Hey Guys, I Went to a Self Defense Class and I Learned Some Things But Mostly I HAD THOUGHTS

We have what's called the "Women's Network" at work. It has kind of a strange mish-mash of functions, with the end result sometimes being that certain events or publications have a layer of "Weeeeee can't all agree on what the underlying purpose of this group is but our committee members are evaluating our performance based solely on how many people join this network/show up to this event/download this pamphlet so we are politely going to try to hit as many of our members' ideas of what the underlying purpose should be as is humanly possible" which is drizzled all over the purpose of any given event. Mostly this is fine, but it often has (perhaps telling?) consequences.

For instance, an example which perfectly illustrates the kind of confusion about the group's purpose happened recently at our Women's Network "Conference." The theme of the event was pretty great: "Engaging Men as Change Agents." This is the sort of progressive conversation that my workplace could really use and is exactly the sort of thing I'd like to see the network doing. But, they also had posters advertising other Women's Network events, most prominently the office Weight Watchers meeting. (Waaa-waaa) Most of the conflicts seem to  stem from this issue of whether the network is a "Ladies Club" or a "Professional Women's Organization."

(Sidebar for your amusement/annoyance and lest you develop jealousy about my workplace and its seemingly inexorable march towards gender equality nirvana: I marched myself over to that thing pretty enthusiastically, impressed that we had such a progressive and modern topic. "If there is something my office could use, it is some men who have been engaged as change agents!" is something I've thought in less charitable terms on probably hundreds of occasions.  The discussions themselves were crushingly disappointing.

Basically, the men they picked as the example "change agents" did not actually seem to be all that engaged. Or rather, they were engaged for change in the women but not in the organization. 
Basically, instead of a discussion there was a heavy dose of "Oh no, this bad boy is FIXED. Y'all just need to LEAN IN! We don't need more of that feminism up in here, no sirree!" I described my disappointment as crushing, because I required several drinks with a crushed ice component to process the ensuing FEELINGS.

Side-Sidebar: In the defense of the people who set up this thing, I've organized an internal engineering "conference" before and we got shockingly little access to the important people we brought in to speak. We didn't know the title of the keynote speaker's speech until about 5 minutes before he started. So, I believe that they just didn't have access to the panel members in order to vet them. Also, management pretty much tells you who your speakers are going to be, so they probably couldn't have just gotten some less important but more engaged dudes.)

Anyway, last night I made an exception to my rule of only going to the "Professional Women's Organization" events and went to a Self Defense class which was sponsored by this network. Here are some probably valuable things I learned:

• When someone grabs you by the wrist, your natural reaction is to try to get out of it by pushing your arm towards the closed part of their hand (ie the connection between the thumb and the rest of the fingers). If you can, it is better to twist and pull on the fingers so that your hand can actually come out of the grip.
• If someone grabs you bodily, it actually a little better for leverage if their arms are around your arms rather than being in a bear hug with your arms free. It makes you a little harder to pick up for reasons that they did not explain well, but which I believe based on subsequent trials with friends.
• Your thumb does not go inside your fist when you punch someone. This is apparently nearly a guarantee that you will break your thumb.
• If you aren't someone who knows that thumb thing, you are probably better off with an elbow to the face than with a punch.

Based on this list, I bet you can already guess where the THOUGHTS part of this comes into play. According to the RAINN website, approximately 2/3 of rapes are committed by someone known to the victim. 73% of sexual assaults are committed by a non-stranger. If this is surprising to you, here is a link to the webpage which I will emphasize begins with a highlighted and bolded heading reading "A Rapist Is Not A Masked Stranger."

I knew these facts going into the class, but I thought "hey, even if its only helpful in a few of the cases, it could still be helpful. Besides, there are other crimes besides rape that this could be useful for, like muggings. Plus, I'll get to hang out with my friends any maybe we'll go to dinner afterwards!(we did)" OH MY GOSH was I unprepared for the onslaught of uninformed rape culture drivel that I had to wait through in order to get to the point where I learned the helpful items from above. The guy teaching the class did a lot of talking, I think in an effort to sell us on the idea that we should pay for more of these classes. But sweet baby Jesus was he uninformed and alarmist and sooooo typical. Here are some of the highlights:

• "Women are delicate and tiny and rapists are big powerful men"
• "Make good decisions like never going anywhere alone and never turning your back to a man" (ps, how is this even possible?)
• "I'm not sure whether its right or wrong [!!!!!!!!!!!] but police care about things like how you are dressed and if you've been drinking...." [NOT SURE? HOW CAN YOU BE UNSURE? EVEN IF YOU ARE UNSURE YOU RUN A BUSINESS WHERE TO GIVE THESE SEMINARS TO WOMEN, AT LEAST FEIGN SURENESS AS A SOP TO YOUR CUSTOMERS!!!]

As I later said over beers with some of my friends who also participated, this is why I usually don't go in for this sort of potentially helpful thing. The people who give them have usually somehow given in to the central conceit that it is your responsibility to alter your decisions and your life based on your risk of being raped. 

One thing which I found to be particularly weird was that almost all of the attendees felt weird at some point during this guy's talk but no one SAID anything at the time. (that clothing thing seemed to be the point where it really jumped the shark for most people) Personally, I confined myself to muttering statistics to those around me because I had an overwhelming feeling that my complaints would fall on deaf ears and an equally overwhelming feeling that it was neither the time nor the place. Just as we hadn't signed up for this two hour seminar in order to hear a lecture on how to conform our behavior to someone else's definition of a "believable victim" the other women in the class probably didn't sign up to hear me lecture this dude about rape culture and his role in perpetuating harmful myths. In the spirit of honestly, part of it was that I am almost pathologically conflict-averse and didn't feel like it. My friends said the same things. 

I don't feel great about saying nothing though. I'm giving this guy no opportunity for growth, and I'm not letting him know that his sales pitch for more classes is tremendously ineffective.  My plan is to send an e-mail with some feedback on how he could make the message more factual and less tooth-grindingly byzantine. Here is the outline of my feedback to him:

1. First of all, the dark alley scenario for a rape is not as statistically likely as other scenarios, So don't get fooled into a false sense of security by having taken this class. Some of these things would also be useful in the more personal scenario you are likely to encounter. Give examples of those situations as well as the "guy coming up from behind you in an alley" situation and show us how to get to a point where we can use your advice when someone is already close to us (which could happen in that alley anyway)
2. Don't mention any details about assualts which are not in the domain of a self-defense class. For instance, ust don't talk about drinking or clothing choices. This is not a class on maximizing your chances of successfully prosecuting your rapist.
3. Avoid making broad general statements about the differences between men and women. (this is good life advice for us all) This is off-putting.

Any thoughts?