Belt for self-defense

Belt for self-defense - From Flickr.com

Here's a quick note about using a belt for self-defense. And we're not referring to the karate black belt either.

As you may or may not know - many every day items are easy to utilize for self-defense purposes.

In order for these items to be of ant real effect, they need to be readily available and also to provide a certain degree of threat or damage if needed.

One such item is undoubtedly the regular belt worn around your waist. If you can easily remove it (without your pants falling down) and it has a rather large and heavy buckle, you've got a nice self-defense tool at your disposal!

A friend of mine once used his belt to fight off two guys at a bar who wanted to "teach him a lesson" and below is a recent story from southcoasttoday.com in Massachusetts.

The victim parked his car in the area of County and Thompson streets shortly before 11 p.m. and was walking to his apartment when he was approached by a man with a knife who demanded his money, according to police.
The victim took off his belt and swung it at the suspect, Detective Sgt. Victor Mendes said. He chased the robber around a parked car and swung his belt at him a second time.
Mendes said the man with the knife ran to a second suspect, who was on a bicycle about a half a block away, and the two fled on the bike.

So there you have it - a good incentive to always wear a belt (not only while driving :)

Using a belt for self-defense

This self-defense related post from latimesblogs.latimes.com points to at least two interesting pieces of information.

First, it describes how highly effective a common belt can be when it is used as a self-defense weapon of choice. I have personally witnessed this in real life, and friends have used it to great effect. Here's the situation with the belt in use:

"A woman in her 30s was molested by a large group of men in the middle of a Cairo street. It was said that none of the onlookers dared to intervene until a taxi driver stopped by and got out of his car. The man then took off his belt and used it to whip the harassers, who soon left their victim half-naked."

Furthermore, there's a telling point of statistics in the article. It points to a survey which has shown that 83% of Egyptian women reported exposure to verbal and sexual harassment.

This included men staring inappropriately at their bodies, inappropriate touching, sexually explicit comments, stalking and telephone stalking.

And here's the interesting part: Almost 70% of harassed women are veiled. This clearly challenges the perception that puts the blame for harassment on women for wearing revealing outfits.

He gave up

TV2 East in Denmark reports about a 21-year-old woman who was on her way from a disco to a pizzeria in Nykoebing, Falster.

At about 1:25 a.m. she was accosted by an unknown man, approximately 25 years old, 185-190 cm tall, and of muscular build.

The man grabbed the young woman and forced her into a nearby gate, threatening her with a knife.

However, the man couldn't get her belt to open, forcing him to give up his ill intent. The assailant then fled from the scene.

The news states nothing to the fact, but this may be a belt-buckle invented by a young, Swedish female named Nadja Bjork.

As previously noted in 2005, she designed a belt-buckle that, according to reports, can prevent rapes.

Allegedly this design has already prevented one girl from being raped at a music festival in the summer of 2005 in Sweden (Hultsfredsfestivalen). The attacker gave up when he couldn't open the belt.

In an interview with the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, Bjork claimed that the buckle work much like a chastity belt. The belt-buckle sits on top of the regular buckle, and that it takes a special two-handed grip to remove it. Since an attacker will need both hands to attempt to remove the lock, it gives the victim more time and room to escape (or fight back) and get help.

Bjork states that the buckle is designed to prevent or hinder a blitz-rape where a victim is attacked by a stranger, and that it will be of little use towards pre-planned attacks (partner rapes, date rapes or acquaintance rapes).

She said to the media that the invention hopefully will be in production spring 2006.