The Martialist: A Publication of PhilElmore.com

“Stay ‘unreasonable.’  If you
don’t like the solutions [available to you], come up with your
own.” 
Dan Webre

The Martialist does not
constitute legal advice.  It is for ENTERTAINMENT
PURPOSES ONLY.

Copyright © 2003-2004 Phil Elmore, all rights
reserved.

Thank you for checking out our premier issue!

So, you’re asking yourself — what is martialism? 
What does it mean to be a martialist?  We hope our first issue, full
of great editorials and edifying articles, will educate you and therefore
assist you in the goal we all share:  success in self-defense. 
But what is self-defense?  Are we preaching one or another end of the
force continuum, advocating extreme pacifism or extreme viciousness?

Laurence Clark writes, “When attacked,
strike the eyes, nose, ears, throat, groin, and knees of the aggressor
repeatedly and fervently. Punch, elbow, kick, tear, stomp, pinch, bite,
lacerate, truncate, and gouge your attacker until he stops his aggression
or he expires. Any resultant pernicious or quietus state the miscreant may
experience is the result of his coercive action. He directly compromised
your inviolable rights and freedoms. To put it simply, kill him if he
persists!”

Those are harsh words.  Do we mean that anyone
who offends you, who looks at you funny, who harms you by accident, has
“got it coming” and deserves to be terminated at all costs?

No!  The choice of any action is, as always,
yours.  Facing a drunk who swings at you once and then collapses
hardly justifies stomping the man’s head in while he’s on the ground or
cutting his throat with the latest in tactical folders.  But the
attitude Mr. Clark expresses could be applicable if you are a woman
facing an abusive spouse or a rapist.  Is that spouse or rapist
administering a beating that, if not stopped, could cause permanent injury
or death?

Tony Manifold
writes, “It is the duty of the defender to make a reasonable judgment
based on the information available to him. If I can make a reasonable
assumption that the person opposite me is preparing to hurt me, I can hurt
him first. If I can make a reasonable assumption that the person opposite
me is going to kill me, I can kill him first. He doesn’t have to have a
weapon; all he needs is two or three friends wearing gang colors and I can
reasonably assume death is a possible outcome. I don’t even have to be
sure that death in the desired outcome or even the most probable outcome.
I just have to be sure that death is very possible outcome. If someone
pulls a gun on me, he may just want to rob me, or threaten me, but I will
assume he means to kill me.”

Of course — and Mr. Manifold would be the first to
tell you this — such preemptive actions may or may not be seen as
justified by juries.  If such action is to be seen as legitimate, you
will have to establish that a “reasonable person,” by objective,
reasonable standards, would have — given the evidence available to your
senses and not simply from your intuition — come to the same conclusion
that serious physical harm was imminent and credible. 

Tony goes on to address the other extreme in the use
of force, however.  He writes, “The problem is that many martial
artists have this Mister Miyagi/Caine from Kung Fu mentality [that
constitutes the expectation] of defeating the attackers without harming
them, whilst teaching them an important lesson.

“The problem is, this isn’t TV and I am not that
good. If I am going to survive against someone who has shown the intent to
hurt me, I have to start at the extreme end and back off from there as
appropriate. If I feel my life is threatened and I kill someone, society
may disagree with my judgment — but if, when I made the call, it appeared
reasonable to me, I can go to my grave feeling morally justified.”

Mr. Manifold would also agree, of course, that
feeling morally justified doesn’t mean a thing when facing a jury or a
judge who believes you acted improperly.

As you will read many times in perusing The
Martialist, the choice is yours. 

Make it wisely — or suffer for it.

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This issue’s subscriber content:

Knife
Defense: The Cutting Edge of Survival and Effectiveness
By Andrew J. Cartwright

Get A Grip: A Knife and Gun
Grip Improvement You May Have Missed
By Don Rearic and Phil Elmore

Welcome to the Criminal
Mind
By Dan Webre

Learning Defensive Shooting
By Ken Cook

The CRKT Pesh-Kabz

By Lawrence Keeney

Victims Win
By Andrew J. Cartwright

Stopping Power: Unrealistic Expectations
By Robert Bolt

I Have Something for You
By GF Matheis

First Strike: Mastering the Preemptive Strike for Street Combat
A Book Review by Phil Elmore

Beyond Aliveness
By Coach Scott Sonnon