You’re very much mistaken about how easy it is to hit. It’s a small movement to put a thigh where the testicles were a split second before. Guys are trained from childhood to protect their junk. Why would it be easy to hit an easily defensible area that people are always guarding? It’s outside the body? Then I guess it’d be easy your you to punch my taint, is that right? What about the mole in my ass crack?
Please forgive me...but I'm curious...[Why isn't a knee to the groin a more common fighting tactic?]
I was just told that doing actual damage that incapacitates by attacking that portion of the anatomy is more difficult than one thinks. Mr.CJ says that one has to hit them just right to actually stop someone. Not only that, coming close enough to threaten those parts puts the opponent in easy assault range. It’s also an easily defended area. According to Mr.CJ, “If they were that easy to damage, no guy would ever sit down.”
Which means that if you try to hit them, you’re likely to hit a leg instead, and a punch or kick to the thigh isn’t going to do anything to anyone. By contrast, if you aim for the chest, or the gut, or the face, there’s pretty much nothing you could hit that isn’t a worthwhile target.
It’s hard because our arms don’t extend like rubber bands. A shot to the head and upper chest are exactly one arm’s length away when you’re standing in front of the guy you’re attacking. His groin is probably about an arm and a quarter. Trying to make up that quarter is going to get you walloped in the head.
On the other hand, if you want to kick him, usually you’re at something more like arm’s length than leg’s length when you fight someone. When you’re at arm’s length, their shins and their head are at the right distance to get hit by your foot. The groin is too close. Accordioning your leg to be short enough to kick the groin is going to take time and be real noticeable. Plenty of time for him to block.
I really don’t think it’s difficult. For example, in martial arts you are taught to always stand with your legs apart. The way the stances are, it is easy to use the front foot to deliver a quick low kick to the groin (it’s just like the common low-kick to the quadricep, except you bend forward your toes). It happens fairly regularly in sparring just by accident, and most people wear a cup.
You wouldn’t try going for the groin from a standstill, same as you wouldn’t throw any other powerful attack. But if you throw a combo–a jab to the face, a cross to the face again, then bam a quick left front kick to the groin–all within a second–you’ll stand a high chance of success.
Huh? Hitting the chest is worthless. Hitting the gut isn’t spectacular either. You have to hit special targets like the solar plexus or the kidneys/lower ribs. Likewise the face has special points, like the jaw and nose. Punch the forehead, and you might as well go punch a wall.
Well…okay…
whatever you guys say…
"…the groin is really not that vulnerable…
"It’s not easy to grasp…
Right…
Guys know…
And has been said to me (no! no cite!) …no guys “expect” an “assault on our nuts…”
Still…I ask… A 'Gentlemen’s Agreement"?..
Males are this “Delicate” about one another’s stuff?
Come on boys.
In future “Sanctioned” wars… let’s all agree that going for the groin - penis and testicles - is “Within Bounds” - A “PRIORITY” even…
Perhaps this will make males protect one another enough to stop?
That is perhaps a thought. The greater the chance of being harmed, the more incentive to avoid conflict. Nukes are probably why the USA and USSR never fought. But now we’re getting philosophical…
Did you get the part where I explained there’s lots of attacks that people don’t do against one another? Why is that hard to understand? Do you just want to go around punching guys in the nuts? Why don’t you carry a switchblade around with you and just slice at them? Did you know you can just kill people with the most common blunt objects? Someone gives you shit, just find a brick. Pick up a ballpoint pen. In our plastic society, lots of things are still metal…
In a real fight, it most certainly is difficult to target the groin.
Keep in mind that while you are attempting to land a blow, your opponent is trying to hit you as well. For instance, extend your arm in a punching motion at eye-level with your elbow slightly bent. This is the range at which you and and your opponent would be trading blows. Now aim the same punch a foot or two lower towards the groin, and you would be forced to lean forward to land the blow. This is bad for balance and leaves you vulnerable. And your opponent might clock you in the head or the torso in the meantime.
Similiarly, you can try to land a kick to the groin since your kicking range is typically longer than your punching range. But that requires you lift one leg off the ground, again ruining your balance. If you don’t land the strike, you may have some problems (opponent throws you hard to the ground, say).
Further, a very natural reaction to an incoming blow to the groin (at least for me) is to rotate the hips, causing the blow to land on the thigh. It tends to be a natural human reaction; what’s your first instinct if someone tries to hit you anywhere? Usually, it’s to try to block with the hands and arms, shrink away, and rotate your body away from the contact.
If you’re grappling on the ground and your knee happens to be in the general vicinity of your opponent’s groin, sure, why not. But the groin is generally a poor target.
lurking guest is seriously abusing the Enter key.
Like I said, low round-kick with the front foot. The more you rotate, the better it is. You can throw a round kick with the leg bent in, and it’s no less effective.
BTW. Steven Segal has a new movie coming out COCK PUNCHER!
The OP keeps mentioning the penis is a highly vulnerable target. It isn’t. The testicles are very particular, but the penis in a flacid state can take (wait for it) quite a beating.
An initial read of your question seems to be focused on entertainment based fights. In action movies, etc., shots to the groin don’t make very good entertainment. It’s not very heroic to either be incapacitated by a groin shot or to use a ‘cheap shot’ to take out your opponent, so bad guys and good guys are both out of consideration. This isn’t a concern in comedies, where you’ll see groin shots abound (Austin Powers, Bad Santa, etc.).
In entertainment fighting (boxing, MMA, whatever) there are rules to outlaw groin shots, and competitors wear cups anyway. Cups work really really well.
Outside of entertainment, we generally aren’t exposed very often to actual down-and-dirty fighting. I would wager that groin shots are not uncommon in actual survival-may-be-on-the-line fights.
There certainly are self-defense systems that include groin shots. One particular system includes the lovely ‘grab-twist-pull’ as one of the initial steps to escape a bear-hug from behind. I don’t think anyone’s ever actually found a training partner to try it on, though.
No, I don’t think that the key to world peace is teach groin strikes. As has been stated earlier, a kicking the nads is a standard part of fight curriculum, and I’ve seen little evidence of Kumba Ya. [1]
That said. You have to think about the context of the fight in question.
On the battlefield, killing and maiming is acceptable, though hand to hand combat is pretty rare today.
Code of honor? No, male instinct
But in most fight situations killing or maiming has consequences. So just as knees to the groin are rare, so are strikes to the knees and elbow breaks. A fight between males of the same species is typically a display. So when male lions fight, it’s not always to the death, since a death match could very well kill them both - even if one lion unequivocally wins the battle. Infection can do that. The ability to fight and hold back is embedded deeply within male intuition and is not unique to homo sapiens. Indeed, this holding back comes naturally and can coexist with rage, anger and hatred.
Weapons are a complicating factor. And humans possess notorious behavioral flexibility. So if you get into a fight with someone you don’t know, you may not be able to predict whether they will act as if they have nothing to lose. Heck, that’s the case if you’re fighting anyone.
[1] Or rather, there has been a decline in violence in the Western World over the past 200 years. But that’s a result of the extension and deepening of the rule of law.
If there WERE a “gentleman’s agreement,” and if it WERE very easy to hit someone in the crotch, wouldn’t hitting someone in the crotch be absolutely devastating? Not only would it be a hit to the crotch, it would be an UNEXPECTED hit to the crotch.
There would be a huge incentive to use it. If you have a 50-50 chance of winning any given bar fight, and can increase your chance of winning to, say, 75% with a simple, devastating kick to the crotch, why WOULDN’T you see it in most bar fights?
The fact that it’s not a tactic in common, actual, real street fights is most likely evidence that for the level of training that most street fighters have, it’s some combination of difficult and ineffective, where ‘ineffective’ means ‘unlikely to hit in such a way as to do damage.’ Whether you choose to believe the posters in this thread or not, it’s simply not the case that kicking someone in the crotch is easy to do.
A real street fight is nothing like TV. Generally they end up on the ground almost immediately and then roll around for a little while until one of them establishes a dominant position on top of the other guy and starts raining down blows to the face. Very little time is available for a groin kick, especially if you risk having your leg grabbed and your balance thrown with the other guy ending up on top of you.
Another thing, aren’t women’s breasts also quite sensitive? And yet, you never see 2 women trying to stand and punch each other in the bewbz. It’s simply not how people fight. One tackles the other and after that it’s all a ground battle.
Haven’t heard yet…
Why males, knowing one another’s vulnerabilities, don’t just “go for it.”
Doesn’t happen.
They’re quite gentle-like in their consideration for one another’s junk.
Males punch one another in the nose, the eye, the gut - use “Kung Fu” moves - but NEVER go for that one vulnerable place.
Never take that knife to cut off the penis or testicles of their opponent on the “hard streets” of male aggression.
Curious.
[Moderating]
lurking guest, you have received quite a few answers that respond to these points. Simply ignoring the answers you receive and asking the same questions over and over again is not particularly useful in GQ. If you have some specific objections to particular answers, please address them directly. Otherwise I’ll be inclined to close this thread as “asked and answered.”
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
You seem to be obsessed with this…the male’s anatomy in general. Is there a reason?