can then be good at fighting but without fighting is not a valid one, to put it politely. It’s a bunch of moves and is as good as the individual is at fighting. Skill and ability in fights comes from the number of fights and wins you have.I personally have never heard of a Wing Chun exponent who was really good at fighting, and I’ve been around. It may well be different for the small guys in Hong Kong and so on. Be aware, though, these guys are the same weight as the Thais (under 130 pounds), and everyone from Hong Kong / China / Malaysia / Singapore who challenged the Thais in the 1960s and 70s (before they knew better) got slaughtered. They were all KO’d in round one or two. Read about some of these fights in Hardy Stockman’s book on muay Thai. If it doesn’t work for real, in a no-rules stand-up fight with no gloves in small man size against the masters of that game, the Thais, then there are questions to be asked.However: if it is modified, in the West, for Westerners - then we could be looking at a whole different ball game. That is precisely how to make something work well right now.There are plenty of people who have trained in Wing Chun and/or fought their guys who don’t have anything nice to say about it from a practical perspective. Example:Scott Phillips on Wing ChunI use one or two moves from it, the same as with a dozen or more other martial arts - in this case a forearm parry in knife work. Like many systems it has one or two useful things to offer.Don’t make the mistake of thinking something with a big publicity machine behind it is a good combat system: first find the proof. Where are the big wins for Wing Chun fighters?Then ask yourself: do they base their fight-winning personal method on the big-name art with the big publicity machine - or is it instead based on something else that is proven to work in the hardest fights such as the Dutch school of Thai boxing invented by Jan Plas? You can find plenty of people winning fights who wear the insignia of some organisation or other - but when you examine their fight-winning method it’s based on boxing and the Amsterdam Thai boxing system. This is called badge engineering in other fields :)There are certainly bad and even useless Thai boxing mcdojos, with their no-fight belt-grading boxercise or whatever. On the other hand there are some pretty good ones too, and the Thais are the proven masters of small man no-rules stand-up fights. This is definitely not the case for Wing Chun - examples of great fighting skills or strong fighters are particularly hard to find. If you try this exercise with, for example, Kyokushinkai karate, you will soon find plenty of strong fighters.So from my perspective you’d be much better off asking the question, “Should I train Kyokushinkai or muay Thai for street survival?”, as it’s far more relevant and certainly more interesting to answer.Thai boxing vs Wing Chun is a whitewash, assuming you train in a decent Thai boxing gym with good fight results and not a mcdojo belt grading fantasy palace. You can see that yourself with the quality of the Thai-based fighters (and those who use some of its moves for their own personal method) on YouTube, versus the equivalent - which as far as I know doesn’t exist. Can anyone produce any evidence that Wing Chun is any use against good fighters? It will work against the unskilled, but then anything does.The test of a combat system is how well it does for the average gym member against equals using other methods.## It’s not about the superstars #### It is not about beating dummies, as anything works for that ##Thai boxing is the supreme no-rules standing fight method for small men under 130 pounds as it is proven to be so: on average nobody beat the Thais in all the challenges they faced in the 60s and 70s. They’re getting a lot better opposition now - because, not surprisingly, after being well beaten, everyone went away and worked on Thai boxing or their local version of it or adding the Thai moves into their local methods - look at how the Chinese invented Sanda in 1979 as a response to getting thrashed; and how there are now silat schools that look remarkably like Thai boxing when 40 years ago all silat looked like what guru Sonny Unpad taught. And not forgetting US kickboxing of course, which didn’t exist until the US servicemen fighting in the Vietnam war saw muay Thai on their R&R in Pattaya.Most everything is influenced by Thai boxing (or some kind of boxing) now; I don’t think you can say the same about Wing Chun and it’s worth asking why.Where can we see how Wing Chun does against the best fighters in the world — and at what sort of bodyweight is it most successful and least successful?Ask the same question about muay Thai and you get: (1) you can see its influence everywhere; (2) the original Thai method works well for small people in real fights, as is well-proven; (3) the Dutch version of Thai boxing (more boxing and low kicks) works well for larger people in real fights, as is well-proven.Postscript: what this answer is aboutI taught street boxing in Croydon. This is a typical south London area, and a typical area for much of the UK, except that it is well-known for violence, mob fights, and knife attacks. I am an expert in what you might call ‘local solutions’: methods of street defence that enable a person to maximise their personal survival potential in this location.My journey involved first boxing, then martial arts for many years, then wrestling, then Thai boxing in Holland and Thailand, a lot of travel; and working in the night economy as a young man. Then later cooking up the resulting mix into the Croydon system of practical boxing. It looks roughly like traditional bareknuckle boxing with its integral wrestling, mixed with modern boxing and Thai boxing. It was designed to be good for street defence, with ring fights as a secondary goal - and it was.I can’t turn a 120 pound data entry clerk into a street battle machine, indeed I can’t turn anyone into that in Croydon as you might have a mob of 15 people chasing you down the street and therefore parkour/free running is the go-to method in that case. What I can do is give you the best method where as like as not there’ll be two or three opponents and someone will pull a knife when it looks like they’re losing.My answer is practical boxing: a type of boxing done the old way, as a fighting art not a combat sport. The priority is for the method to work well, bare fist, against multiple opponents, as that is what the local conditions dictate. It uses modern boxing as the container, and old English bareknuckle punches and tactics plus the strikes they used; importantly, using the wrestling integral to bareknuckle boxing - traditional boxing was absolutely not about punching alone; and with the relevant parts of Thai boxing added in especially as used in the Dutch style, which is way better than the pure Thai method for anyone over 150#.Wrestling skill is need in order to stay on your feet, to optimally perform in the scuffle (close range grab/hit/clinch/throw/escape and anything related), so you can defend the takedown, use throws and/or get free.Any stand-up combat system *must* include wrestling, as trying to fight without a grappling method is suicide, around here anyway. You absolutely do not go to the ground round here - it’s all about hit and move, and staying on your feet, or you’re dead. We integrate the useful moves from the Indochinese boxing systems too, since they are fight-proven and gold for us.So: I’m an expert on punch, scuffle and throw fights with multiple opponents and concealed knives; the various ring testing and improvement options for it; and comparative martial arts, due to 50 years of training and practice; and absolutely not on anything else. I used to shoot but gave it up when they banned handguns here.This is why I don’t call myself a self-defence expert: I can’t speak for other locations, situations or experiences, and I can’t coach on situations very different to mine. I can’t train a non-fighter to survive in the situations we get here, which is clearly the direction of some self-defence tuition: give a non-fighter some survival tools. Round here that just isn’t going to work.For example when I lived in Durban, South Africa, it became obvious that local fights were based around short-range pistol quick draw and fire methods versus multiple opponents with medium-length knives (one section of the population carry 6″ or 8″ knives, one section open carry or conceal carry according to preference, and when they clash it’s a shoot ’n stab fest). This is not a subject I can offer any advice on, except you better practice on super-quick draw & fire on the first target, then fast-shoot multiple-target short range scenarios - my approach to this was a fast retreat. While in my extended stays in Amsterdam, I found that a two-person team confrontation with medium knives was not uncommon and they know how to do teamwork knife fighting, since that happened to me there.Do not take anything I say or advise to be useful or current info anywhere apart from a place like south London where they don’t carry guns but will attack in numbers, and some will have hidden knives. Nothing I say or advise is supposed to be applicable outside of that situation. For mob brawls I know what I’m talking about as it’s a Croydon speciality. Just google <mob fights in croydon> or <school knife fights croydon> or anything like that, these things are endemic here.For gunfights and so on, please look elsewhere: my choice would be Clint Smith, and the US police undercover / detective who survived 14 gunfights: Bob Stasch. The stuff they teach is sometimes opposite to the normal advice: for example Stasch says multiple .44 mags in the centre mass at point black range didn’t work but shooting them in the face did; and learn to shoot one-handed because that has far more value than two-handed stances in the gunfights he had. I’m only repeating what a guy says who had way more gunfights than the people who wrote the orthodox book. For knife defence my skills are very basic - if you want the real deal, find someone with a lot of scars as they have the background - I did everything to avoid knife fights although sometimes it wasn’t possible to run. I would be very unwilling to take any knife fighting advice from someone with no scars, it would be like learning street or ring fighting from someone who never trained any good fighters. I trained a lot of good fighters in my day, ask around. I retired due to illness, cancer and the whole nine yards. Now I write.I do have the background to write authoritatively on practical boxing and related topics. There are many ways to go about it, mine is just one. In my younger days I travelled the world to find people who could teach me real fighting. At first my quest was based around martial arts in the traditional sense, but I soon found that the open-rules boxers were the kings of real-world fighting at the time, and the vast majority of martial arts training was a waste of time if you had my goals. I say training - and am careful to do so - because it often isn’t the art per se that is at fault, it’s the lack of realistic training and contests.I distilled everything I found worked in a real fight into the Croydon Gym practical boxing system: old boxing, new boxing, Thai boxing, wrestling, assorted stuff from army pals, and all the martial arts my group of friends had trained in. If it worked after you take a couple of hard punches in the face or got thrown, we used it. Most things don’t. There are no jump spinning crescent kicks in my system. Not because I can’t do that - when young I got the vote for ‘best jump kicks’ from among a group of TKD black belts doing a training session in a large sports hall with many spectators; it’s just that I worked a lot with developing the best tools for street survival and mob fights, and my practical research did not result in high kicks being a major part of the best solution on average. Traditional boxing and throws came out top. You can add whatever you like if it floats your boat; I can’t argue that if you are 6 foot or so, with an inside leg measurement of 33″ plus, and have multiple head kick KO wins in contests - then a head kick could work well for you. Try it and see. What I do know is that head kicks in street fights work well for less people than the number who say it works, and the difference is the number who tried it and got taken down or slipped over then got mashed up bad.At my gym we were able to evaluate many different combat systems because we had an open house policy and anyone could train with us. They could spar light if they wanted, or get in the ring for one of our famous mob battles called the Bundle. We clearly saw exactly who could fight and who couldn’t, it was obvious. And for those who could actually fight in a mob battle: exactly what they were good at and crap at. You just can’t hide in a mob ring battle, you show up *exactly* what you can or cannot do - what you’re good at, what you’re not good at. The people who had survival potential were: streetwise boxers, Kyokushinkai karate guys who knew how to box, boxer-wrestlers, Thai boxers who had some upgrade work. Everybody else without exception got flattened.What we found is very, very simple: when the chips are down you need to be strong on punching, throws, hard stop kicks like the front thrust kick, and a range of other stuff appropriate to the chaotic situations you find yourself in: out of position elbow strikes, assorted escapes, knees for in close, fast technical stand-ups and roll-outs, and so on. Everybody gets punched hard in the head and everybody gets thrown in these mob fights - so you better be good at dealing with that.Don’t ask me about gunfights as all I know is what my pals tell me, and it’s second-hand info - which I never trust. I trained plenty with a handgun in the days when they were legal in the UK - but I never had any fights. Experience of training is pretty much irrelevant compared to the experience of people who fight - it’s light years apart.What I say, I know about personally. You can tell me all you like about how great [X] martial art is; but when they took part in the bundle in the Croydon Gym, almost all of them were useless. The martial arts people who did best were the Kyokushin guys but they can’t take head punches unless they spent time in a boxing gym; and some good wrestlers the same thing - vulnerable to head shots, and no multiple opponent capability as they can’t hit. Boxers do OK until anyone gets close, then they get thrown and they’re done - they are the easiest to throw of all groups and then it’s over, they have nothing on the ground. Note this is very different to old style bareknuckle boxing as wrestling was a core part of that. It is also notable how modern sport boxers are useless at environment management, they don’t have a clue who or what is behind them - most of the martial arts people are better at that.We saw what worked and what didn’t, it was tested in a no-hiding-place scenario. We saw what worked on the street in our location and what didn’t - the bigger guys worked the doors there; most had stories about fights in the local pubs, late night cab offices, and the street outside them. Some had the ‘croydon tattoo’: a knife scar on the neck from where you’re dealing with one guy then another sticks a knife in your neck from behind. As a direct result of street and door work experience, our methods were adapted. For example we ditched the ring attrition moves like the left cutter elbow or the round kick, for street engagements: a strong opponent walks right through them. We like stoppers: hard shots that stop them in their tracks or knock them over; and throws for when they get past your hits.This is what I talk about and nothing else. It’s all I’m qualified to address, and nothing I say should be taken as applying to gunfights or similar. It’s for when there are no guns and often multiple opponents. For gunfights, or for duels in a safe space (one on one, no others piling in and stomping your head into the concrete, no knives used on you in the roll which is certainly what will happen in Croydon), or for specialist knife work, then please seek advice from another.The reality shockIt’s true I’m proud of what we developed there. It was a mob battle method par excellence.On the other hand it has its downside, like everything no doubt. Here is an unfortunate example.A senior karate instructor I knew visited us and took part. He found out in our gym that he couldn’t fight and wasn’t fit. Some time later he committed suicide, and I went to his funeral.Now the story was that he had woman trouble and so on; but I can’t help thinking that the revelation that everything he had spent his life doing and that he was teaching to others in his several gyms, which was then shown to be utterly worthless in a tough fight, had something to do with it. He was a god to his karate students, I overheard them speaking of him at the funeral - one comment was along the lines of, “I can’t understand it, he was super fit”. No idea how that would affect you if you decide to end it all, but anyway I knew he was a very long way from being fit and he couldn’t fight his way out of a paper bag. The problem was he had too much invested in his system and too much in the way of excuses about how it worked in fights, like many martial arts dreamers, when plainly it didn’t.[Look - I was in the same situation back in the late 70s when I was running a taekwondo association and had training in kickboxing, as it mixed what I knew: martial arts and boxing; and then I got into wrestling too. Finally I figured out that Thai boxing was the way to go, after seeing what the Dutch guys could do in Amsterdam. There was nobody at over 160 pounds who could touch them at that time. I just handed my clubs over to my assistant instructors and walked away. I’d seen the light, luckily - because it was obvious what really worked for what I wanted to do: fight better than anyone else; because I had the good sense to realise it; and because I then had the drive to go for it. They all got an invite to follow me if they wanted to, and some did. This was the honest approach to it: forget about trying to mix TKD, boxing and wrestling to produce a workable real-world fighting system, the Thais already did it and a lot better; and the Dutch tuned it up for bigger Westerners. Basically I went back to boxing as I’d now seen how well it worked if you just trained right and fought in proper fights not the disney version. Not everyone can do this: it’s just too much for some to handle. After all, half the bullshit in the world is just there to protect someone’s prior position.]People really go for martial arts 100%; and then if it turns out the basic concept is worthless for actual fighting, this can understandably be a serious blow to someone’s state of mind; they truly believed that what they were doing was about fighting ability in some way. I’m sorry about my acquaintance and the outcome but you need to be very wary of propaganda in this world. First demand the proof.Nothing has kool-aid like martial arts do. Caveat emptor.

As you say, some Muslims not all or most of them. In the meantime, unfortunately it easily might be seen that in various religions and believes, the followers don’t perform all the orders completely. Thus it is a common issue that … like we say:Why some or many people smoke also they are aware of its disadvantages?!Free study about alcohol: The Effects of AlcoholAnd:What is Alcohol?Besides its deleterious influence on the nervous system and other important parts of our body, alcohol has a harmful action on the phagocytes (white blood corpuscles), the agents of natural defence against infective microbes - Professor Metchnikoff, Pasteur Institute, Paris.Alcohol is one of the chief curtailers of life. The man of twenty who drinks has a probable life of fifteen years before him, the abstainer one of forty four years - Professor Lombroso, Italy.Alcohol perverts the moral nature, affects the judgment and impairs the memory, it, moreover, especially affects the motor system and creates an enormous loss to the community through destroying the productiveness of the skilled craftsman -.Dr. Robert Jones.In a few statements given above out of so many are set forth the expert opinions of some of the most eminent medical authorities of the world in regard to a most important problem of the human Society as affecting its physical health and all-round well being. Due to considerations of space many valuable comments from persons of great eminence have had to be omitted, the mere listing of their names would need several pages.Nor would such an exhaustive list serve any useful purpose. Suffice it to say that not only the physicians, the surgeons and the professors of medical institutions in their individual capacity, have given their unequivocal verdict against this dreadful enemy of Society, but also in their collective voice through the mouth-piece of their organized associations all over the world they condemn its evils in no less emphatic terms.It would be tedious task to recount the resolutions of such associations in the space available here. Yet a few such warnings from highly outstanding expert bodies do bear mention, to bring out the collective views of the medical professor. The Neurologists in session at Chicago thus delivered themselves on this problem.Whereas, in the opinion of the Neurologists of the United States in convention assembled, it has been definitely established that alcohol when taken into the system acts as a definite poison to the brain and other tissues and, whereas, the effects of this poison are directly or indirectly responsible for a large proportion of the insane, epileptic, feeble-minded and other forms of mental, moral and physical degeneracy; and whereas, many hospitals for the insane and other public institutions are now compelled to admit and care for a multitude of inebriates; and, whereas, many states have already established separate colonies for the treatment and re-education of such inebriates with great benefit to ,the individuals and to the Common-wealth's; therefore be it. Resolved, that we unqualifiedly condemn the use of alcoholic beverages.Resolved that we recommend the general establishment by all the States and Territories of special colonies of hospitals for the care of the inebriates; and Resolved that organized medicine should initiate and carry on a systematic, persistent propaganda for the education of the public regarding the deleterious effects of alcohol.The West Virginia State Medical Association thus expresses its views : Whereas the study of alcohol from a scientific stand-point has demonstrated that its action is deceptive and that it does not have the medical properties that were once claimed for it; now therefore be it Resolved by the West Virginia State Medical Association that we deplore the fact that our profession has been quoted so long as claiming for its virtues which it does not possess and that we earnestly pledge ourselves to discourage the use of it, both in and out of the sick room.The Medical Society of the state of North Carolina, Resolved that it will use its best efforts to discourage the use of alcohol in any form. Resolved second it is the sense of this Society that any member of the profession who does promiscuous or unnecessary prescribing of alcohol either to patients or to non patients is violating one of the principles of our profession and is deserving of censure.Whereas it is one of the chief contributing factors to poverty, misery and crime. The American Nurses Association in their convention adopted the following resolution: The American Nurses Association believe, that alcohol lessens vital resistance, fosters poverty and all the diseases that come from poverty, hindering the progress of the community.The pronouncement of the Life Extension Institute of America consisting of ninety four of the most eminent Americans, including professors from the leading universities, the Surgeon General of the United States Army and distinguished physiologists of Medical Faculties.FacultiesFaculties is worthy of the deepest consideration vis-à-vis the problem of alcoholism. It runs as follows "Experimental laboratory work has kept pace with Statistical investigation and the knowledge gained from the laboratory, not only in experiment on animals but on man himself, shows that a higher death rate among alcohol users is what we would naturally expect to find in the light of what we know regarding its effects on the body.One half to one quart of bear is sufficient to distinctly impair memory, lower intellectual power and retard simple mental processes, such as the addition of simple figures. The narcotic or deadening influence is first exerted on the higher reasoning powers that control conduct, so that the lower activities of the mind and nervous system are for a time released.The every-day well-poised, self-controlled man goes to sleep, as it were, and the primitive man temporarily wakes up. Eventually the nervous system is narcotized and the drinker becomes sleepy. Muscular efficiency is at first increased a little and then lowered, the total effect being a loss of working power.Alcohol is a handicap for the nation at war. It is a handicap for an individual in the struggle for existence. This is not the judgement of scientists alone, nor of weak and faddists, out of the big-brained, strong-fibered men upon whom has fallen the tremendous :burden of guiding great nations through the greatest crisis of history."Is Alcohol A Medicine?Is alcohol a medicine? Whereas, it is the unanimous opinion of the Council on Health and Public Instruction of the A.M.A. that alcohol has no drug value, either as a stimulant, as - a tonic, or as a therapeutic agent, and that it has no food value; and whereas, its use as a beverage or as a therapeutic agent is detrimental rather than beneficial to the individual.Therefore, be it resolved that the House of Delegates of the A.M.A. declares it as opposed to the use of alcohol by individuals either as a medicine or as a beverage, and be it further resolved that its use in medicine is permissible only in the preparation and preservation of Pharmaceutical products. (Resolution passed by House of Delegates of American Medical Association 1917).Gopsel Advocate SaysStatistics show that ten thousand people are killed by liquor and one is killed by a mad dog; yet we shoot the dog and license the liquor What sense is there in this?Dr. Charles Richet of Paris SaysIt is the drunkards who fill our hospitals and lunatic asylums. By devising this un-natural product (alcohol) unknown to animals, man has increased his sorrows.Extract from "Life and Health", March 1969, Page 4.Early Detection is Protection - Know these Early Warning Signals of Alcoholism1, Difficult to get along with when drinking.2. Drinks "because he is depressed".3. Drinks "to calm his nerves".4. Drinks until "dead drunk" at times.5. Can't remember parts of some drinking episodes.6. Hides liquor.7. Lies about his drinking.8. Neglects to eat when he is drinking.9. Neglects his family when he is drinking.…Reference and more free study: What is Alcohol?

About Iran, it is prohibited to drink it. Totally, drinking alcohol is haram or unlawful according to Islam but unfortunately it is used somewhat is some Islamic countries. In fact it depend on the laws of the countries and the lever of Islam in the practice of the Muslims.Free study about alcohol: The Effects of AlcoholAnd:What is Alcohol?Besides its deleterious influence on the nervous system and other important parts of our body, alcohol has a harmful action on the phagocytes (white blood corpuscles), the agents of natural defence against infective microbes - Professor Metchnikoff, Pasteur Institute, Paris.Alcohol is one of the chief curtailers of life. The man of twenty who drinks has a probable life of fifteen years before him, the abstainer one of forty four years - Professor Lombroso, Italy.Alcohol perverts the moral nature, affects the judgment and impairs the memory, it, moreover, especially affects the motor system and creates an enormous loss to the community through destroying the productiveness of the skilled craftsman -.Dr. Robert Jones.In a few statements given above out of so many are set forth the expert opinions of some of the most eminent medical authorities of the world in regard to a most important problem of the human Society as affecting its physical health and all-round well being. Due to considerations of space many valuable comments from persons of great eminence have had to be omitted, the mere listing of their names would need several pages.Nor would such an exhaustive list serve any useful purpose. Suffice it to say that not only the physicians, the surgeons and the professors of medical institutions in their individual capacity, have given their unequivocal verdict against this dreadful enemy of Society, but also in their collective voice through the mouth-piece of their organized associations all over the world they condemn its evils in no less emphatic terms.It would be tedious task to recount the resolutions of such associations in the space available here. Yet a few such warnings from highly outstanding expert bodies do bear mention, to bring out the collective views of the medical professor. The Neurologists in session at Chicago thus delivered themselves on this problem.Whereas, in the opinion of the Neurologists of the United States in convention assembled, it has been definitely established that alcohol when taken into the system acts as a definite poison to the brain and other tissues and, whereas, the effects of this poison are directly or indirectly responsible for a large proportion of the insane, epileptic, feeble-minded and other forms of mental, moral and physical degeneracy; and whereas, many hospitals for the insane and other public institutions are now compelled to admit and care for a multitude of inebriates; and, whereas, many states have already established separate colonies for the treatment and re-education of such inebriates with great benefit to ,the individuals and to the Common-wealth's; therefore be it. Resolved, that we unqualifiedly condemn the use of alcoholic beverages.Resolved that we recommend the general establishment by all the States and Territories of special colonies of hospitals for the care of the inebriates; and Resolved that organized medicine should initiate and carry on a systematic, persistent propaganda for the education of the public regarding the deleterious effects of alcohol.The West Virginia State Medical Association thus expresses its views : Whereas the study of alcohol from a scientific stand-point has demonstrated that its action is deceptive and that it does not have the medical properties that were once claimed for it; now therefore be it Resolved by the West Virginia State Medical Association that we deplore the fact that our profession has been quoted so long as claiming for its virtues which it does not possess and that we earnestly pledge ourselves to discourage the use of it, both in and out of the sick room.The Medical Society of the state of North Carolina, Resolved that it will use its best efforts to discourage the use of alcohol in any form. Resolved second it is the sense of this Society that any member of the profession who does promiscuous or unnecessary prescribing of alcohol either to patients or to non patients is violating one of the principles of our profession and is deserving of censure.Whereas it is one of the chief contributing factors to poverty, misery and crime. The American Nurses Association in their convention adopted the following resolution: The American Nurses Association believe, that alcohol lessens vital resistance, fosters poverty and all the diseases that come from poverty, hindering the progress of the community.The pronouncement of the Life Extension Institute of America consisting of ninety four of the most eminent Americans, including professors from the leading universities, the Surgeon General of the United States Army and distinguished physiologists of Medical Faculties.FacultiesFaculties is worthy of the deepest consideration vis-à-vis the problem of alcoholism. It runs as follows "Experimental laboratory work has kept pace with Statistical investigation and the knowledge gained from the laboratory, not only in experiment on animals but on man himself, shows that a higher death rate among alcohol users is what we would naturally expect to find in the light of what we know regarding its effects on the body.One half to one quart of bear is sufficient to distinctly impair memory, lower intellectual power and retard simple mental processes, such as the addition of simple figures. The narcotic or deadening influence is first exerted on the higher reasoning powers that control conduct, so that the lower activities of the mind and nervous system are for a time released.The every-day well-poised, self-controlled man goes to sleep, as it were, and the primitive man temporarily wakes up. Eventually the nervous system is narcotized and the drinker becomes sleepy. Muscular efficiency is at first increased a little and then lowered, the total effect being a loss of working power.Alcohol is a handicap for the nation at war. It is a handicap for an individual in the struggle for existence. This is not the judgement of scientists alone, nor of weak and faddists, out of the big-brained, strong-fibered men upon whom has fallen the tremendous :burden of guiding great nations through the greatest crisis of history."Is Alcohol A Medicine?Is alcohol a medicine? Whereas, it is the unanimous opinion of the Council on Health and Public Instruction of the A.M.A. that alcohol has no drug value, either as a stimulant, as - a tonic, or as a therapeutic agent, and that it has no food value; and whereas, its use as a beverage or as a therapeutic agent is detrimental rather than beneficial to the individual.Therefore, be it resolved that the House of Delegates of the A.M.A. declares it as opposed to the use of alcohol by individuals either as a medicine or as a beverage, and be it further resolved that its use in medicine is permissible only in the preparation and preservation of Pharmaceutical products. (Resolution passed by House of Delegates of American Medical Association 1917).Gopsel Advocate SaysStatistics show that ten thousand people are killed by liquor and one is killed by a mad dog; yet we shoot the dog and license the liquor What sense is there in this?Dr. Charles Richet of Paris SaysIt is the drunkards who fill our hospitals and lunatic asylums. By devising this un-natural product (alcohol) unknown to animals, man has increased his sorrows.Extract from "Life and Health", March 1969, Page 4.Early Detection is Protection - Know these Early Warning Signals of Alcoholism1, Difficult to get along with when drinking.2. Drinks "because he is depressed".3. Drinks "to calm his nerves".4. Drinks until "dead drunk" at times.5. Can't remember parts of some drinking episodes.6. Hides liquor.7. Lies about his drinking.8. Neglects to eat when he is drinking.9. Neglects his family when he is drinking.…Reference and more free study: What is Alcohol?