Toastmasters - CC - Projet N°2: Structurer votre discours: "From Jewish ghetto to now, Krav Maga, a way of self-defense"

Dans le cadre de mon parcours Toastmasters-Competent Communicator, j'ai réalisé mon projet N°2: "structurer votre discours" sur le thème du Krav Maga. L'objectif du discours était de montrer que le contexte de création du Krav Maga en fait une technique de self-defense adaptée aux besoins des civils d'aujourd'hui.

Ci-dessous, la retranscription du discours, après prise en comtpe des remarques du grammairien anglais:

From Jewish ghetto to now, Krav Maga, a way of self-defense

It is late at night, in a city. You leave your friends after a party. It is dark outside. You walk back to your car. Suddenly, at the moment you open the car’s door, you feel like a spike on your back and you hear someone telling you: “don’t move and give me your keys”:

•       How do you feel?
•       How want you to react?
•       How have you the right to react?
•       What is the best way to react in this situation?
•       (And Finally) How will you react?

It sounds like an urban legend but someone tried already to answer these questions during World War 2.

During the Second World War, Imrich Lichtenfeld was in a Jewish ghetto of Bratislava. Because of the oppression, he thought about a way to defend himself and the other Jews from the Nazis based on his skills in sports and combats. So, with his background in wrestling, boxing, judo, gymnastic, etc. he tried to put in place a defense method. The difficulties were:

•       He had no weapon,
•       In the case he killed or injured a Nazi, he gave a reason to reprisals.

Finally, he put in place self-defense groups into the ghetto, which applied his method and tried to uphold self-defense.

After the war, he went to Israel and developed his method by creating Krav Maga for military purposes.

He developed the Krav Maga philosophy on principles and properties of:

1. Avoiding dangerous situation: it is sad but you have to accept that letting your wallet on the table at a coffee terrace is kind of a provocation,
2. Avoiding the fight through fleeing away, or speaking with the offender to discourage him,
3. In case of fight, defend and attack, minimizing your risk taking, and by the shortest way,
4. Target the sensible points of the human body: like eyes, nose and even the balls
5. (Finally) There is no rule, no limitation, no holds barred in Krav Maga, because you have to consider your defense as a matter of life.

And as a proof of civil population need, after being under military secret, Krav Maga extends from Israeli population to all over the world. You can find now a club in every significant city. And there are specific sessions for women.

The method and technics tend to be always easier to learn, more efficient. Through hard training, Krav Maga teaches to react in stress conditions against a determined agressor. And because Krav Maga is in perpetual evolution, the method is not frozen and you have to train again and again.

Finally, to go back on the bad situation I exposed during the introduction, after five years of training that is the way I want to react: I give the agressor what he wants, even the car, because it is just a possession. But if he makes a move I consider like an attempt to injure me, I have to react. I hit the balls first, and continue to hit him without stopping until I am out of danger.

But you know what; I never experience this kind of situation. Maybe this is because I apply the first rule: avoid dangerous situation.

Thank you.