Comments by "" (@redtela) on "Can You Hit a Child in Self Defence?" video.

  1. other half is a teacher, and yes, it's a grey area, but appropriate force is permitted. She's told me that if she ever has to use force, to expect an automatic suspension pending an investigation, but I think that just makes the balance right. Dissuade, rather than outright disallow. She's also a black belt in karate, and I saw the light bulb go off in her head the day I suggested "simply block & feign until they get tired/bored"
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  2. If a child were to come at me aggressively with a knife, it's entirely possibly to remove the weapon from them without "hitting" them. I would argue that to "hit" anyone only vary rarely qualifies as "reasonable force" - ie, police officers rarely hit anyone, even when arresting people that don't want handcuffs to be placed on them.
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  3. My eldest daughter was bullied at junior school. Group of 4-5 kids her age stood around her, her age, hitting her. My youngest son ran over (4 years younger), and the school called me with "he made them all cry" - I took him for an ice cream since school didn't want him in lessons for the rest of the day. As he's grown up, in high school, a bully was throwing balled up paper at him repeatedly. He threw a chair back at them and he got excluded for 2 days for it. So I enrolled him in karate to teach him the value of an appropriate response. Kids 3 years older than him found out he did karate and wanted to "challenge" him, he stood his ground & dealt with everything the older kid could throw his way, and never once lashed out at the other kid. School did absolutely nothing about it, but he found it funny. It's entirely on the parents to correct the mental attitude of kids, it's clear no-one else will.
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