The whole basis of street self defence is having effective techniques and moves to deal with real street fights. Fantastic as they may look and devastating as they may be after years of training most martial arts techniques aren't relevant to most people dealing with real violence.
Street self defence is all about an appropriate response to an attack or situation. Those who study it aren't thugs out to hurt or injure people - we don't go looking for trouble we simply want to be able to deal with it.
Always of course wanting to stay inside the law we largely rely on our body's natural weapons in street self defence - elbows, fists and knees. But there are also times it can be neccessary to use what some may call an 'equalizer.' If faced with a number of attackers, a person with a knife or other weapon or jsut a situation where you feel the threat is extreme it's reasonable to improvise a makeshift weapon.
A good example is a simple bunch of keys. Held in your hand in an appropriate way keys can become and effective weapon in street self defence. You must keep your mind open to objects around you which in a moment can become self defence weapons. In a pub fight for example - the worst possible scenario is someone smashing a bottle or glass to attack you. Anything from a hefty ashtray, menu or the good old bar stool can all become equalizers to block or defend yourself or if required become weapons to counter attack.
There are objects all around us which can be used for self protection in street self defence. Matrial arts rely on traditional weapons like tantos, jos and staffs - fantastic in the right hands but you can't carry these around!
I'll talk about improvised martial arts weapons more in later postings but for now just keep your mind open to what can be used in self defence as situations demand.
