By Piper Rutherford | Staff Writer
The self-defense course that is offered at Baylor helps equip students with the necessary verbal skills, body language positions and physical maneuvers to combat those seeking to harm them.
Jon Antunes, instructor of the self-defense course and third-degree black belt in martial arts, said that what he predominantly centers the course around is general awareness and how students can avoid escalating potentially dangerous or life-threatening situations.
“The first thing I always tell my students is that they should always be aware of who is around them and what is going on around them,” Antunes said. “Now, I am not suggesting that they live a paranoid life, but that if they are in an abnormal situation, such as walking home alone at night, they need to pay attention to their environment.”
In teaching his students how best to act in these abnormal situations, Antunes said that he frequently looks at FBI statistics to see the common threats against college students, which most often include physical altercations, robberies and, particularly for young women, an individual trying to attack or abuse them.
“With these kinds of situations, I first emphasize the use of body language,” Antunes said. “It can look like standing or positioning yourself in a specific way so that if I see someone is walking towards me, I can take a step back, angle my body, put my hand out and ask what it is that they need to see if they continue walking towards my center line or not.”
In teaching these non-physical cues, Antunes hopes that he can help his students not engage in the normal human reaction to a threat, which can often be a physical response, because it not only puts the other person in danger, but them as well.
“When people are taken by surprise … the first instinct of someone would be to stand back, when they really should lean into it to avoid absorbing the full force of the blow,” Antunes said. “Similarly, for a young lady, if someone grabs a hold of them, the worst thing that they could do would be to slap or hit the person, since that will not significantly harm them, but will make them angrier.”
There are also legal repercussions that Antunes said he warns his students about, specifically in the instances that they have to engage in the last resort of physically harming another individual.
“Even though this would be in self-defense and you would not face criminal charges, you do not want to severely hurt someone unless it is absolutely necessary,” Antunes said. “You have to change your way of thinking to ‘How can I eliminate the threat and do as little damage as possible?'”
Lifetime Fitness Program Director, Dr. Mary Ann Jennings, said that there are limited seats available in this class each semester.
“We only have one section and one instructor for the class — in which there are typically 16 to 18 spots — and not a lot of students drop the course after signing up for it,” Jennings said. “This limited enrollment is in large part due to the fact that the course is so hands-on and instructor-intensive, especially when dealing with sensitive topics that may emotionally trigger certain students and working with potentially dangerous maneuvers that can harm someone if they are not careful.”
If a student is not able to get into the self-defense course that Baylor offers but still wishes to learn about ways that they can protect themselves, Antunes said that there are local places in Waco that offer self-defense training.
“I recommend a school called Shins Martial Arts, which prides themselves in their commitment to teaching self-defense,” Antunes said. “Unlike a normal martial arts school, they don’t necessary encourage competition, but instead show their students how they can defend themselves by taking matters into their own hands.”
