The Problem With Being Soft: Ali Maclean

Ally McLean, what's the problem with being soft?

The problem with being soft is everything you're told about...

Well, it's, in general, self-defense, isn't it? Like, that's what people think soft is.

And every course, every YouTube video, every magazine or every video you watch on Instagram shows when someone grabs your wrists or they, you know, grab their hands on your neck.

And by that stage, you've already kind of lost.

You, you've already failed at probably the most important part.

In fact, in the UK today, there are approximately 1.94 million violence against person offenses recorded by the police in England and Wales in 2024 and 2025.

Now, if you look back at 2013, 2014, there were only 600,000, so that's, like, a decade.

That's more than, more than tripled.

And so it's not going away, and the problem with that is people are just basically unaware of being situationally aware, not being capable enough, and the pr- big, big problem with that as well is the fact that a lot of these issues are caused not by the stranger in the alley thing people have, like, "Oh, a stranger in the alley is gonna attack me." It's like m- most of the time it's by people you fucking know, and that's the big issue with it.

So for instance, would you say, uh, there's a, there's a couple things at play here.

If I had to put the finger at some things, I'd say social media, one.

We're watching, you know, street compilations of fights, knockouts.

Uh, Twitter can show you some of the most savage knockouts, and where maybe in the '80s and '90s you'd watch films and think that you could be the main character, suddenly now you're looking at social media and thinking, "If someone started on me and my mates at the pub, I'll just chin all three of them."

Y- that's...

It's exactly that.

And so I, I talk about there being three types of people.

There's unprepared people, and they avoid everything.

They, they know they're soft, but hence they, they just kinda avoid the conflict both in, if it was to approach them in the street, but also in their own life where they're not gonna go to training.

They're gonna pretend that they can go through life with, you know, nothing bad happening to them.

We've got delusional people, and these are the people that see red apparently, and when [laughs], when it kicks off they can just handle themselves.

They're the people who turn up to jiu-jitsu and realize, "Holy crap, I am absolutely useless." But they think it's 'cause they're just gonna turn it on.

And then you have people who are actually capable, that train, but have it under control.

And like the old quote everyone speaks about and overuses is, like, "It's better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war." And that, that's the important thing to remember with it, I mean, because, uh, it's...

people are massively delusional.

Ally McLean, what's the problem with being soft?

The problem with being soft is everything you're told about...

Well, it's, in general, self-defense, isn't it? Like, that's what people think soft is.

And every course, every YouTube video, every magazine or every video you watch on Instagram shows when someone grabs your wrists or they, you know, grab their hands on your neck.

And by that stage, you've already kind of lost.

You, you've already failed at probably the most important part.

In fact, in the UK today, there are approximately 1.94 million violence against person offenses recorded by the police in England and Wales in 2024 and 2025.

Now, if you look back at 2013, 2014, there were only 600,000, so that's, like, a decade.

That's more than, more than tripled.

And so it's not going away, and the problem with that is people are just basically unaware of being situationally aware, not being capable enough, and the pr- big, big problem with that as well is the fact that a lot of these issues are caused not by the stranger in the alley thing people have, like, "Oh, a stranger in the alley is gonna attack me." It's like m- most of the time it's by people you fucking know, and that's the big issue with it.

So for instance, would you say, uh, there's a, there's a couple things at play here.

If I had to put the finger at some things, I'd say social media, one.

We're watching, you know, street compilations of fights, knockouts.

Uh, Twitter can show you some of the most savage knockouts, and where maybe in the '80s and '90s you'd watch films and think that you could be the main character, suddenly now you're looking at social media and thinking, "If someone started on me and my mates at the pub, I'll just chin all three of them."

Y- that's...

It's exactly that.

And so I, I talk about there being three types of people.

There's unprepared people, and they avoid everything.

They, they know they're soft, but hence they, they just kinda avoid the conflict both in, if it was to approach them in the street, but also in their own life where they're not gonna go to training.

They're gonna pretend that they can go through life with, you know, nothing bad happening to them.

We've got delusional people, and these are the people that see red apparently, and when [laughs], when it kicks off they can just handle themselves.

They're the people who turn up to jiu-jitsu and realize, "Holy crap, I am absolutely useless." But they think it's 'cause they're just gonna turn it on.

And then you have people who are actually capable, that train, but have it under control.

And like the old quote everyone speaks about and overuses is, like, "It's better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war." And that, that's the important thing to remember with it, I mean, because, uh, it's...

people are massively delusional.