Self-defense against male violence fueled by the patriarchal power relationship is on the agenda of women. Recently, many women had to use self- defense to survive male violence.  According to National Women's Martial Arts Federation (NWMAF) Self-Defense Director Prof. Martha E. Thompson, self- defense aims to teach women how to use their voice at first. Thompson who has been training women for the last 32 years underlined that women's struggle is a historical struggle and said: No one women can do it alone. We have to be together. We have the power to create a social change."

 

We spoke to Thompson about self- defense and how the lives of the women have changed after these trainings.

 

We know that you are teaching self defense for years as a sociologist, retired lecturer and a member of NWMAF for years but we would like to hear from you once again, who is Martha Thompson?

 

I am director of self-defense at NWMAF. So that turned out to be a lot of wonderful work. More than I expected. I'm also involved in two other groups. There's a research group that studies empowerment self- defence and I'm facilitating those meetings and I'm also a member of another group called Empowerment Self- defence Alliance which is trying to change the conversation. Nationally and internationally about self defence. And I'm also doing some research on what are the lasting effects of taking a self defence course. And I'm also a granmother and I have two grand children I enjoy spending time with.

 

Why did you focus on self- defense? Is there a spesific reason?

 

There was no spesific incident in my life. It was much more, there were several different reasons but the first time that I took self defence course I was a professor, so I was working with people all lived in their brains. Trying to talk about social change, particularly for women and women's lives, and when I took the self defence course I realized how much women change in terms of their posture, their willingness to use their voices, and me too. I benefited from that too. That I really saw the benefits of engaging in physical movement.  I saw that we dont change just because of our brains, its kind of a whole body thing. That's what really drew mo to it. Because my original commitment was less about.. I mean certainly adressing violence was a part of it but, I was really drawn to the ways that engaging our bodies could change how we thought about orselves in the world, what the possibilities are. I saw people changing from being very quite so you can hardly hear them speaking out in a thick voice and that was exciting to me.

 

You have been working on self- defense for years. What is self-defense? What does it mean for women?

 

I suppose self-defense is anything that we do to protect ourselves phsically, emotinally, mentally sexually..To maximise our own safety and the safety of others. One of the things that makes this more complicated is that there are so many different ways that people think about self defense. I think most of the people think about self defense as striking and kicking, doing something physical. And this is certainly a part of it. But the people I am involved with, we talk about empowerment self defense which sees self-defense in terms of awareness, understanding risks, using our voice as well as phsycial things and also understanding the social contacts, you know what are the risks of violence in this place? What are the realities people? So for some women and I'm sure the cases that we can talk about are horrific, dramatic..Oh my gosh.. But for so many of us and most of the time, according to the women I have heard from or the stories that I've listened to or the reasearches that I have seen, is that self defense is often addressing speaking up, like saying, 'No, I dont want to do that. No, I dont want to go there. I dont want to take that job' or 'Yes, I am going to do that even you don't want me to'. Self defense includes a whole range of things. Like from being able to say no to simple things to dealing with very dramatic and horrific situations. Empowering self defense teaches that we are not responsible for the violence we are subjected to, the aggressors and the perpetrators are.

 

Have there been situations that moved or inspired you during your time teaching self-defense to women?

 

I have been working self-defense with women for 32 years. I've listened to a lot of women's stories. The desire of women to listen to each other has always impressed me the most. You wouldn't believe what women would tell you when they know that someone is listening to them. I think we don't tell our stories because we don't think the people would listen to us. But there're so many stories I heard I mean certainly there are all sorts of violence you can imagine but there are also stories of people finding themselves. Some say I was afraid to travel, now I can travel. All the way to people saying I experienced this horrific thing and I wanna make sure that never happens to me again. And I think so many of them are just really about women wanting to be prepared either because they experienced violence before and don't want to go through that again or they want to face their fears. I treasure every story I ever heard.

 

Women are being murdered everyday all over the world. They are exposed to violence. For example, just in the year 2020, more than 300 women were killed by men in Turkey. Lately we hear stories of women that had to kill their attackers, mostly their husbands in order to survive. What is your take on these women fighting back?

 

Yes there are women going through horrible things in every country. I do know that in every country there are horrific cases, which gets the most attention, but I think violence against women is a every day thing which most of the people doesn't think of them as violence. Most of the time, people may not know what they are going through is violence. I've read a little bit and read about Melek İpek lately and I have to say I just wanted to cry. It's so terrible and the fact that she was jailed is incomprehensible to me. Women are so much more likely to be involved in violent situations. And women are much more likely to be the victim than a perpetrator. I think the attention comes when they fight back. Because people aren't expecting women to fight back. The expectation is that the women will not fight back. The expactation is that the women do what the men want them to do. Women who fight back, like Melek İpek, it is very clear to me that this women was exposed to prolongued domestic violence and that it was escalating. The threats to her and her children - I can't even imagine how she can be put in jail because of the situation she faced but I do think gender and expactations about who has privilage and who has rights is what contributes to the fact that women are much more likely to be targeted then men. And in domestic violence situations the idea is that the man sees his wife and his children as property. As his to do what they want. There's so much about how law and the police are established that don't adress domestic violence. Most of the time the laws about violence are for one incident. One thing happens but in Melek İpek's case, this has been going on. It was prolongued. This has to be taken into consideration. This is not one thing that happened there is a story behind it. I have read that her husband threatened to kill her and her children. Whether or not he meant it, that is a threat. So to me she was protecting herself and her children.

 

There are Kurdish women's units in North and East Syria and they are organizing trainings of self- defense. What is the importance of self-defense collectives formed by women in the face of the increasing violence against women and the understanding that feeds it all over the world?

 

I have read about the Kurdish women's units in Rojava. It is impressive. I am impressed that there is a struggle against patriarchal norms. So are the Gulabi women known as the pink forces in India. I am very excited hearing about these collectives formed by women. These women are trying to make the world a safer place. I am all for it. 

 

You mentioned empowering self-defense in an article. How does Empowering self-defense sees the harassment, rape and violence against women?

 

Empowering self- defense sees harassment, rape and violence as a part of a continuum. They are all part of the same thing. How is plays out and looks is different but they are all part of this cultural structure that disrespects women, doesn't value women and they are not seperate things but they are really based on the devaluation of women. Empowerment self-defense addresses all of those things. The idea of empowerment self-defense is to provide women and girls and LGBTI people who are marginalized because of their gender of orientation. People who chose to not fit in, or do not fit in to this categories of male and female are experiencing violence. In the empowerment self-defense there is this idea that we need a range of tools, not just being able to hit somebody in the nose or kick them in the groin, and you need these tools but not only them, that we really need to have the knowladge and the information about what the risks and the realities of the violence. In addition to information, we need to have affirmation that we are worth it, we are worth defending, we deserve to be safe, that we deserve to be valued. And so empowerment self-defense is the idea that it's not only defending against phsyical attack but really beginning to see ourselves, that we are worth it. And we are capable and powerful. 

 

How are the lives of the women trained in self-defense changes?

 

I will say that on my observations, and not right after the training but years after that, their confidence in themselves was increased. They had greater awareness of risks. Greater awareness in their environment, like when you're walking down the street and someone is looking at you in a wrong way. Knowing that you can do something about it changes a lot. Also, women reported that they became more aware of the abusive behavior of their husbands. They stopped telling themselves 'Yeah, he is a grumpy guy'. They began to see the signs and stopped explaining abusive behavior as grumpiness.  Women reported that they learned to use their voice 

in so many more ways. One researcher calls it 'less self silencing'. Women stopped being silent against abuse and started to speak up more. They also have increased belief that the perpetrators are responsible for the violence, not themselves. Often people who experience violence are questioned about how they dressed, and what were they doing there. I don't know if this happens in Turkey but this happens a lot in the United States. And sometimes women feel they were subjected to this violence for something they did or something they said. After these courses they are able to think that they can be dressed how they want and be anywhere they want to be. That they are not responsible for the violence they were subjected to. They are more willing to set and enforce boundries. I see in my research now, in the stories of the women that theşr bodies have changed. When they are afraid they now take a breath. They consciously make sure they are not holding their breath or they do not stand in a cowerdly way and take up more space. They use their bodies differently. These changes in their lives lead them to take a new job, move to another city, establish a relationship that is based on mutual respect and not going along with someone who mistreats them. I just think that this is very exciting to hear from the people you train. And I want to express that, when women do not feel these things that's becasue that's how they been thought and treated.  We can't necessarily do it all by ourselves. And we don't have to. Because most of us are thought to be quiet, not to stand up for ourselves, and I feel that it's so important to share these tools because most of the women and girls were not thought this messages. 

 

What kind of a unity women need to establish in the face of what they are going through?

 

We don't have to do this on our own. No one women can. We have to teach these tools to each other and get the message to every girl and woman. There are people like me. But they haven't had the opportunity yet. That's one of the things I find so memorable and exciting about teaching self defense. It doesn't take very much. Tt takes listening, witnessing, being with, hearing stories, providing tools for women and girls to be powerful. Because it's there. The courage is there, the resilience is there, we just need some support, we need people like you, writing stories about these women, and changing people's minds about what is possible. And I so apprachiate the work that you're doing. 

 

So, what is your message to the women?

 

Well my message to individual women is, you are worthy, you deserve safety and freedom. You deserve both. So many times people believe they have to chose. No. We deserve to be free, to chose how we wanna live our lives and we deserve to be safe.

 

And to the community,  We can't do this alone. No one women can do this alone. We need community, we need a collective. We need to listen, just like you're doing now, we need to listen to the women telling their stories. And support and share what we know. Share our tools, stories, knowladge, I believe each of each of us have the capacity to be a social change agent right now. We all have that capacity. 

 

And as the women who listen to these stories, who writes these stories, you have the power to change the language of the media that incites violence against women.

 

MA / Zemo Ağgöz- Gözde Çağrı Özköse