The IUS Police give self-defense seminar during sexual assault and rape prevention week at IU Southeast.

Sergeant Monica Wise held a self-defense seminar attended by seven students and faculty members in Hoosier Room East on Thursday, Oct. 2.

Wise has worked with the IU Bloomington, New Albany and IU Southeast police departments and spent 15 years teaching physical tactics at the New Albany police department.

The seminar covered rape prevention, situational awareness, developing a survival mindset and a handful of basic self-defense moves.

“I’m teaching how to get out of a dangerous situation,” Wise said.

The self-defense moves covered were all focused on getting the victim out of someone’s chokehold or grab.

“There is no perfect time to escape, but by acting fast you increase your chances of survival,” Wise said.

Wise said women, because of how they are brought up to be ladies, are often timid toward their attackers and avoid a fight or struggle in an effort to survive.

“You hear stories of the victim bringing the rapist to Jesus, but don’t bet on it,” Wise said.

“You can’t negotiate with criminals, because they don’t care; if criminals were rational members of society, they would not commit crime,” Wise said.

Eye gouges, strikes to sensitive areas of the body, pressure point manipulation and moves designed to use the attackers force against them were emphasized along with basic punching.

Students and faculty in attendance enthusiastically struck pads while yelling phrases aimed at drawing attention to an attack.

The thwacking sound of fist meeting canvas mixed with a loud, high-pitched “stop,” “no,” or “get away” could be heard throughout Hoosier Room East and The Commons.

“I learned a couple of new butt-kicking techniques,” Angel Dyke, psychology junior, said.

Dyke said she felt the class did a good job of reinforcing the idea that women should always maintain a healthy guard of their surroundings.

Wise said it was important to keep the moves simple because under stress, our minds have difficulty remembering how to perform complex tasks.

The largest portion of the class was a lecture and presentation by Wise outlining things women can do to prevent a violent situation from happening.

“The whole purpose of the class is to raise the level of awareness,” Wise said.
Avoiding a second crime scene was another point stressed by Wise.

“Crime scene two is the ditch or sewer where we usually find the dead bodies of missing young women,” Wise said.

“You never want to go along with the attacker’s plans,” Wise said.

Wise said listening to her intuition saved her life several times while she was on duty.

While discussing this, her students agreed.

“Women will ignore feelings of intuition, because they feel they will be portrayed as a bitch,” Kim Powell, adult student center, said.

According to statistics presented at the seminar, every 45 seconds, a woman living in the United States is raped, one out of every five college women will be sexually assaulted and nine out of ten will never report the crime.

Wise said this disturbing figure is attributed to the fact that young women feel that if they report a rape or sexual assault, people will think it was their fault or label them as promiscuous.

“It is so important that victims report it and talk to someone, because, if they don’t, it will affect them the rest of their lives,” Wise said.

Wise said countless studies have shown that talking to someone after a traumatic event such as rape will help the victim recover.

“Rape is all about control; if you are raped, the attacker takes your control and when you talk to someone you are taking it back,” Wise said.

Two students in attendance talked to the group about their sexual assault experiences, and both of them expressed a sense of relief from talking to people.

Personal counseling is offered at IU Southeast. The personal counseling office is located in the University C enter South, room 201.

Wise said that while working at the IU Bloomington police department, she read a disturbing statistic showing 58 percent of men polled on college campuses said they would carry out a sexual assault if they knew they could get away with it.

Wise said 85 percent of sexual assault involves someone familiar to the victim like a friend, boyfriend or a family member.

Wise said young women should always have personal rules for dates and stick to them.

“Try to go on group dates, and never send a mixed signal,” Wise said.

By MICHAEL MARCELL
Staff Writer
mdmarcel@ius.edu