Martial Arts For Secretaries

23 Apr 2008 13:32 by Mark

When it comes to people in the office workplace no other group is more victimised - often quite fairly, to be brutally honest - than the humble secretary. Oh, other than temporary staff, of course, but who the hell cares about them?

While it's true that some secretarial staff are perfectly able to defend themselves from all manner of office-based assaults - sexual advances from the chairman, or a barrage of requests to run the payroll early this month, for example - for the vast majority of secretaries the flip-side of being the lynch-pin in the running of the organisation is the burden of vulnerability to attack after attack. Sales people, delivery people, people who wander in wanting to leave leaflets offering to valet cars every day, junior managers (shudder); each one knows it must defeat the secretary, and the secretary has no defence.

Until now!

Are you a secretary? Do you know a secretary in need of assistance? Do you want to know the secrets of secretarial martial arts? Are you skipping over all these words simply to get to the pretty pictures? Then read on!

Rubber Band Hold

If a debilitating attack isn't deemed necessary then there are a number of holds that can be performed by the secretarial martial artist, the most popular of which is the Rubber Band Hold. If seated then an assailant's hands may be the better choice, otherwise the head should be your target. Pull out a handful of rubber bands from your desk's top drawer where you've been keeping them for some unknown reason alongside the nineteen opened boxes of paper clips, numerous loose thumb tacks, those three rolls of sticky tape, and collection of assorted biros, most of which no longer work. Use sweeping motions with your hands to apply the rubber bands to your attacker, instantly immobilising him or her.

Filing Cabinet Shin Stab


Lure your assailant next to a filing cabinet; a pretext of looking at some flowers or holiday photos atop the cabinet works well so long as they are actually there, otherwise you'll come across as a bit of a loon. Drop into a crouch (keeping your back straight for health and safety reasons) and pull open the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet with as much force as possible. The upper edge of the cabinet drawer should shatter the shin bones of your attacker rendering him or her helpless and less likely to keep pestering about the printer ink cartridges.

Double Handed Staple Slap


A good secretary always makes sure he or she has at least two, fully-loaded staplers to hand. Although the stapler makes a great paperweight and has been known to staple paper together too from time to time, it can also be transformed into a martial arts weapon of fearsome disabling ability. With an attacker looming grab one stapler in each hand. Flip the wrists, straightening each weapon and perform a clapping motion to the head area of your opponent. This attack causes pain but no lasting damage to your adversary unless you go for the eyeballs. So that's where I'd aim.