Great thoughts in this discussion topic. I enjoyed hearing so many different aspects.
My take-aways on this are:
Train as if if you are really going to hurt someone who is attacking you. Make the training as realistic as possible: physically, mentality and emotionally.
Use life-like scenarios to help this happen.
Use physically challenging and demanding work outs to prepare the body.
Bullring practice allows students to train for random unforeseen responses.
Punching drills where contact is made, both with bags, makiwara, and live persons. Padding up helps the striker execute realistic technique, but no pads helps condition the recipient to be able to handle the shock of a real strike in preparation of mind and body.
Variety in training helps shock the mind and body and allows for increased interest in the training.
Be smart about what injuries you want to accept in your daily training in order to increase your longevity in the art.
Self defense may mean reactive techniques.
Observation and avoidance are more important than physical techniques in most every situation.
We should understand what failures of observation, action and preparation put us in a scenario where a reactive techniques must be employed.
We need to be pro-active in our preparation for defense and minimize the need to even use our striking. But train like we will use them no matter what the consequences.
There are concerns about how hard training style can drive the average person away from Kajukenbo because of the 'brutal' training methods. In my opinion, I think we start slow, and work up to it. We don't have to scare the white or yellow belt away. By the time they get to higher belts, they become more 'immune' to the strikes and hard training. Although I would say that repetitive injuries should be avoided wherever possible so that we can have a long and happy life in the martial arts. I have knees, elbows, shoulders, and vertebra that complain at me all the time now. Did I enjoy the hard hits and falls back when I was younger, heck ya! Do I enjoy the pain of getting older quicker than other people my age, hell no! Do I want to keep training? yes, and because of this I now need to watch what I do. I used to punch the concrete floor at full power almost daily to build up my punching first. I still can do it - but when I do, I have to wait a week or so before I can do it gain. So now I'll do it rarely. I'm going to have arthritis like the old masters one of these days. I write software for a day job, I hope I'll be able to type on a keyboard for years to come... maybe technology will continue to improve so that I can blow into a tube to type in the future. Is that my future?
We need to train realistic, sure, but we need to train smart so that we can have 'a long life and happiness through this fist style'.
Can we substitute things to help us condition our bodies without breaking them down needlessly?
I'm training to defend myself and my family - I may never have to hurt someone. Should my every-day training for a non-event cause my quality of life to be less than that of a person who lives in condition white: oblivion that fails to prepare in any way whatsoever? no
Ultimately the more prepared will have a better shot of surviving and even winning the encounter. And today is the day to prepare. But preparation is all inclusive.
Regarding the legalities of strike first or overkill. I think we have to make that decision as needed. Each situation has a different scenario. Multiple attackers, a weapon, the setting, etc. But its hard to make a snap decision that will affect the rest of your life so you have to make the decisions ahead of time and then be committed as hesitation will kill you. Hesitation during a strike is wasted strike and will also kill you.
Regarding the disneyland techniques: Sijo Emperado, the founders and the old-timers were pretty genius. The alphabet techniques are simple, straight forward and pretty caveman like. Its hard to mess up something simple, its not pretty (and it shouldn't be) its effective. And every strike sets up the next. And yes, some people might react differently due to whatever the conditions, thats why the repetitive training and the ability to make adjustments. I don't expect that every techniques would need to be used to its fullest in every situation,we should be able to adapt on the fly after we have committed to using our weapons. The beauty about the simplicity is that the basic techniques can be chained together or adapted to many different situations.
Last week at the Malama event in South Dakota, Professor Nuno Nunes from Portugal in one of his sessions taught a single, straight-forward technique. And then proceeded to show how it could be used in a variety of different attacks with just slight modification. Are all the the various techniques there just for us to find the few that we can execute and make ours for every situation? Or do we need to memorize hundreds of different responses and train the body and mind to choose the right right one at the right time, while dealing with adrenaline and random unexpected and unprepared-for variables? I'm still trying to figure that one out - I'm starting to lean towards the former not the latter. But I understand how having more tools gives you more options, and I like having more options.
Thank you for everyone that shared.