Solo Training

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 29th Jun 2020

If you want to get good, it’s down to you, and the effort you put into your own training; and this means that the majority of your practice time, occurs outside of the dojo or studio. This doesn’t mean that you have to put in hours and hours of practice outside of regular class, but that regular, consistent solo training, is where you will progress and develop; it will be in class, training with others where you will realize and recognize that development. If you were to go back to school, you’d acknowledge that in a lecture you might be...Click To Read More

It Would Never Happen To Me

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 22nd Jun 2020

Wherever possible, I try to be scientific in my approach to self-defense and personal safety. I try to take an evidence and research-based approach to the study of violence, rather than other people’s well-intentioned good ideas about what they think violence looks like. When I am talking with fellow professionals who are expressing ideas based on their experience(s), I try to consider, the context in which they were working, and how translatable that is to others, etc. Experience – including my own – by its own definition is limited to the individual, and so may not always be applicable to...Click To Read More

Movement

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 15th Jun 2020

Movement in a fight accomplishes one of three things: it moves you away from danger, it puts you in a position from which you can attack, or it is part of an attack. If your movement isn’t accomplishing one of these things, then it’s likely that it’s unnecessary and unwarranted. A real-life confrontation differs from a ring or cage fight, in that you don’t have the time to feel out the person you are dealing with, and you’ll expect the same to be true of them, therefore any movement must be both economical and effective; time is not on your...Click To Read More

Crime trends During A Pandemic

Gershon Ben Keren

Tue 9th Jun 2020

With much of the world in lockdown due to COVID-19, I thought it interesting to see how the stay-at-home advisory may have affected different types of crime, by comparing the incidents of various offenses in May, with those of previous years, for the city of Boston, where my school/studio is located. When looking at any crime statistics it is worth reminding ourselves of certain things we need to be aware of. Firstly, correlation does not necessarily imply causation e.g. just because offenses went up or down in 2020 compared with 2019, doesn’t mean that this was the direct result of...Click To Read More

Witnesses

Gershon Ben Keren

Mon 1st Jun 2020

If you are involved in a violent altercation where you must make the claim of self-defense, there is a very good chance that this claim will be tested in court. Claiming self-defense, means that you are admitting that you used violence, but were justified in doing so for your own protection, etc. One of the pieces of evidence in such a case is that of witness statements, and these can be extremely unreliable. For this reason, in England and Wales a criminal case can’t be brought against another person if it relies solely on eyewitness testimony; there has to be...Click To Read More