Last updated on September 17th, 2024 at 07:45 am
Original article : https://justiceforwomenindia.wordpress.com/2012/11/06/need-for-self-defense-an-interview/
There is a lack of awareness about self-defense amongst women in India. We asked some questions to Franklin Joseph, our Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training organizer in Bangalore, and this is what we learnt out of it.
1. What is self-defense?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ The idea of self-defence is still stuck in the Stone Age. The majority of people still associate self-defense with martial arts or techniques from such disciplines. Few women enrol in free self-defense lessons, and there are reports of certain crimes against women. Everyone eventually forgets, and things return to “normal.” Regretfully, everyone genuinely thinks that if I ignore this problem, it won’t ever happen to me.
2. Why is Self Defense important?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ About 24,206 rape incidents were reported to the National Crime Records Bureau of the Ministry of Home Affairs in India last year; the number of rape crimes has climbed by 826% since 1971. However, no one seems to care about the 99,135 recorded crimes, the 42,968 molestation instances, the 35,565 kidnapping and abduction cases, or the “cruelty by husbands and relatives” incidents. 92% of the time, men they already know conduct these assaults against women.
- Can a six-year-old child who was sexually assaulted by her stepfather escape her nightmares by punching and kicking?
- Is it possible for a wife who is raped by her husband to leave their marriage by giving a round kick?
- Is it possible for an 85-year-old woman dressed in a sari to fighting her younger, more formidable assailant off her ailing body?
- Can a sixteen-year-old college student fight back against a gang of men who are eve-teasing her without worrying that she’ll end up an acid victim the next day?
Real-world problems cannot be solved with punches and kicks. Our perception of movie magic is so strong that we begin to believe that the good guy will really win the girl after martial arts fighting the bad guys.
3. What is your opinion on women being known as the “weaker sex?”
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ The majority of males with whom I have spoken seem astounded that some or most women do not, cannot, or would not fight back with a fistfight if they feel threatened. Naturally, they claimed that women’s lack of aggression was directly related to their physical weakness and referred to them as the “weaker sex.”
Regretfully, the majority of women believed that they were inferior to men, particularly in terms of size, strength, flexibility, and other physical attributes.
The day that we males told women they had to be good daughters and take care of the family’s “shobha,” we implanted these ideas in their minds. When we were advised to stay inside the house for protection while our sisters, who were more fragile, were free to do whatever, we as brothers encouraged them to doubt their power and appearance. As parents, we never supported girls’ physical training because we believed it would reduce their femininity or darken their skin, rendering them unfit for marriage and other social situations.
It’s interesting in one respect that, as males, we tell them that their age, size, strength, flexibility, or other physical limits prevent them from doing something. While we as a society instill these fears in them, we also expect women to defend themselves against an attacker who may be bigger and stronger than they are.
And it indicates that she provided consent if she doesn’t. Let the victim take the blame! Simple!
4. Is physical fitness important to learn self-defense? If so, why?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ Now that you know, you know that to win a fistfight with someone consistently, you need strength, size, fitness, endurance, flexibility, and a certain skill set. Tony Jaa, Bruce Lee, and Jackie Chan do not struggle with weight concerns or pot belly because of this. They have trained in their various martial arts for over ten years.
- What actions would a six-year-old girl do against an adult man?
- Or a 20-year-old facing up against a bunch of men?
- Can a forty-year-old mother fend off a robber?
- Or an 85-year-old woman taking on a younger assailant?
In my Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training I’ve met a lot of women who have told me they’ve slapped the eve-teaser and it worked for them. They want to teach these guys a lesson because they don’t want them to do the same with other women. I agree entirely. You have to take vengeance, but I’m concerned that it shouldn’t escalate into violent provocation. The majority of these molesters, rapists, and Eve-tasters are juvenile offenders and delinquents who have no regard for the law, the system, or women. They also don’t think twice about using violence. So the question is, what will you do if he gets aggressive and the situation gets out of control?
I understand that I haven’t given you much optimism up to this point, but trust me when I say that the crime rate against women ought to have dropped by now if women’s self-defense only required a few martial arts techniques. Regretfully, crime is a complex, dynamic living creature that changes all the time, much like other aspects of life like love, marriage, employment, etc.
5. How can you ensure safety of women?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ In order to help teach people on the realities of women’s safety awareness, self-defense, and psychological empowerment against crime, violence, and sexual abuse, I founded Franklin Joseph Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training. Prior to getting into this, let us address one more self-defense-related matter.
6. How can your workshops help women?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ PowertoWomen.in: Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training
I’m not just a martial artist with a certificate that lets me instruct self-defense. Since I am merely a trainer, I am essentially teaching ladies how a male should act in a situation when he is threatened: he should utilise his power, size, fitness, age, flexibility, and skill set to intimidate the enemy and not worry about the repercussions.
One of the online videos I watched showed a tactic where the victim would have to pretend to be unconscious or to be experiencing an epileptic attack in order to search the attacker for weapons. The victim would then be held captive by the attacker and would have to use his or her hands to look for hidden knives in his or her pockets or waist and his or her legs to look for knives concealed under his or her socks. The victim should then seize him by his clothing and toss him over his head to neutralise the threat. Wonderful, Look for weapons, then subdue the threat.
The only problem arises when a woman is the victim and a man is the assailant, and molestation is the danger. Imagine the woman rubbing her legs against his while stroking his pockets and waist and passing out into his arms. Oh my god, molesting the molester — what a harlot! I apologise! I have no doubt that I would now be the target of a fatwa!
7. Tell us something about your history with self-defense.
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ Jokes aside, it’s time to re-examine the issues of crime, violence, and sexual assault against women as well as the ways in which Indian women are taught and comprehend self-defense. This is a brief summary of my experience with self-defence:
Having grown up in the New Delhi slums, I have first-hand knowledge of the tactics used by criminals and their mindset, as well as a lifetime of experience fighting on the streets.
I became a social entrepreneur and motivational speaker 11 years after leaving my job as an IT-Creative Director in order to listen and impart the lessons I’ve learnt about life.
In order to overcome and better myself after experiencing my own sexual abuse and violent history, I began studying and educating myself on Safety Empowerment in 1986.
I began working, researching, and developing a module on women’s safety empowerment in 1995. I did this by living with or studying women who had experienced trauma or abuse in the past.
Since 2003, I have accumulated extensive experience teaching corporate workshops and tactical training for military, police, and special forces as a Krav Maga Israeli Self Defense instructor.
began leading and specialising in ‘PowertoWomen.in’ Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training in 2008, which centred on the internal empowerment of women.
8. Could you give us a brief on your workshops?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ The following are the main highlights of Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training:
- Workshop participants and trauma survivors, as well as a woman psychologist, provide input into the design of the workshops.
- Israeli Self Defense Neuro-behavioral Reprogramming tactics, like as Krav Maga, are used to help in threat prevention, avoidance, and escape.
- uses positive emotions and intervention strategies based on neuroscience to increase and stabilise DHEA, the hormone that gives one the impression that they are in control.
- Redesigns the psychological resilience response, which strengthens a person’s capacity to handle stress and hardship.
- Awareness of your own physical strength: no matter how big, strong, or fit you are, you are capable of surviving.
- Knowledge of recent crimes and comprehension of a predator’s strategy and how to stop it
- Determine Pre-Conflict Signs and Recognise Post-Conflict Risks
- Pre-Assault Situation Awareness and Conflict Prevention: Preventing oneself from being selected as a victim through body language, attitude, etc. The survival mindset: eliminating fear and inspiring bravery
- Stress management: operating efficiently under stress when there is a genuine risk to one’s safety
- Risk prevention strategies include verbal confrontation, diffuse exercises to stop eve-teasing, and office Sexual abuse, amongst other things.
- Preventing risk: avoiding sexual abuse, kidnapping, and domestic violence
9. Which forms of Self Defense are useful for women and where to learn it from?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ Women need to push the so-called experts in women’s self-defence to adopt a more gendered perspective. Rather than treating women like clients who merely pay fees, they should only advise women on what to do after thoroughly understanding the root cause from a woman’s perspective and providing a solution that treats her like a living, breathing human who must live with the consequences of her decision.
If a woman wants to be trained by any random person who makes claims and calls names, she should be aware that the person is only imparting a male-dominated perspective that has been traumatised onto her. Thus, you ought to.
Practice any martial art or self-defense technique you choose, but don’t practice mindlessly by accepting whatever half-baked information he tosses at you.
Pose enquiries, exercise common sense, and present a manageable task for them to tackle. Make him consider your well-being rather than just his upcoming fees. Give him limitations based on actual life, such as: Can the victim use the same strategies if she is 87 years old or 6 years old?
Investigate the material you discover, ask yourself probing questions, and test it in a more grounded situation where you are experiencing pain or fearing for your life to see whether it remains effective and whether it will handle any fallout from your decision to fight. If not, come up with an alternative strategy.
10. What has been your experience training with women so far?
Safety Specialist Guruji Franklin Joseph ~ Having led numerous Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training, I have always been in awe of the women’s inner strength — her size, her drive to defend her loved ones, her level of fitness, her wisdom, and her adaptability to be a self-assured professional, housewife, and family member. My goal in my Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training is to simply demonstrate to her that she doesn’t need any tactics to understand that she is a tigress rather than a rabbit and that she is never — not even in the slightest — a lesser sex.
In association with Franklin Joseph, P.S. Justice For Women is hosting a free self-defense Power To Women Corporate Self Defense Workshop with Psychological Women Empowerment on Warrior Leadership, Stress Resilience and Conflict Management Wellness Training in Bangalore on November 17–18, 2012. Please email us at mail@justiceforwomen.org for further information.
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About Specialist Franklin Joseph
