Writing the Fight Scene: "Can a Woman Take on a Man in a Fight and Win?"

As I wrote on July 3rd, I have changed this month's writing the fight scene topic to answer a question posed by one of my readers. The reader wrote on June 19, 2012, "Hi David. I wondered if you might have any insight regarding hand-to-hand combat with a female protagonist.

"I recently read somewhere that a woman cannot "take on" a man, period. No way, no how.

"I know that upper body strength is an obvious issue, but wonder if there are certain things she can optimize, use to her advantage, or take advantage of in a male opponent, etc. And I don't mean basic self-defense either. I'm thinking equivalent to a trained, female soldier.

"Appreciate any thoughts."

After I wrote the first draft of my response to this, I found I was over ten pages single spaced on Microsoft Word.  Most blog readers don't want to read something long, so I have decided to split the answer into two blogs. This is the first.

Before I begin, I must warn you of three things:

• It will still be lengthy;
• It will be answered frankly and honestly as this Sandan (3rd Degree Black Belt) in Chinese (or Tracy's or Original) Kenpo sees it based on both personal experience and those he has had the honor of calling sisters in the brotherhood of black belts; and
• If you harbor a false male ego that men are superior fighters because they are physically stronger, your ego will be shattered like a porcelain doll---a very girly porcelain doll. (I think I hear some shattering already.  Oh well. "Clean up in aisle 6! Clean up in aisle 6!")

Obviously, the answer to question if a woman can defeat a man is yes. Before I explain why it is, and at the risk of sounding like I am providing a mathematical proof, let me lay down a few things to be sure you and I are on the same page.

1. I am assuming that neither the man nor the woman have any injuries, illnesses, mental problems, or so that would limit them.
2. I am also assuming that these people do not have special abilities or magical powers, and so forth. If they do, this would still be true—as long as your world is treating them equally in the sense that they would otherwise be normal people.

I write the following with both the Kenpo Code and the Oath in mind. I have taken this oath since I was ten and done my best to live by the oath and the code.

The code is:

• I come to you with only open hands, other weapons, I have not. But should Right or Honor require it my hands will bear me out.

 My oath is:

• I solemnly pledge that I will use the art of Karate solely for the purposes of defense, never for purposes of aggression.
• I will treat with respect both my teachers and fellow students.  
•  I will strive to impart an attitude of respect and appreciation for the teachings of Karate, and an understanding of the responsibility that a knowledge of Karate entails.
• I will never sanction the use of Karate for destructive or harmful ends.  I make these promises solemnly and on my honor.

Let’s begin by defining the word "fight". If we are looking at a ruled completion (as in a ring match) where there are certain things that are either required or disqualified, then either person may be over matched. I know rules are meant to make a competition fight fair, but they usually lean towards one style or ability (such as strength) over others.  Unless you are writing the next Rocky or Karate Kid tournament novel, rules will not apply to what you are writing.

(Sidebar: Police officers do have to follow certain rules on the street. Contact your local police department on what those are.)

This leaves us with either with hand-to-hand combat or a street fight. In either case, I personally follow these philosophies:

1. (To borrow from Joss Whedon who said it best with his Character Mal Reynolds in Firefly) “Someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill 'em right back!” (Sidebar: Just because you are defending yourself doesn’t mean you may not be arrested. However, a good lawyer can get you out of a jury of twelve. He can’t get you out of a box carried by six.)

2. There is no such thing as the undefeatable opponent. Everyone and everything has a weakness. The trick is finding and exploiting it.
3. There is an old Asian (I think Japanese) saying I heard as a twelve-year old boy that has stuck with me and I have passed it along to all those who I have taught any self-defense to: “A butterfly could knock down a man if it only knew where to place its wings.”

I will show you those weak points and how to exploit them below under “Butterfly Wing Techniques.” (next month's blog)

Let’s walk before we run.  

Everything from here on assumes the combatants are unarmed. This is a misnomer. If your character (or if it is you in real life) have clothing on, you are armed. You read that correctly. Unless you are naked and the ground you are fighting on is completely sterile and empty and your hands are empty, you can always have a weapon--even if that weapon is a stick of chewing gum. I will make that a separate blog subject in the future (September 8th).

(Sidebar: I once gave a student of mine a “homework assignment.” I asked him to think of anything that could not be a weapon. He came back and mentioned a few things. I showed him how they could be used as a weapon. I explained as I did so the real definition of what a weapon is. I had him do it again. He came back and explained about the various things he thought about (and I had to give him credit, he was quite inventive on showing how things could be used as a weapon) and concluded everything could be a weapon. He was right.)

How does a woman defeat a man? The same way any weaker opponent defeats a stronger one: by using their brains and their (dis)advantages to the best of their ability. A fighter is never brainless (unless you are writing zombies or berserkers). The stronger opponent doesn’t want you to think. He wants you to fear. The weaker opponent must think and use their fear to their advantage.

Before I go into how to see your or your characters advantages, let me tell you a story about someone who should not have been able to defeat stronger opponents. But, he did . . . quite often and it was fun to watch.

A late instructor of mine, Steve Leventhal was a great fighter. He was short, around five foot two to five foot four. His height did not prevent him from competing in martial art fighting competitions nor did it prevent him from walking home with the trophies from them. With his foot on the ground, he could kick a man over six feet tall in the head.

No, I’m not making this up. While I have always believed from my earliest days of Martial Art training that there was no such thing as an undefeatable opponent, watching Steve was watching the philosophy come to life every time he stepped in to the ring.

It is with great sadness that I must end this example by saying Steve passed away at the age of 27 from unknown causes in 2006. He was the same rank I am now when he passed away. His storytelling and his teaching is missed very much. Yet, his living lesson continues on in all those who watched him and learned from him—including me.

How did Steve do it? Simple! He used his brains, experience, and timing to get inside of the taller opponent’s reach. Once he was too close for the opponent to punch or kick, the opponent had to withdraw to a more comfortable distance. There was no way he was going to let the opponent do that. Instead he stayed on top and struck from his punching or kicking range.

If the opponent is stronger, use his strength against him.

If the opponent has more experience, use it against him. (It is quite common for Black Belts to be surprised by White Belts because the White Belts don’t know that they can’t do something.)

If the opponent is faster, use his speed to his disadvantage.

If your opponent is scary, use the adrenaline pumping in your veins to make yourself terrifying.

Do you get the idea? What are your or your characters disadvantages are, from there you can discover your advantages. No one is undefeatable. (Tougher than hell, but not undefeatable!)

As I wrote above, we will continue this discussion next month on August 11, 2012 with a blog titled "Butterfly Wing Techniques" that will go through all of the points where any man (as the saying goes, "be it ape, man, angel or demon") is weak.

Thank you for reading and please visit www.davidalanlucas.com and www.thewriterslens.com. You can also follow me on twitter @Owlkenpowriter and the Writer’s Lens @TheWritersLens. Fiction is the world where the philosopher is the most free in our society to explore the human condition as he chooses.

Writing the Fight Scene Part 5 (Understanding the Trained Fighter Part 4)

The final type of fighter we will explore is the "gym fighter." By this term I am lumping in all the boxing gyms, the studios, the dojos, and any other type of fight training school that lasts for more than a few months of training. Generally speaking, no matter the style, the gym fighter is a man or a woman who may have started to train to fight for self-defense, to get off the street, or because of the exercise and eye-hand coordination. Whatever their reason, they trained and trained and may have even competed. They went past the level of training someone who would have taken the training for standard self-defense would have gone and have moved in to that insane level of perfecting their ability and knowledge. These people have chosen the narrow, rocky, and demanding road called "the warriors' path."

If you think I am trying to make these people (and myself) out to be something beyond normal, let me use a cliché: Someone enters a karate school to check it out. They ask the head instructor, "How long does it take a normal person to become a Black Belt." The instructor answers, "Normal people do not make it to Black Belt." The same adage could be said with boxers, fencers, and all other trained fighters who have spent years and continue to train every day. We are not super human or anything. What gives us our edge in a fight (especially, if we train in street fighting or other combat outside of the sport ring) are:

1. Endurance Training--we are trained to make it through several rounds thinking, fighting, talking, and breathing. Each round can last roughly two minutes (depending on the style). Ask a normal person to do jumping jacks and hold a conversation for two minutes--watch the results.
2. Strategy training--Because we constantly train and face a new fight every time (even if it is someone we faced before), we are forced to adapt and change our approach. We are forced to think moves ahead--like a chess master must think far ahead in the game to win.
3. Hours of simulation-- In the military and within the police, they spend hours simulating and training for possible events. Fighter pilots spend time fighting in dogfights in simulators as well as flying. Cops spend time on shooting grounds that have "civilian and bad guy" targets to learn not to shoot the wrong one. Gym fighters have the ring. We will face more hand-to-hand combat situations in one hour of training than a normal untrained fighter will see in their lifetimes. Not only does this improve our endurance and strategy training, but it also improves our ability to read the opponent like a poker player watching for "the tell" in his opponent. It improves our dexterity and reaction time. Because we can read the other person, see their tell and predict what is about to happen, it makes us look faster than we really are. The reason is our time to react is extended because we know what you plan to do.

In my next set of blogs, I plan to explore the various kinds of training in more detail and then will eventually go into weapons use, disarmament, and the psyche behind the fighter.

Thank you for reading and please visit www.davidalanlucas.com and www.thewriterslens.com. Fiction is the world where the philosopher is the most free in our society to explore the human condition as he chooses.

Writing the Fight Scene Part 3 (Understanding the Trained Fighter Part 2)

The first trained fighter we are going to examine is the police officer. Police officers, including federal agents, undergo a level of training in a preferred martial art. The martial art changes from country to country, or even police precinct to precinct. This can also change in time as well. For the purposes of this blog I am going to address the modern United States police system and I am going to use a large paintbrush to describe it. It does not take into account individual training.

Despite being trained, the police officer doesn’t have the extensive training that most gym fighters would have. They have only a short amount of training and it is usually in Aikido or Judo. These two styles of martial arts are focused on arm locks and tying up the opponents body, which is appropriate for bring a suspect into custody. This also defines the strategy that the police officer uses in any fight they are in.

The rest of the training that a police officer undergoes in regards to fighting is with firearms, pepper spray, and police nightsticks. (Again, there are some other weapons they may learn to use, including “street weapons” like a baseball bat.) The nightsticks can take the form of their mag-lite, a baton, side handle batons (that look like and are used the same as the ton-fa), the expandable baton, and the stun baton. Each of these types of batons has strengths, weaknesses, and move differently. To the common person you might not see too much of a difference, but if you get the opportunity you might want to talk to a police instructor to get a better understanding.

One of the things that all these weapons have in common is the target areas the police officer is allowed to strike. I will talk about target areas in another blog entry, but let me give you a quick list for now. While accidents can happen, because usually a suspect that has a baton taken to them is resisting and moving and otherwise being less than cooperative and thus might get hit where they shouldn’t, the police officer is not allowed to hit the skull, sternum, spine, or groin. Most of these targets would take out a suspect immediately—sometimes with deadly effects, thus why they are not allowed. What they are allowed to strike are large muscles and nerve areas. 

My next entry will look at the training and preferred martial art styles of the Armed Forces.

Thank you for reading and please visit www.davidalanlucas.com and www.thewriterslens.com. You can also follow me on twitter @Owlkenpowriter and the Writer’s Lens @TheWritersLens. Fiction is the world where the philosopher is the most free in our society to explore the human condition as he chooses.

Writing the Fight Scene-Part 1 (Understanding the Character Motivation)

Everyone is an expert in at least one thing. We bring that expertise to the stories and articles we read and to the movies and television shows we watch. Speaking for myself, when I see or read something that is clearly wrong I want to shout, "That's wrong!" Often times I fight myself from stopping my enjoyment of the story and moving on to something else. Watching or reading a fight scene is one of those things that catches my eye and often makes me groan (to say the least). Often times, friends do not want to go to a movie with me if there are a lot of fight scenes--or at least not ask me what I thought of them. Often times, the look on my face says enough. Why am I this way?

I started studying Martial Arts over thirty years, about the same time I started writing. I have dabbled in a few different fighting styles, including fencing, Iaido, and various hand to hand styles. At the time of this blog I hold a third degree black belt (Sandan) in Tracy's Karate, which has always been my foundation in training. I have spent much of my life, in one way or another, studying how to fight and how not to fight (including when to run like the devil was after you). Despite all of this, even I catch myself writing a fight scene wrong. 

How do I write a fight scene, as an expert in fighting, and how do I correct it when I go wrong? While I would imagine there is a book on how to write a fight scene, I haven't seen it. So, I am going to tear apart the process as best as I can over the several months. Before I begin to outline it, let me be very clear: Writing is an art. Martial Arts is an art. There is no one way to do anything. Take from this what works for you, knowing that, like all writers and marital artists, we all walk our own path.

The first thing I do with writing a fight scene is to understand who is involved. When people fight in real life, everyone has a set of skills, a way they think, and a motive to be in the fight. Let's work this backwards and start with motive. Why does your character want to fight? 

Let's think about your character and about fighting. Fighting is dangerous and painful.  How dangerous? Allow me to share with you a true story.  How many times have you been somewhere . . . a park or a bar . . .where some people break out in a fight and you hear the spectators cheer on, calling to the world, "Fight! Fight!"  The story I am about to share is not about one of the combatants but one of the spectators.  As the spectators gathered around to cheer on the drunken fight, one of the bar room warriors pulled out a knife and swung it blindly at his opponent.  Instead of cutting or stabbing his opponent, he slit the throat of one of the spectators--someone who had gone out for a few drinks left his life's blood pooled out like a pool of sticky dark blood all because he wanted to watch two morons fight over  . . . what?  What were these drunks fighting over and what had been worth so much for someone to die?

Someone can be beaten to a proverbial pulp or lose their lives over trivial issues--like a pair of shoes, a spilled drink, or (as a guy I once knew discovered) looking at someone's girlfriend the wrong way. In St. Louis, Missouri a game among teens has developed where they go up to complete strangers and try to knock them out. Fights can start over imagined slights, being drunk, forced to protect yourself or a loved one, property and so forth. 

Why is your character willing to fight?

Before you decide to turn your character into a super hero or the next Jet Li, let me break down the motivation a bit. There was a story my Master Instructor once told me that I have never forgotten.

A man, who was studying Martial Arts and had grown so confident that he felt like he was bullet proof, was once asked what he would be willing to fight for. He was asked, "If ten men were leaning on your car and causing trouble, would you fight them?" 

He replied with confidence, "Of course I would beat the . . .." You can fill in the words.

His instructor then asked, "What if they all had chains and baseball bats and you were unarmed?"

The student thought about it and agreed he would not fight them. 

The instructor then asked one final question, "Take these same men, armed the same way, and now they are raping your wife. Would you fight them?"

His answer changed.

The circumstances in real life and in our fiction writing are what will determine if someone will be willing to risk their lives in a fight. What are you willing to fight for and lose your life over? If you answer that quickly, I personally ask--plead with you--to think about it a little more. What is your character willing to fight for? What is their line in the sand?

On February 11, we will begin to get inside of the fighter's mind--from the untrained to the most trained.  How do they fight? More importantly, how do they think about fighting?

If you have questions about writing fight scenes or about how various characters might act in a fight, please feel free to ask.  I will do my best to answer your question.  Your question's response may even lead to a blog entry in this series.

Thank you for reading and please visit www.davidalanlucas.com and www.thewriterslens.com. Fiction is the world where the philosopher is the most free in our society to explore the human condition as he chooses.