Self Defense Quotes

“When a man is penalized for honesty he learns to lie.”
― Criss Jami, Salomé: In Every Inch In Every Mile

“People can have their opinions about everything in the world, but people's opinions end where the tip of my nose begins. Your opinions of others can only go so far as to where their own shoreline is. The world is for your taking, but other people are not. One is only allowed to have an opinion of me, if that person is done educating him/herself on everything about me. Before people educate themselves on everything about you, they're not allowed to open their venomous mouthes and have an opinion about you.”
― C. JoyBell C.

“How can you protect yourself by carrying a sword if you don’t know how to use it?’
Not me, sir. Other people. They see the sword and don’t attack me,’ said Maladict patiently.
Yes, but if they did, lad, you wouldn’t be any good with it,’ said the sergeant.
No, sir. I’d probably settle for just ripping their heads off, sir. That’s what I mean by protection, sir. Theirs, not mine. And I’d get hell from the League if I did that, sir.”
― Terry Pratchett, Monstrous Regiment

“Most gun control arguments miss the point. If all control boils fundamentally to force, how can one resist aggression without equal force? How can a truly “free” state exist if the individual citizen is enslaved to the forceful will of individual or organized aggressors? It cannot.”
― Tiffany Madison

“Raff,' Katsa said, 'your problem is that your heart's not in it. We need to find something to strengthen your defensive resolve. What if you pretended he's trying to smash your favorite medicinal plant?'
'The rare blue safflower,' Bann suggested.
'Yes,' Katsa said gamely, 'pretend he's after your snaffler.'
'Bann would never come after my rare blue safflower,' Raffin said distinctly. 'The very notion is absurd.'
'Pretend he's not Bann. Pretend he's your father.”
― Kristin Cashore, Bitterblue

“Sometmes when you pull knives on people, they get this impression that you're going to hurt them, and then they're completely terrified. Crazy, I know!"

"Okay," said Nick. He turned to Jamie & popped his left wrist sheath again. "Look."

Jamie backed up. "Which part of 'completely terrified' did you translate as 'show us your knives, Nick'? Don't show me your knives, Nick. I have no interest in your knives."

Nick rolled his eyes. "This is a quillon dagger. That's a knife with a sword handle. I like it because it has a good grip for stabbing."

"Why do you say these things?" Jamie inquired piteously. "Is it to make me sad?"

"I didn't have you cornered," Nick went on. "You could've run. And this dagger doesn't have an even weight distribution; it's absolute rubbish for throwing. If I had any intention of hurting you, I'd have used a knife I could throw."

Jamie blinked. "I will remember those words always. I may try to forget them, but I sense that I won't be able to.”
― Sarah Rees Brennan, The Demon's Covenant

“If there's any guy crazy enough to attack me, I'm going to show him the end of the world -- close up. I'm going to let him see the kingdom come with his own eyes. I'm going to send him straight to the southern hemisphere and let the ashes of death rain all over him and the kangaroos and the wallabies.”
― Haruki Murakami, 1Q84

“Beautiful girls should know how to defend themselves against the advances of gentlemen.”
― Cassandra Clare

“A woman who goes around wearing a knife is obviously looking for trouble." She reached deep into her pocket and brought out a long, slender piece of metal, glittering all along one edge. "However a woman who carries a knife is ready for trouble. Generally speaking, it's easier to appear harmless. It's less trouble all around.”
― Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind

“In fact, if law were restricted to protecting all persons, all liberties, and all properties; if law were nothing more than the organized combination of the individual's right to self-defense; if law were the obstacle, the check, the punisher of all oppression and plunder — is it likely that we citizens would then argue much about the extent of the franchise?”
― Frédéric Bastiat, The Law

“We are not ready to fight because we love fighting. We are ready to fight because we are worth fighting for.”
― Zoé Samudzi, As Black As Resistance: Finding the Conditions for Liberation

“Remaining for a moment with the question of legality and illegality: United Nations Security Council Resolution 1368, unanimously passed, explicitly recognized the right of the United States to self-defense and further called upon all member states 'to bring to justice the perpetrators, organizers and sponsors of the terrorist attacks. It added that 'those responsible for aiding, supporting or harboring the perpetrators, organizers and sponsors of those acts will be held accountable.' In a speech the following month, the United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan publicly acknowledged the right of self-defense as a legitimate basis for military action. The SEAL unit dispatched by President Obama to Abbottabad was large enough to allow for the contingency of bin-Laden's capture and detention. The naïve statement that he was 'unarmed' when shot is only loosely compatible with the fact that he was housed in a military garrison town, had a loaded automatic weapon in the room with him, could well have been wearing a suicide vest, had stated repeatedly that he would never be taken alive, was the commander of one of the most violent organizations in history, and had declared himself at war with the United States. It perhaps says something that not even the most casuistic apologist for al-Qaeda has ever even attempted to justify any of its 'operations' in terms that could be covered by any known law, with the possible exception of some sanguinary verses of the Koran.”
― Christopher Hitchens, The Enemy

“I am not all sneers and scathings, you see, I have my gentler side.”
― John Banville, The Infinities

“You had a good dinner of properly fried food, and if you want to live long enough to have another one, you’ve got to weaponize properly.”
― Dean Koontz, Deeply Odd

“The foolish friend provokes the wise foe,
then moans and yells for rescue.”
― Mouloud Benzadi

“The very essence of self-defense is a thin list of things that might get you out alive when you are already screwed.”
― Rory Miller, Meditations on Violence: A Comparison of Martial Arts Training & Real World Violence

“The goal of self-defense is not to win a fight, but rather to avoid combat in the first place.”
― Rory Miller, Scaling Force: Dynamic Decision Making Under Threat of Violence

“Risking your life for anything other than saving a life is ego, it's bullshit, and it is childish.”
― Rory Miller, Scaling Force: Dynamic Decision Making Under Threat of Violence

“Fitness does not always mean size and strength. People inexperienced at violence look at size first, muscle definition second. Experienced people look at movement.”
― Rory Miller, Scaling Force: Dynamic Decision Making Under Threat of Violence

“A few hours of reading will never protect you from your own bad decisions.”
― Rory Miller, Scaling Force: Dynamic Decision Making Under Threat of Violence

“I had often been complimented, inveigled, caressed, and otherwise importuned in my travels. and it was my experience that a few sharp minuten--tiny pins meant to fix a butterfly to a card--when judiciously applied to an offender's person invariably rendered him apologetic.”
― Deanna Raybourn, An Unexpected Peril

“One of the hardest concepts about explaining deadly force is that so few people have a frame of reference. The cannot really grasp what it is to use deadly force or what it will be like to exist even for a few seconds in the conditions that would justify it.”
― Rory Miller, Scaling Force: Dynamic Decision Making Under Threat of Violence

“One of the hardest concepts about explaining deadly force is that so few people have a frame of reference. They cannot really grasp what it is to use deadly force or what it will be like to exist even for a few seconds in the conditions that would justify it.”
― Rory Miller, Scaling Force: Dynamic Decision Making Under Threat of Violence

“Fight and flight in accord. Which one is happening is subject to change without notice.”
― Marc MacYoung, A Professional's Guide to Ending Violence Quickly: How Bouncers, Bodyguards, and Other Security Professionals Handle Ugly Situations

“Trust your intuition. Your personal safety can be directly compromised if you chose to dismiss your intuition. You offer no greater cooperation to a potential attacker than by subconsciously acknowledging certain information, feeling uneasy because of your intuition, but then deciding not to take any action to change the situation.”
― Robert Kaiser, NEVER A VICTIM - The Definitive Guide to Women's Safety

“I'm with you all the way. I'd prefer action to sitting around like a target.”
― C.J. Sansom, Sovereign

“The best defense is to never get into a fight.”
― Millie Florence, Apprentice Alliance

“Remember, the real aggressors are not going to hold back and play by the rules. This is why you want to train holistically by going through a variety of scenarios — so that you don’t get caught up by surprise when a new scenario hits you.”
― Thomas Lu, The Personal Sustainability Handbook: 60+ Practices to Sustainabilize Your Health, Finances, Relationships and Beyond

“Self-defense is much, much more than being able to fight. If you don’t think so, go out and just learn Jeet Kune Do. I’ll see you at your funeral.”
― Marc MacYoung, Cheap Shots, Ambushes, and Other Lessons: A Down and Dirty Book on Streetfighting and Survival

“Do you really believe that strength has anything to do with whether you win or lose? You will always be weaker. You will always be smaller and at a disadvantage. He is beating you because you are allowing him to define the terms of the contest. You want to win? Change the terms. Improvise, adapt, cheat. Lean into your strengths, not his.”
― Shay Hatten