It really is a common perception that all eye attacks blind, and that blinding is too severe. Most people think of a WWII commando permantly blinding a street begger. What does Dimitri's t-shirt have on it? A creepy and bad drawing of a bloody, removed eyeball on a finger? ! Jeez! Therefore, thanks to these images, the baby is thrown out with the bath water.
BUT! There are:
flicks,
jabs,
eye gauges.
In all of my time in the business, all the cases I've worked, all the cases I have seen, an eye flick causes only very temp damage. One time there was a guy who had his eye cut from a sharp fingernail. This case was postponed until his eye was evaluated and the Doc's cleared him. No damage. healed. The case was dropped by the DAs office.
Flicks come in hooking from all four corners of the clock, top, sides and bottom, touching the ocular cavity (sorry, you know I like to avoid such "heady" terms) and the eye. The lid usually closes in a micro-second. But the twitch reflex can jolt the head and well...it's just some good stuff inside a common fight. I have done this in cop scrapes so many times I could not tell you. A flick across the eye area. Zero problem.
The jab is the next dangerous. It comes straight in and well...it can do more damage. But, it is not as bad as a gouge.
The drilling gouge is reserved for rapists and serious, serious situations. You cannot have eye gouges in party fights, persistant street beggers, etc. Technically, the military versions involve holding the head as best one can so the head will not buck back and you can plunge your thumbs into the eyes! SERIOUS! I have written a lot on this. If a woman does it on a parking lot against a man her size or bigger? The law really grants a lot of leeway. Women even shoot guys more and get away it where men would be hassled and questioned.
Grappling wise - just pressure in and around the eyes are a real distractor. And what a body manuever-er! This is magic on the ground. And of course, this is what ground fighters belittle and bicker about so defensively. But if you want to try to distract someone's ground game? Jack in and around their eyes. I use these pressures inside combat scenarios with other strategies. And I have seen many vet, ground, black belts stalled out by complete rank amatuers using an eye hunt. Knocked off their game. Is the fight over? No. Obviously, they need more. For example...
http://www.cqcmagazine.com/2005-fall/ground-pound-escape/index.htmor
http://www.cqcmagazine.com/jul-05/leg-pinch/index.htm...inside a whole string of things.
I cannot beat guys like Jim McCann or my insane buddy Tom Barnhart on the ground or just two examples, without such cheats. But even in practice I can get a positional and distraction edge on them by hardly touch
near their eyes. People might say, but that is in practice! But being the victim of such, even in light practice is quite telling.
McCann trains like a freaken madman many days a week with his group of madmen and constantly reports how anything near his eyes screws up his plans..
But, I would tell anyone to flick at the eyes of an attacker when the going gets scary. I was taught that in Parker Kenpo over thirty years ago as a set-up. Multiple flicks. Tony Blaur popularized it with marketing tricks and his downlines do too, trying to give it new and neat names to distance themselves from the lineages they came from...
Use of Force progression. Moral, ethical, legal.
Hock
