Quite recently I was forced to intervene in a fight between two of my closest friends. A few of us were drinking at another friends house, seemingly having a good time, just chilling and chatting as you do when suddenly it all kicked of.
One of my friends, who I shall call Joe (not his real name), had had too much to drink and for some reason he decided to kick one of the other guys in the face for no reason at all.
That started the confrontations of.
My other friend, who I shall call John, tried to calm Joe down a bit but Joe was having none of it. I could see the red mist rising in him and I knew the situation was going to descend into a nightmare, as indeed it did.
Joe punched John in the face for getting involved and then the two of them went at it like prize fighters, trading blow for blow.
At this point I was just starting to realise what was going on, because I had missed the kick of. There I was, chatting away, nice and relaxed, when violence suddenly reared its ugly head and I felt the adrenaline kick in straight away. I ran over to the two of them and pulled them apart, shouting at them to calm down, nobody wants this, you’re mates, the usual things you say in such situations.
Joe was not for calming down. Like I said the red mist had completely blinded him to all sense and reason. He was like a man possessed and there was no calming him down. The best I could do was put him in a head lock and take him down to the ground and hold him there. The problem with that was John kicking him as I was holding him. So I spring up and push John away, at which point Joe jumps up and starts again, this time on me, accusing me of taking sides.
What do you do? I didn’t want to hit him; he was one of my closet friends. As far as I’m concerned it was my job to try and calm things down, not inflict more damage. Unfortunately Joe didn’t see it like that and threw a load of punches at me. I took a few of them before grappling him down to the ground again, pinning him this time and hoping he would calm down.
Then John would run again and I would have to get up and do the same with him. And back and forth for a good hour it
In the end it was John who finally walked away. Things finally settled down. All three of us were bruised and battered. I had a cut eye, a busted lip and bruises all over me from all the grappling on concrete. Needless to say I was sore for the next few days.
Joe and John are still not talking, at least not properly.
Lessons Learned
Most people just shook their heads when they heard about this situation. They kept asking me why I didn’t just knock the two of them out. I was reminded of the fact that I was a martial artist and that I could’ve done it easily.
That’s certainly true, it wouldn’t have been hard for me to knock them out or choke them out and leave them lying there in a heap. But why would I do that? These guys are two of my closest friends and I’m not in the habit of hitting my friends for any reason. It may seem silly to some, but I was prepared to take whatever they threw at me until I could put a stop to the fighting. Hitting them back would have made me as bad as them for fighting in the first place. Someone had to take the moral high ground.
People think that just because you know how to hurt someone that you have do so when someone comes at you, which isn’t always the case. I’m not in the habit of hitting first and asking questions later. As far as I was concerned I was almost duty bound to not hit Joe or John. I wouldn’t really have been defending myself, but fighting. By putting myself in the middle of them I was getting in the road of their drink-fuelled tempers. The red mist was everywhere. Both of them were out of control. It was my job to bring them back under control again and minimise the damage, not add to it. Damage control, I guess you could say.
I did use my training to an extent. I used it to control them, to take them down and hold them there. I just took a few shots in the process. The training also allowed me to keep my head and not panic. It was certainly a testing situation, especially when it’s your friends involved, but I kept a handle on it. The other people that were there (some of whom tried to get involved but were immediately stopped by me) said the situation would have been much worse had I not been there to contain it. It would have ended up as a free for all and more people would have gotten hurt.
In the end I stayed in control, which is what self defense is all about, keeping control of yourself and the situation as much as possible, not making it worse by allowing your pride or ego to get in the way and lead you down the wrong path.
What I was reminded of by being in this situation was firstly that fights happen when you least expect them and that you can never really be ready for them. The test is how quickly you can react to them (especially when you’re intoxicated) and how well you can keep your head during them. How well you can do this depends on how much control you have over the situation. The more control you can exert over yourself and the others involved, the better the situation will turn out.
Secondly, I was reminded that alcohol has a very bad effect on some people. Some people just shouldn’t drink because it makes them loose all control over themselves. Now I don’t really subscribe to the view that alcohol is to blame for people’s behaviour. People are to blame for their own behaviour. Substances like alcohol just bring out what is already there, and for that reason I won’t listen to those who try to absolve themselves of responsibility by blaming this or that. If you are that way inclined and alcohol or whatever brings your aggression to the surface then stop using it. Either that or except the fact that you are going to get in serious trouble some day over it.
Thirdly, I was reminded of the power of fear. Like most people, I don’t spend all my time fighting. Situations like the one I described above rarely arise in my life. During the long gaps between these confrontations you tend to let fear and doubt get the better of you. You build violent confrontation up in your head into this really scary and fearful experience, when in fact it is not as bad as your mind likes to make out most of the time. Yes you’re still afraid of getting hurt but you can usually handle violent situations better than you think, especially if you just let the training take over. Even getting hit isn’t that bad. It’s good exposure training. What matters is what you learn from the experience.
I learned to trust the training, which is reason enough to keep going.
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