7 teens gang up on you...what is the consensus on how to respond?

[fixer]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VG3D...e_gdata_player


NSFW for language...


This isn't an ordinary school yard brawl...you can hear clear threats to kill and I lost count of how many kicks to the face the kid took.

I'm sure some have heard this story.


http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2012/01/...ed-on-youtube/

So...what is everyone's take on this as far as a tactical response?

Of course you try to avoid a confrontation...but this guy was lured down this alley by a girl...it was a set up.

[TCinVA]

Criminals who want to hurt people often use a ruse to get you into a trap. Knowing that, actively watching out for those traps would be a good start.

As for seven on one, it's a classic disparity of force situation. While it's possible that all seven of them are hardcore sociopaths who care not for their own lives, odds are that once you clear leather and shoot a couple of them that the rest will suddenly feel a strong impulse to be elsewhere. The same is highly likely to occur if you produce a knife and start opening major arteries. The mental transition from beating a dude down for fun 7 on 1 to "Holy crap, he's killing people!" can be quite unsettling.

[TGS]

Tactical response? Where do these terms come from, who makes this shit up? I'm a dude on a street with a gun, not a Vice Crimes Unit........

Besides critically dynamically shitting myself, I would shoot. TC said why. It's 99% clear-cut as a good shoot unless I did something to provoke them.

[jmjames]

As for seven on one, it's a classic disparity of force situation. While it's possible that all seven of them are hardcore sociopaths who care not for their own lives, odds are that once you clear leather and shoot a couple of them that the rest will suddenly feel a strong impulse to be elsewhere. The same is highly likely to occur if you produce a knife and start opening major arteries. The mental transition from beating a dude down for fun 7 on 1 to "Holy crap, he's killing people!" can be quite unsettling.

When I was in college, there was an incident where a student got jumped by 10 guys, I think at a party or a sporting event. They were piling on him pretty badly. He took a knife out and starting stabbing... the only person he hurt was the police officer who was yanking people off him. That stuck with me for a long time. Was he trying to protect his life? Absolutely! But it highlighted to me the dangers of trying to use a weapon to protect yourself in that scenario. In a situation like that, you've escalated "getting your tail handed to you" to "lethal encounter", and I simply do not see anything short of a firearm or *maybe* a baseball bat (or similar long-reach item) as a force equalizer. It's just too easy in a 7-1 for someone to grapple me or take my down, and then turn my knife around on me. All they need to do is surround you, and the person in the rear attacks your knees, and it's all over.

J.Ja

[superr.stu]

As for seven on one, it's a classic disparity of force situation. While it's possible that all seven of them are hardcore sociopaths who care not for their own lives, odds are that once you clear leather and shoot a couple of them that the rest will suddenly feel a strong impulse to be elsewhere. The same is highly likely to occur if you produce a knife and start opening major arteries. The mental transition from beating a dude down for fun 7 on 1 to "Holy crap, he's killing people!" can be quite unsettling.

I'm going to have to agree with this.

While I think jmjames' point of having your weapon turned against you is a haunting thought to say the least. I also believe in a seven on one situation that you are probably already in a fight for your life.

Maybe Southnarc or someone can weigh in on this.

[TGS]

I wouldn't share the same enthusiasm/confidence for breaking out a knife, personally.

Short of having the knife-fighting skills of a professional, I don't imagine myself as a big threat with a knife to where people are going to go, "oh shit!" and run away. I haven't the slightest bit of grandeur in my mind that I would be able to "open major arteries" as if I'm Wolverine. It's a great attitude to have unless you've got little knife fighting experience. Obviously if it's all I got, then I'm going to use it or whatever I can pick up since 7 on 1 is definitely a life threatening situation, even if they are only meaning to scare and bruise you.

I'm just saying to not be surprised when you pull out a knife and they get more enraged.....I wholeheartedly believe people will not react nearly as much to a knife as they would a gun, especially in a 7 on 1 situation. There's a reason guns had the effect they did on primitive societies, as opposed to blades.

Remember, the only absolute in knife fighting is that you will get cut. I wouldn't be so brazen in my attitude as to using one.

[jmjames]

While I think jmjames' point of having your weapon turned against you is a haunting thought to say the least. I also believe in a seven on one situation that you are probably already in a fight for your life.

The intent of these kinds of beatings isn't lethal, although they may well be (and they can certainly be crippling or disfiguring). They are a terror technique. If people want to kill you, they kill you. If they want to rob you, they certainly don't want to split it among 7+ people. No one wants 6, 8, 12 others involved in a homicide, because everyone knows that the first one to roll over to the police gets to paint themselves as an innocent bystander and everyone else takes the fall. This is one of those situations that, barring very unusual circumstances, Joe Citizen doesn't find themselves in. Even the one that I recall from college, the kid who was getting beat up had some sort of beef with a gang to begin with, it's why he was carrying a knife.

EDIT to clarify: by "terror technique" I mean something that rival gangs use on each other in turf wars, fights over women, etc., not to terrorize the average citizen.

J.Ja

[TGS]

The intent of these kinds of beatings isn't lethal, although they may well be (and they can certainly be crippling or disfiguring). They are a terror technique. If people want to kill you, they kill you. If they want to rob you, they certainly don't want to split it among 7+ people. No one wants 6, 8, 12 others involved in a homicide, because everyone knows that the first one to roll over to the police gets to paint themselves as an innocent bystander and everyone else takes the fall. This is one of those situations that, barring very unusual circumstances, Joe Citizen doesn't find themselves in. Even the one that I recall from college, the kid who was getting beat up had some sort of beef with a gang to begin with, it's why he was carrying a knife.

EDIT to clarify: by "terror technique" I mean something that rival gangs use on each other in turf wars, fights over women, etc., not to terrorize the average citizen.

J.Ja

I don't think it's too unusual for a person to find themselves 1 vs multiple, if that's your point. Happens all the time.

[jmjames]

I don't think it's too unusual for a person to find themselves 1 vs multiple, if that's your point. Happens all the time.

That's correct... but there's a cut off (which was my not-enunciated point), where it transitions. It's a fuzzy line, but it's definitely there.

J.Ja

[BaiHu]

A couple of points here: some come from a professional background (I teach martial arts), some from an opinion putting myself in that kid's shoes and then an overall opinion about the 'situation'.

1) From a self defense (SD) perspective, the kid did the best thing he could given the odds. He covered up in the fetal position the best he could when he no longer had a chance. From a awareness perspective, I give the kid a big fat 'F'. First, you don't go down an alley without heads up and scanning-no different in pistol work. Second, he obviously missed his first opportunity to escape by not having a 'heads up' awareness. Yes, the girl lured him, but any girl luring you into a snow filled alley for a BJ even must be questioned.
2) The negatives for this kid were way against him. The odds. The terrain. The weather.
3) Once the hyenas took a break, b/c they were all exhausted, the kid didn't improve his position.
4) As a kid, knowing this could be his life, he never utilized his reptilian self. His adrenaline and fight/flight were high and yet he chose neither for too long. Eye gouging, biting, screaming, flailing would have all given him some room and some 'credibility' to gain him a new position. I'm not talking about him suddenly becoming Jackie Chan. I've taught people for 10 years, who will still never be Jackie Chan, but will have a good SD background to not be suckered and not be caught unawares in most situations. This above explanation might not be as good as a gun or a knife, but it far outweighs just taking a pummeling.
5) I give the kid an 'A' for toughness, he took a decent beating from a lot of good blows and didn't go out, which is why I was so curious about why he didn't fight back. Perhaps we'll find out that the 'previous' altercation made him feel bad about what he might have done in the past-he just didn't want to fight even though they might have killed him.
6) Side note, I live in a quiet suburban area that doesn't have a danger zone unless you drive 15 minutes East or West, but a guy was killed at a bar one year with one punch to the back of someone's head-shit happens, even when you don't mean it.

All the above I've said as someone who knows SD well, but isn't expecting the kid to have any SD experience at all. If he had any SD training, he probably would have fared better. That being said, I have to liken this to Columbine for a minute. I'm glad that this beat down went this way, b/c this is a better way to deal with teen angst than having one or many of these kids showing up with dad's gun or a fertilizer bomb to their high school. I have a HUGE problem with the Zero Tolerance Bully mandates a lot of these schools have. I think it puts kids in a dangerous situation and it removes peer group problem solving, but that might be another thread.

Personally, this type of stuff makes me sick and although 'society' somehow will make this better, b/c people ratted everyone out, it's a shame that 6 boys and a girl thought that this was a good way to spend 5 minutes of their day. The honor amongst thieves has left the building.