Brazilian jiu-jitsu training could be instrumental to police reform | Opinion

I’ve never been interested in the conventional sciences. I’ve never wanted to be a doctor. I’ve never read swaths of literature on anatomy. Still, I somehow knew exactly what George Floyd’s autopsy would reveal before the results were made public.

I knew because I’ve spent years of my life practicing Brazilian jiu-jitsu.

The autopsy commissioned by the family, which was released June 1, revealed that “pressure (applied by the officer) cut off blood flow to (Floyd’s) brain.”

How did knowledge of a martial art influence my understanding of that heinous video showing Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling into Floyd’s neck? Well, it’s quite simple, actually. The very first chokehold taught to many jiu-jitsu students is the rear-naked choke, because it is relatively simple to perform and used quite often both in sanctioned and unsanctioned fights.

I remember distinctly how my instructor described the choke. He explained that, although the choke involves someone grabbing a combatant’s neck, it does not restrict airflow. Rather, it actually restricts blood flow to the brain by blocking off the corroded artery. Eventually, the lack of blood flowing to the brain can cause fainting and, if held long enough, be fatal.

A person doesn’t need to have gone to medical school to understand the difference between influencing blood flow vs. oxygen flow with pressure to the throat. But there are other ways to learn this, and practicing jiu-jitsu is one of them.

Police officers in the U.S. are engaging in these maneuvers and not only have they not gone to medical school, they aren’t being trained in jiu-jitsu, either. Utilizing dangerous submissions is always risky for a street fighter, but it’s far more fatal if the combatants don’t understand what they are doing as they execute the tactics. Thus, both officers and communities they serve would be better equipped if police training included a basic level of martial arts-based competence.

When a baby cries at birth, that’s a good sign. If the baby is crying, the logic goes, it means the baby is breathing. Although I’m not particularly interested in defending Chauvin’s actions that led to Floyd’s death, it’s at least possible he used similar logic. Floyd could be heard saying “I can’t breathe,” so by virtue of that, it must mean that he can. Had Chauvin been properly trained in jiu-jitsu, he would’ve known that Floyd was trying to articulate the discomfort associated with inhibited blood flow to the brain.

Even if Floyd did understand what was happening and tried to express it, Chauvin likely wouldn’t have believed him, because the officer lacked that comprehension. Therefore, the onus of having physiological competence of maneuvers being utilized is not upon the victim being detained; it’s on the officer conducting the move.

Don’t take it exclusively from me, for whom MMA is simply a passionate hobby. Take it from UFC champion Jon Jones, who also identified this as a “blood choke” prior to the release of autopsy results.

The fact that I, a non-professional fighter, could identify the semantics of the choke the same way a UFC champion was able to, it shows how basic a level of jiu-jitsu training one needs to be fully equipped with life-saving information. Jones is correct when that someone only needs to have “practiced the very basics of jiu-jitsu” in order to properly understand the nature of the choke. Indeed, in the Floyd video, a bystander who claims to practice jiu-jitsu was able to identify the danger of the choke. Given the context, it’s difficult to understand what he meant by that, as jiu-jitsu teaches to immobilize by putting a knee on your opponent’s stomach as opposed to his neck. But I imagine the bystander referred to the nature of what was happening to Floyd’s corroded artery, which clearly had anatomic similarities to the rear-naked choke.

Baseline jiu-jitsu practitioners also can identify other basic medical terms associated with the sport, such as hyperextension. I’m not arguing that we can’t allow police on the streets until they have a Gracie certified black belt; I’m saying there needs to be a basic level of prior experience, especially when performing high-risk maneuvers on low risk suspects.

This tragic Floyd case notwithstanding, it would be good practice to require jiu-jitsu proficiency amongst police forces anyway. The discipline became famous as a martial art on its reputation of being the least bloody of combat sports. Indeed, the whole premise of jiu-jitsu is to disarm and disengage through varied submission wrestling maneuvers. No punches, little blood or bruising: This is precisely what we want our police to do when making arrests. The goal should always be to immobilize the suspect, get him or her handcuffed, and back on their feet safely without serious damage done. Jiu-jitsu is uniquely suited to accomplish that.

In addition to the safety of suspects, police officers also will be better prepared if trained with these skills. Every time an officer with minimal combat capabilities gets into an altercation, he or she is in danger. A live-fight situation between an officer and civilian finds two unqualified fighters in what could be a battle to the death. Just as a skilled martial artist knows that he need not exert much effort to defeat an untrained individual, so too we want our police officers to effortlessly and safely apprehend those resisting arrest.

Look, for example, when UFC Hall of Famer Matt Serra was able to calmly and easily subdue a drunken civilian in a video that went viral in 2018. Wouldn’t it be prudent to have our officers able to operate that casually Giving the men and women in blue experience in jiu-jitsu would take the chip off their shoulders that is often associated with street fighting.

It isn’t as though practitioners aren’t ready and able to implement these changes into police training. Aljamain Sterling, the presumed No. 1 contender for the UFC bantamweight title and someone who has been outspoken on this issue, indicated that MMA fighters could teach people in police academies to prevent further tragedy.

If the goal is for law enforcement to be able to quickly apprehend and safely transfer suspects, if the goal is for America to stop tearing at its seams because of alleged police brutality, then we have to make sure that police know what they are doing both tactically and physiologically. Teaching them jiu-jitsu would be a good way to start.

Elliot Fuchs is a political commentator, consultant and writer. Follow him on twitter @Elliot_Fuchs.