Nov 15 Dennis Jones – Violence – Should You Interfere?

This interview was conducted in June 2005.

SR  Hi Dennis, there’s been some controversy regarding our conversation last month..

DJ  What was that about?

SR  You said that bouncers shouldn’t get involved in fights even if people are getting hurt and that they should just ring the police.  Some readers thought that wasn’t moral.

DJ  The reason I said that was quite simple, society has changed and there’s now a much bigger risk of getting arrested and locked up.  I was watching a television programme the other day and a crime prevention officer was talking about planting a bush in front of a window to make it harder for a burglar to gain entry and the commentator suggested planting a prickly rose and the CPO said no because the burglar might hurt himself!  What planet do these people live on? His comments speak volumes.  On the street over here, when it ‘goes off’ it’s hard to be a saint, but you’re expected to behave like one. 

So I think it’s just better to avoid the hassle and phone the police.  I wonder how some politicians would react if they were caught up in the kind of confrontations that a lot of decent people find themselves, through no fault of their own.

SR   But you don’t follow your own advice though do you Den….  I seem to remember a short while ago whilst living in a particularly rough neighbourhood you saw two heroin addicts robbing an OAP across the road to you and you went after them….

DJ  Your memory’s too good!! (laughs) I just reacted instinctively.  These two junkies had knocked on the door of an old age pensioner across the road and asked for a drink of water.  He’d let them in and my son was watching from one of our windows and called me over, he said that they had gone into the front room and stolen some money off the table and the pensioner hadn’t seen them.

I went down after them, I was.. ahem… doing some building work in the house and forgot that I still had a ‘tool’ in my hand….  I shouted at them as they came out and they ran. I was so annoyed that I was prepared to ‘bash the living daylights’ out of them for what they’d done. I knew that they were probably armed – but I was ready for them.

However, never let it be said that heroin addicts can’t run, I’m fit and run regularly as part of my training routine but these guys could run!  The fifty year old was out in front of the twenty year old and I couldn’t catch either of them!

SR  Erm…  maybe having a half Chinese ‘tooled up’ madman chasing them may have had something to do with their speed?

DJ  (laughs) Yeah… probably…  when I returned to the old boy he looked totally perplexed and said “they only wanted a cup of water”  – bless him, so innocent – and these guys had just taken advantage of him.  They’d taken all his money and a digital camera. 

SR  The reaction is instinctive, but it depends on other factors as well like mood and health.

DJ  You’re right. Also it’s personality. Musashi said that when you are underneath a sword – all is hell, one step forward, all becomes heaven.  If that’s the case, what does one step back become? What makes a person go forward? I think Musashi was talking as much about personality as technique.

SR  How is anyone going to develop that nowadays?

DJ  Everyone seems to be talking about what’s realistic and what’s not in the martial arts and we have to remember that being a doorman or a martial artist doesn’t mean that you know it all – you only have the perspective of your experience. But just to let the readers know how rough it can be being a bouncer, my friend who has a security company told me that in the last month he’s had 4 doorman bottled, another had his jaw fractured and another 2 arrested for assault. I can’t talk about the assault incidents (sub judice) but I’ll discuss it when it the law has run its course. 

Many people teach self defence quoting that they have experience from ‘working the doors’ but have only really had a very limited experience, it’s like a white belt in karate with just a few lessons trying to teach or tell you what to do.

SR  Location also gives a different perspective – you could work 10 years in a quiet town on a busy door and 10 years in a busy town on a quiet door.

DJ  I’ve worked in many different pubs and clubs over the years and every door has a different type of story.  Some people are in the army for 3 years and see a lot of action and some for 20 years and never see any.  It’s difficult sometimes to get to the truth, of what someone has experienced and the question then is – are they able to realistically analyse it and build a set of responses that will work for a variety of different people?

SR  I’m very suspicious of these ‘packaged’ response systems as I never see them being tested where it really counts.  A good instructor works on a much broader canvas and doesn’t sell like a ‘snake oil’ vendor.  I prefer icebergs to mountains.

DJ  Icebergs to mountains?

SR  Yeah – it’s all under the surface with only the minimum showing above the water.  Anything that ‘builds confidence’ is giving something that can be taken away.  If you simply learn who you are, what you can realistically do and what you can’t – you have a better chance of survival.  These ‘packages’ can give a false sense of security, particularly practising them on compliant or ‘training’ people.

DJ   I’ve met ‘martial artists’ with ideas and training that soon fell to pieces under pressure.  I remember one guy turning up with his entourage to the door of a nightclub I was working on and I refused them entry, his friends said “you don’t know who you’re dealing with – Master X can take you apart with one arm tied behind his back” unimpressed I said “he still ain’t coming in”. A couple of the others went on about their master and then they all left. The instructor didn’t say a word he just let his sycophantic students talk for him. But I knew what turned him on – he liked being worshipped.

Steve, it never enters my mind who I can and can’t beat. It’s irrelevant and I also waste no energy trying to get people to think that I can walk on water. I just decide what I’m going to do and do it. Most of the time though, it won’t involve anything physical but I always follow my instincts. There is no point getting upset if someone says so and so can beat you. I don’t dwell on it but I do know (having seen enough of them) that having a street fight is hard work and can be very dangerous irrespective of who you are.

SR  A bit of humility and good manners goes a long way.  Keeping your skills hidden gives you the advantage.  Learning a system that is principle based, devised by people that actually had sufficient experience on a broad enough canvas makes all the difference.  If the martial artist and his entourage who came to the door at your nightclub were humble and polite enough, they wouldn’t have had to lose face.

DJ  Exactly.

Steve Rowe

Steve Rowe is a highly successful Martial Arts instructor - an International Neigong, Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher and an 8th Dan Karate with many other senior dan grades in other martial disciplines.

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