The Tribune

IN the face of repeated abortive attempts to halt the progress of our social decay, can a tried and tested culture that uses combat training to teach life lessons such as respect for authority, integrity and teamwork be exactly what the modern Bahamas needs?

By PACO NUNEZ

Tribune News Editor

RICARDO was trouble.

Angry, reckless and volatile, he’d been kicked out of several schools for fighting.

A young man with no plan, no ambition, no direction. At one point, he even considered becoming a hit-man.

In short, Ricardo was the kind of young man this society shuns, repudiates on a daily basis, but at the same time continues to produce in ever-increasing numbers.

Like so many others, Ricardo grew up in a one bedroom household run by a single mother with nine children. No running water, no electricity.

And with home being a scene of constant strife and want, and school having failed him completely, Ricardo learned his lessons on the merciless streets of inner-city Nassau.

What that upbringing taught him was that compassion, honesty and respect are weakness. Violence, dominance and ruthlessness are strength.

So, why not kill for money? Why not climb atop the noxious heap that was his neigbourhood and ensure that he and his family prospered?

His homicidal ambitions were not just some “Playstation fantasy” said D’Arcy Rahming, veteran social worker and distinguished local martial arts instructor.

“This was a realistic option for him to contribute to his family.

“These are the choices many young men are making and it’s not because they are evil.

“Many simply have not been taught that there are other possibilities, they are not being mentored and so are learning from the examples they see on the streets,” Professor Rahming said.

Several years ago, while volunteering with the Youth Empowerment and Skills Training (YEAST) programme, he crossed paths with Ricardo, whose name has been changed to protect his identity.

“He had come to YEAST as a last resort,” Professor Rahming said. “Semi-literate, he could hardly read basic instructions and his math skills were non-existent.

“But I sensed a genuine goodness in him. Ricardo loved his family and he was trying to find a practical way to help their situation.”

So, he began to give the young man math lessons, and decided to teach him Judo as well.

Ricardo took to martial arts immediately.

“I think this was because it empowered him and the drill discipline made him feel stronger,” Professor Rahming said. “He really liked the structure of the programme – so much so that he enrolled two of his younger brothers into the free Fox Hill Judo Club that I ran, so they could gain the benefits of having a structured activity and belonging to a positive group.”

If you met Ricardo today, you would never guess his background.

“Ricardo is a gentleman,” Professor Rahming said. “He is employed and knows how to show up on time and put in a good day’s work for his pay.

“He has a young family that he is maintaining and is a faithful church goer.”

It is the kind of elusive result being desperately sought by community activists, church groups and social services programmes across the Bahamas today.

How was this troubled young man able to turn things around?

“He learned how to discipline himself through a method that was taught to him. It had to be practised by him, and he needed to be guided through it by persons that modelled the desired behaviours.”

Discipline is all well and good, and certainly in short supply in this country nowadays.

But the approach is bound to raise some eyebrows – particularly among those whose understanding of martial arts is limited to stereotypes nurtured by the ever increasing violence of action movies.

How, they will ask, can you stop young men from being reckless and violent by teaching them how to fight?

As it turns out, the philosophy behind this method is as old as civilisation.

“Prior to the industrialised age,” Professor Rahming explains, “most cultures recognised the need for initiation of its young people through elaborate ceremonies.

“These ceremonies often involved some type of trial where the individual was tested and earned his manhood. For example, some trials used the hunt of a dangerous animal to prove an individual’s worthiness to the group.

“Initiation had several characteristics including separation from parents while put in the company of older mentors. The end result was to produce a valuable ‘citizen’ who knew their place in the world and had respect for those institutions and persons around them.”

This focus on the value of initiation as a gateway to discipline, respect and responsibility is at the core of the Youth of Steel Discipline programme, which Professor Rahming founded after returning to the Bahamas following a corporate career in the United States.

“I live to help people like Ricardo and his brothers,” he said. “But it was not always like that. In 1998 I was the CFO of a major retail company.

“I was sitting in my office one day. I had just fired a guy at the order of my boss.

“I had argued for the guy but, you know, the boss is always right. So I did what I was instructed to do.

“I knew that I had hit bottom. By all the world’s standards, I was on top. Young, with 250 people reporting to me. Respected. A great career ahead of me. I was making good money too. But I knew that I didn’t belong.

“Then I received another message. Not from my company boss, but from THE BOSS. He simply said to me, ‘Go and help the youth!’

“This was not a burning bush moment. I didn’t actually hear a voice, but I did get the feeling and as I said, The Boss is always right.”

Already an accomplished martial arts competitor and teacher in the US, he decided to approach helping young people by applying everything his training had taught him about discipline, character, effort and self-control.

A few years earlier, he had co-written “Men of Steel Discipline”, a history of black American pioneers in the martial arts – men who overcame racial, financial and physical barriers to become respected around the world.

Their example seems relevant to the struggles facing young Bahamian men, so Professor Rahming named his programme in their honour.

It began with one small class in Fox Hill, but as word quickly spread and its popularity grew, the sheer scale of the adversity with which he was confronted threatened to overwhelm him.

So, he developed a coaching course at the College of the Bahamas for students who had done well in the Judo and Jujutsu classes he was teaching there.

Now, these coaches work in several inner city schools and community programmes, teaching the lessons of life through Judo.

“Judo was chosen for several reasons,” Professor Rahming said. “It is an Olympic Sport and one of the most widely practised sports in the world. It is safe to practise when taught properly.

“It was developed during a period when Japan faced many of the social ills that are now facing the Bahamas – that is, wild and untamed young men threatening to wreak havoc on the culture.

“The physical lessons of Judo are evident in increased strength, physical fitness, a knowledge of the human body and its balance points.

“Less evident are the mental abilities which include a knowledge of strategy to win matches against a similarly sized and skilled opponent.

“Even less evident are the social aspects of Judo which make it ideal for Bahamian culture: leadership skills, ability to follow instructions, the certainty that there is a time and place for everything, an understanding of hierarchy and a respect for all persons, stronger and weaker.

“In fact you cannot learn Judo by yourself and you quickly realise your limitations and your own strengths and weaknesses.”

There is a good deal of scholarly evidence supporting Professor Rahming’s approach.

The most recent example was a 2009 study in the European Journal for Sport and Society, which interviewed 40 martial artists between the ages of eight and 12.
It found the young practitioners “feel they have more confidence, they show less aggression and they ask more of themselves than before”.

One 12-year-old boy told the researchers: “I used to become angry easily and would want to start a fight right away. But now I usually try to stay calm.”

And despite their training, the study found that more often than not, young martial artists try to talk first when a conflict arises.

“(The) children indicated that only in extreme circumstances would they use force to defend themselves and others. They also indicated that when a fight was inevitable, they would only defend themselves or the others without hurting the attackers.”

Compare this attitude to the ease with which almost any encounter between young men can turn into an excuse for grievous violence in the modern Bahamas.

Overall, the study concluded, “Findings seem to support the relationship between martial arts practice and positive socio-psychological outcomes. Children who were interviewed in this study reported increases in self-confidence, self-control and social skills, as well as adapted a non-violent attitude in relation to conflicts.

“These results are clearly supportive to the findings of various other studies.”

Youth of Steel Discipline is now the social outreach programme of the Bahamas Judo Federation. There are 235 young Bahamians enrolled in the system and it continues to grow.

At the same time though, the problems it seeks to address are more intimidating than ever.

“The Bahamas is becoming a tale of two cities – the haves versus the have-nots. The gap in the middle is growing wider with more people tipping into the have-nots category, and there is a lot of anger out there. This spells disaster,” Professor Rahming said.

“Our beautiful country is at a tipping point with the violence and we’re tipping in the wrong direction. And its not all about the economy like so many are saying.

“What the youth are lacking is something a lot more fundamental and even when things turn around, I fear that we may not see a change for at-risk populations.”

I have personally witnessed the results of Professor Rahming’s approach, and firmly believe the programme should be in every community, every school across New Providence and the larger Family Islands.

The aim is to eventually have 3,000 participants. In a country this size, the social impact of that could be tremendous.

But it’s up to us: Youth of Steel Discipline is completely funded by corporate and individual sponsors.

Bahamians spend a great deal of time complaining about what has happened to their country.

But as our circumstances continue to deteriorate – despite the strenuous of efforts of people like Professor Rahming – the extent to which the rest of us are willing to step up and turn our words into action remains to be seen.

What do you think?

• Email any comments or questions to pnunez@tribunemedia.net or join the conversation athttp://www.tribune242.com/news/opinion/insight/

Learn more about the Youth of Steel Discipline programme at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUuhGweQeUc