Beat up a kid tonight

[gregimotis]

A kid in our gym (pretty new) is showing some potential - he learns fast, works hard, listens to instructors. However, he also talks a lot of smack, and wants to box all the instructors. I was assigned the 'job' of knocking him down a notch... so I did.
His jaw is going to hurt for a couple days. I didn't really hurt him, but I'm not sure I feel good about whooping a 14 year old either.

Does anyone have stories about the tough guy who came into the gym? Most of the time tough guys (read disrespectful jerks) are just pressured out of our gym eventually. Sometimes they get trounced by the instructors, sometimes they come around.


Of course, I'm not talking about people who want to learn and fight, I'm talking about people who want to talk s**t, and damage fellow students.

[ryanhall]

That's a tough situation, dude. Did your instructor actually ask you to knock this guy around? If so, that was pretty irresponsible of him. He should have spoken to the kid about his behavior and instructed him that if he did not discontinue it, someone would eventually get pissed with him and break his jaw. Assigning someone the task of beating up a 14 year old is definitely not the right thing to do.

Wannabe tough guys don't usually last at serious boxing/MA places for the simple reason that they can't stand losing--it doesn't fit the image that they have created for themselves. Either they quit on their own, or they hurt someone who can/will hurt them back.

[Damian Mavis]

I disagree, you did this kid a serious favor and taught him a valuable lesson. Good for you! You have made the world just a little bit better! I applaud you.

People like this need to get banged up a bit and learn respect. If you don't teach it to him who will? He will probably grow up into a complete buttmunch that makes everyones lives around him that much worse. I'm not talking breaking a childs bones, just banging him up a bit, what I would consider normal every day training for myself.

"Wannabe tough guys don't usually last at serious boxing/MA places for the simple reason that they can't stand losing--it doesn't fit the image that they have created for themselves."

Yes that is very insightful, I've seen it many times in my own school. I often encourage their wake up call though by partnering idiots with my toughest students, half of them crap their pants just from pad holding heh.... had one guy put the pads down and start to walk out, asked him where he was going and he said "oh, I left something in the changeroom, I'll be right back", he fled out the door. This guy came into the school saying he could take all my boys no problem, too bad no one taught him a lesson early in life.

Damian Mavis
Honour TKD

[Karate_is_cool]

thats hilarious! yeah i agree, those guys need to learn and often a little bit of pain is a great way to teach some humility

[Thai Bri]

I'm with Daman. It was done with rules and gloves etc right? Not just a street vicious mauling?

I've had exacrtly the same with macho men when its their turn to hold the pads. In Shukokai they use these dense foam pads. Hurts like flook if the striker knows what they are doing. The best guys grin and bear it, but these "tough guys" always have something they just need to do....

I know where Ryan's coming from.... but a big mouthed 14 year old is usually small in the ears department. Talking rarely works.

[gregimotis]

Yes, it was done with gloves and reasonable force - not just an out and out beating. Also, I didn't hurt the kid, just left him sore on the jaw. The way my instructor put it was "You can't HURT him, but you can bang him up."

Wannabe tough guys don't usually last at serious boxing/MA places for the simple reason that they can't stand losing--it doesn't fit the image that they have created for themselves. Either they quit on their own, or they hurt someone who can/will hurt them back.

I think this was what My Khru was trying to arrange - the kid wants to fight, so let him fight someone who can hand him a bruised ego without breaking his jaw; then see if the kid wants to learn more than he wants to feel like a winner.



Thanks for the responses.

[EvilGun]

Keep us posted on the progress of the kid. I want to know if he came back. I think every body at my gym thought i punk out of classes because i showed up after a couple of weeks off, cause of shin and back issues. The worst thing about it was that the last class i was at i got drilled all night because i wore a shirt that said MASH Vodka on it. so it just looked bad that i didn't go for a bit, i got crap all night. But also shocked a few who thought i was a newbie.

[osopardo]

We have two ways of dealing with "attitude problems".

1. Puke drills - We put the "problem" in with some of our better conditioned students and work drills until somebody feels like they're going to puke. It's funny how they don't even realize they're being shamed into trying to keep pace with somebody who's way out of their league. Takes the starch right out of them before we even hit the 90th push-up or hundredth kick.

2. After that, we spar. We have a few students who are so well conditioned that they can wear you out without even hitting you, just using evasion. There's one in particular who smiles and trash-talks through the whole thing in the most devious infuriating manner, saying things that seem like encouragement or compliments while actually being demoralizing;
"Nice try, too bad you missed." "C'mon on, come at me faster!" "You know, you can hit me harder if you want, I wont break", that sort of thing.

And of course, we tag team the "problem" so that there's no way he can possibly keep up.

[m.artist]

don't know if rickys is gonna get pissed at me for saying this but here it goes
at the jkd place(warriors way) where harley teaches, bjj instuctor,ricky, is a good friend and student of harleys. well ricky is the guy that harley calls on when some "macho" guy think he has some balls and what's to be all that. well he was new( a marine guy i think) who had studied some korean arts, and when harley was talking with the new kids he was asking how many fights they had all been in. he would yell out "5" and some kids would put their hands down and some still raised(along with the marine guy. harley would yell out "15" "35" "50" and apparently this guy still had his hand raised up, and was the only one. (this is from what i was told by the way, if u see this harley then feel free to correct me, but i got this from ricky) so harley figured this guy was just screwing around, kinda showing off a bit, so harley asked what kind of fights these where and more then 95% percent of these "fights" where cheap shots from behind. he still had an attitude so he called on ricky to "take care of him, show him what we do" so they fought(sparred....in a way...) and at the end ricky ended up getting the better of the guy. so a few weeks later the guy shows up again all "humbled" and asks ricky to show him(what i think was called) a heel lock. so they got down in position and ricky was telling him to go a lil further(with the lock) and a lil further adn a lil further, untill it got to the point where the opponents ligiments would snap or the opponent would tap. so he held ricky there for a few minutes, and i don't know why but the guy just tweaked (totally and obviously on purpose) and ended up tearing rickys ligiments in his knee and he was out for a year and a half. (son of a bitch! that sux) then the guy "ships out" like 3 days later leaving us all pissed, ricky bed ridden, and a "marine" telling his friend on how he took at jkd,bjj guy out....pisses me off....what an ass

[fugetsu]

chopping down the big tree

I witnessed a great "falling" of a big tree - but it's results were not necessarily effective.
My instructor, who I will refer to as Khun Kru in this little story - one of Ajarn Chai's first students - (who was 40 at the time and had a blown out knee needing surgery) taught Muay Thai at a boxing gym and western boxing at the local Gold's Gym. Anyway, a tall, mouthy, thought he could kick anyone's ass-type of guy - someone who came to be refered to later as Cupcake - anyway, at the time Cupcake was a senior in high school I think, and was taking trash to Khun Kru's son, saying that he would KO Khun Kru in boxing class. Anyway, the long and the short of it is that Khun Kru got wind of the challenge, and at the end Cupcake's first boxing class, during sparring, Khun Kru got into the ring with Cupcake and went three rounds. During the first and second rounds, Khun Kru went easy and saw what Cupcake could do to him. I was the time keeper, and before the third round Khun Kru looked at me, said "he's mine now, give me the signal for the last 30 seconds," put his mouth piece in and went for it. During the first 2 and 1/2 minutes, he took it easy, and then when I called out "thirty seconds," Khun Kru turned on whatever switch he had in his head and took Cupcake to town. He moved in with savage hooks to the body and when Cupcake's hands went down, Khun Kru went high, and then low again, knocking the wind out of him, and causing Cupcake to spit out his mouth piece, and Khun Kru really didn't back off until I called time. Anyway, this was one of many lessons that Cupcake has learned over the years, most memorial of the others was the hundreds of push ups at camp in front of the group- those of you who have been to the Oregon camp might be able to guess who this kid is, and then guess who my instructor is too. Anyway, while Cupcake has come a long way, after a while the beatdowns became more like rewards than punishments, kind of "I just got special treatment from Khun Kru" than paradigm shifts causing introspective self-criticism. So, while the beat down may work to shake people up and help them to learn the meaning of respect, it isn't the single answer. Leading by example and the moral uprightness of the Khun Kru is of paramount importance.
My two bits, and may respects to Khun Kru, and even to Cupcake - who has admittedly come a long way since that first day at Gold's Gym.
Fugetsu

[squidd]

really a very interesting topic. here in the philippines some people prefer to go to rather high-end m/s and boxing gyms where memberships signing up fees range from 12K and up in philippine pesos (that's about 200US$) plus a recurring monthly fee of about 15 dollars. may not sound much to you guys but in a third world country this amount hurts the pocket as much as ... say a well executed kimura.

i really don't know how this would sound but in this country, you can expect a certain level of sophistication from people who can afford to shell out this much for a hobby (which is not to say that people who can't afford to shell out this kind of money are not sophisticated). anyway, my point is that the fee is an entry barrier for the brasher breed.

i once worked out in a gym that charged a mere fraction (US$ 10 sign-up, US$ 10 per month) and we really did get some characters that needed some smacking.

i just want to ask if this "financial weeding out process" holds true for other countries. do you get less brash people in more expensive gyms?

[seany85]

good on ya, sounds like he needed it

[seany85]

my instructor turns them away if they have an attitude problem, as since we train in such a small group, he says that it would create problems in the group

[fugetsu]

turning people away

I understand that it may be better for internal group dynamics to turn away potential problem makers, but isn't one of the goals of martial training to build character? Shouldn't martial arts schools be arenas for character building, especially for big-mouths who think their shit does not stink?

[darrianation]

We have this kid he’s 13 years old but he’s my height (5’11”) I thought for the longest time he was 15 or 16. Any way this kid is good, really good, but he has a problem with his temper. He thinks that when he spars he has to win. When things don’t go his way he gets frustrated and looses his temper and starts fighting with anger 100% power. He would hurt the younger kids and it got so bad that the instructor was going to throw him out.

I intervened with the instructor because this kid’s a 4th kyu (purple belt) and he is testing for his brown belt next month and I didn’t want to see him go. So now he’s only allowed to spar the adults and when I spar him I tell him the object is to learn not to win, and I’ll go only as hard as he does. That means if he looses his temper and goes into fight mode with all his power and will respond in kind. Only I’m much larger than he is, he’s probably 140 lbs soaking wet and I am 220lbs.

The other night we were sparring and he got mad because I leg shield one of his kicks and jammed his toes and he lost his temper and swung a punch to my face full power. I slipped his punch threw a medium power punch and landed right on his chin and as he stepped back I threw a ¾ power round kick to his mid section that knocked him back and he started crying. I told him you want to go full contact, full power I’ll do it anytime. Otherwise you need to control your temper or you’ll have to leave.

I hope he truly learns that losing his temper in class just isn’t acceptable. If he doesn’t clean up his act he will be asked not to come back.