We all know pain is the best way to defeat a calm, rational enemy. But what if you’re fighting a man too insane to feel karate? Or too drunk to know when to die!? In 2010, Loren W. Christensen came up with a solution. It is my great, eye-gouging honor today to show you his book called FIGHTING the Pain Resistant Attacker (fighting drunks, dopers, the deranged and others who tolerate pain).
When he wrote this, Loren was a 64-year-old former Oregon cop who had written over forty books about killing dirtbags with your thumbs and feet. “Oh no, this is going to be racist,” you might be thinking. You have good instincts, but you’re wrong. In fact, on the very first page, he explicitly says three different times this is not racist:
This is a story of his time in Vietnam. He was in the military police, which might be why he puts “racial tensions” before “snipers, bombings, and rockets” in his list of Vietnam Dangers. The story goes on for a few pages because he takes time to explain things like how hard he can punch. However, when he got behind this black maniac, and again he doesn’t have a problem with that, he started throwing punches into his spine and got completely ignored. He concluded it was because “he was padded with fat and muscle and flying high on drugs.” He had to watch as this unstoppable African American tore through people of all colors in an inclusive display of violent harmony.
It was this gigantic man, immune to the pain of punches, who inspired the fighting techniques we’ll be learning today. I want to warn you, though; we will still be using a lot of pain. In fact, it’s pretty central to all of these moves. These might be my keen former-Cracked-writer senses talking, but it’s almost as if this man wrote a normal self-defense book then someone else gave it a provocative, misleading title. Anyway, let’s go over which type of enemies are weak against this book:
It’s good against all huge guys, intoxicated guys, cranky guys, and the mentally ill. It’s also effective against the very bonered. See, some attackers want you to hurt them. When that happens, Loren’s advice is do it. Scrape and bonk them… see where the relationship takes you. The point is, this book is great against everyone except small, calm attackers. So if you’re being strangled by your kind dentist, get a different book or die. For everyone else, it’s maniac killing time.
This move rules. I went into this book expecting complicated techniques designed to cripple a Terminator robot. Instead, Loren went, “Here’s how you defend against a real jerk: steps one through three are slap them upside their fucking head.”
One aspect of Loren’s self-defense system is to imagine a worst case scenario, a mentally deranged assailant, but also be super optimistic about it– he probably looks around a lot and protects his brain with a papier-mâché skull. This would be so fantastically dumb in a regular fighting book, but it’s a stupid too magnificent to look at in this particular one. If you’re fighting a pain resistant attacker, these are instructions on how to secretly smack them without their knowledge, not disable them. Why would he ever thin– oh, right. “Pain resistant.” This is what self-defense is left with when you take away the dick attacks.
Loren livens up his groin strike theories with comedy. Like remember when figure skater Nancy Kerrigan had her knee shattered with a pipe? Ha ha you get it, she was in a lot of pain and had no idea why she was attacked. Groin strikes are sometimes like that, and sometimes not. And you can’t tell if someone has a kickable penis from looks alone. Sure, kick it, but also don’t bother? Another aspect of Loren’s self-defense system is that nothing means anything and karate is more of a desperate guess than a real answer. Okay, let’s learn how to defend against a Dumpster Push.
Step One: get pushed. Steps Two and Three: bash them in the goddamn head. Just flap your paw into them like an orangutan trained to safely box children. This is glorious. As advice, it is so much less than the first instincts you would have in your first fight. This is like teaching someone to swim by saying, “I don’t know, thrash around in a primal attempt at survival.” What gave Loren the idea that you could stop any grabby creep with a gentle rabbit punch? I’m glad you asked! It was the time it happened to him!
I know better than to trust an anecdote in a karate manual, but this book does make more sense when you consider it was written by a clumsy idiot whose body immediately shuts down when something bumps into it. His next tip is probably going to be, “Distract any attacker by shouting their social security number. Mine is 240-33-0183, and the first time an enemy screamed that, I had already lost the battle. He was black, but that’s okay.” Anyway, now you know the defense for Dumpster Push. Let’s learn how to defend a Dumpster Tackle.
Bash! Repeat as necessary! Leave! YOU ARE NOW A MASTER OF LOREN W. CHRISTENSEN’S FIGHTING ARTS! Or maybe you’re skating away from a below average hockey fight. What I’m saying is, if you needed a book to tell you “try clubbing the angel dust warrior with your human hand,” you’re going to die. Until someone creates a style of kung fu based around holding still and waiting for death, this is the laziest martial art there could be, and Loren fights like he knows all these punches and conks are a waste of time. And I think I found another story to explain why. It’s the time he and five cops had to restrain a bodybuilder:
What’s great about this story is it demonstrates how Loren’s fighting abilities, which didn’t work on a giant man who felt no pain, also didn’t work on a giant man who felt way too much pain. For almost an hour, Loren and five other police officers rode around on a man who went berserk every four minutes. I love this story, and believe every word of it. If you told six cops you were a muscle werewolf, they would absolutely jump on you. It’s called a police code 139, or a “Hulk Rodeo,” and it pays double overtime. What I especially love is how after their brilliant idea of grabbing him until he let them tie him up so they could tranquilize him like an escaped rhinoceros, Loren says “This is an example of improvising.” He thinks the dumbest fucking thing anyone could possibly do and barely winning a 6-on-1 fight was, like, an innovative solution!
A lot of Loren’s advice is barely more than “win the fight and leave.” His ground technique here is to already be beating the shit out of your pain resistant enemy, and if things start to go their way, smash their face against the ground and go somewhere else. “Somewhere with fewer dead bitches,” you could tell their remains.
Let’s get serious for a minute. This is the kind of takedown defense that might have been okay in the ’80s when most karate battles took place in a yellow belt’s imagination, but Loren published this book in 2010. He could have asked any casual MMA fan, “We now live in a world with 20,000 recorded tackles… has any man ever stopped one by clapping?” The answer is no! You can’t fluff a man’s head like a pillow and expect the methamphetamines to wear off.
If the clapping didn’t work and you find yourself mounted by your assailant, Loren’s aggressively optimistic advice is to keep clapping as needed. How would this hurt anyone? What am I, Brendan Fraser at the 67th Annual Golden Globes? Boom, roasted 2010 style.
This is how to punch a maniac in the neck when he is in your moun– wait, no. Loren, this is your “guard.” I get none of this would work anyway, but it’s worrying you don’t even know the names for the things you’re getting wrong.
You’re still wrong, Loren. About a very basic thing mentioned during every televised fight at least fifteen times. How can this be? This man claims to have 11 black belts. He has been a martial artist since Dwight D. Eisenhower was president. This is like spending your entire career editing encyclopedias and your retirement speech is, “What the fuck is a double U? Giraffes are bicycles, thank you.” It’s impossible. It’s stupid in what has to be a deliberate way. But why?
Well, I think I figured it out.
A lot of martial artists like Loren have to pretend MMA doesn’t exist because when you actually test these moves, it turns out you’ve been playing a pointless game of ninja make-believe your whole life. But Loren is feigning ignorance for a whole other reason. He seems to think you can’t get convicted for sitting on a man and beating him to death if you don’t know what that’s called. An entire page of this book is dedicated to pretending you’ve never heard the words “ground and pound!” To avoid prosecution after you do it! This is the kind of detail a fifth grader would make up to explain why Steven Seagal can’t be arrested for his death matches, but Loren W. Christensen was a fucking real cop. How many suspects did he let go because they claimed to have never heard the term “missing wife”?
Sometimes a maniac will try to kick you. Step one is don’t get kicked. Step two, three, and three again are FUCKING BASH THEM.
This is another great move you can try against your local unstoppable lunatics. After you’ve won the fight, try slapping them in the neck. Loren calls this move SLAP FROM BEHIND, but you better pretend you’ve never heard that name when your lawyer asks.
To save time, Loren sometimes skips past the easy part of the fight. Let’s assume you’ve already defended against their attacks, taken their back, and secured their neck in a choke. For legal purposes we’ll call this “the attacker’s left mount.” Great, now squeeze. Keep squeezing. Wait for them to be groggy. You’re listening for snores, possible whispered secrets, and… now! Flee.
A wall is not like a dumpster. If you are tackled into a wall, you want to clap, not conk. It’s in your best interest not to remember this, but this forbidden move is called Fierce Urkel Plays the Accordian, and if you land it the fight is already over. But, you know what? This would be the perfect time to see if you can really break a neck like in an action mo– oh shit, it worked! Flee.
Somewhere towards the middle of the book Loren remembers its premise. He realizes all these attackers he’s dropping from ear slaps and eye pokes are supposed to be immune to pain. It’s here where he comes up with his boldest pain resistant attacker theory– pain hurts again if you rub it. For instance, instead of poking your attacker in his eyes, which would do nothing to a madman, you rub your fingers across his face. It’s crazy, the childlike plan of a lifelong idiot, but fighting madness with madness is crazy enough to work. Let me show you another example:
Once you have the junkie trapped in any face clasp or advanced head clomp, saw your arm back and forth to “activate numbed pain sensors.” Wake up, pain. It’s time to party. You can also use this to check if a sticker smells like grape. The point I’m trying to make is, Loren thinks these moves are deadly because they’re how he lost a fight to his big brother in 1953.
You won’t always be grabbing the drunks and dopers from behind. Sometimes they’ll be grabbing you! If this happens (rare), do a little peek over your shoulder to find your attacker’s eyes. If they’re not where you look, they’re probably in the spot you’re not looking. No time to rub! You have to just poke and hope he’s not immune to pain! Sorry, this should have been in a different book, flee.
If you hate poking and rubbing eyeballs but still want to blind an unstoppable monster, you still have some options. You can delicately flick at the corner of their eye. There’s no need for violence when any gesture made anywhere near the eye will cause enough pain to disable a man who feels no pai– wait, okay, now I hear it. This one’s dumb. But you know what’s not dumb? Eyeball law.
Get your story straight for when you explain yourself to a jury. First tell them you tried all of your pain-based martial arts techniques. They’ll have a hard time believing this, but next you tell them your pain-based martial arts techniques did nothing. This part of the story they’ll believe. Then, and only then, do you tell them you decided to unleash the deadly face rub that landed you here in eyeball court. Again, it’s worth reminding everyone this author was a police officer. How many murderers did he let go because they claimed their wives could not be stopped by nerve pinches? Enough legalese– let’s learn how to stop a tackle!
If you’re being tackled, bash the pain intolerant attacker in the brachial plexus, the most painful part of the neck. It’s hard to find, but you can keep trying until you get it. It’s not a great plan, but it’s only a maniac attack. Have fun with it. Speaking of fun, here’s the origin story of why Loren W. Christensen thinks you have a magic off switch on your neck:
In the history of martial arts literature, no one has ever written a book like this. Loren has designed a combat system specifically to defeat himself, a man whose nervous system shuts down when you poke any part of him. From his point of view, Fighting the Pain Resistant Attacker is a selfless and noble act. It’s like Aquaman handing out hair dryers in case he ever loses his mind and must be stopped.
Of all the moves in the book, this might be my favorite. You wait for your attacker to swing a knife at you and fuck it up. Then you kick them in the neck after verifying it’s a justified neck kick and making sure your kicks are faster than knife. I’m not the one to say this because my kicks are faster than knife and I’m never wrong, but this, every word of this page, might be the worst advice possible under any circumstance. It’s spectacular. Maybe flee, but also maybe DEATH KICK YOUR KNIFEMAN.
Loren isn’t good at taking a hit, explaining karate, or defeating the pain resistant attacker, but he’s great at slapping. I don’t have any notes for this one. I only included it because I think slapping is the worst thing a man can have as his only skill. Almost suspiciously worst.
Wait, Loren once accidentally stomped on another cop’s leg in karate class? Is the lie in that story that it happened at all or that it was an accident? Would a police force even let a cop keep his job if he thought it was reasonable to accidentally stomp on a prone man? I’ll research that later, but first: HEAD AND NECK COMBINATIONS!
The Head and Neck Combinations section shows how we can chain our attacks together. For instance, you can follow up a headbutt with a headsnuggle to activate the junkie’s nerve receptors or whatever. Then you… I mean, you get it. Bash and flee. This sucks. I want a challenge. Aren’t there any moves for easily distracted attackers who kind of forget where they are?
Oh, perfect. Wait for them to try to figure out where they are and then BASH. Don’t even bother fleeing. This poor, confused man will never be able to identify you.
There’s a whole series of these toward the end of the book– moves for finishing a man already mostly dead from liquor.
For a guy concerned about the legality of street murder, it’s weird for Loren to advise his readers to shove a drunk by the back of the head to amplify his fall damage. Like, he’s not even trying to spin this one. This man is going through something totally unrelated to us and we’re smearing the skin off his skull for doing it too close. Grind it until the son of a bitch is more sidewalk than head; wait for help to arrive or flee when you can.
“Sometime all it takes is one powerful blow to activate the arm’s delete button,” says the man who thinks everyone’s arm has a delete button. “Don’t you guys hate when you hit your leg nipples on a coffee table and can’t get a boner for 15 years?” he adds.
This move almost makes me feel bad because bonking someone in the arm until it drops lifelessly is such a sweetly innocent idea of combat. It’s like the author still believes anything possible and I shouldn’t stand in the way of it.
Seriously, this is wonderful. Punch both arms until they don’t work! It’s something my daughter would suggest if we were being crushed by a robot.
Well, now you’ve ruined it, Loren.
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