History Main / VerbalJudo

* Delia of InPlainSight pulls off one of these brilliantly when a Neo-Nazi potential witness tries to pick a fight with her.

* This is a key tactic of BugsBunny's. Just when his pursuer has him cornered, he changes the subject and tricks his foe into dropping his guard long enough for Bugs to escape or retaliate.

* ComicStrip/BeetleBailey has lots of tricks for avoiding Sarge's incoming rage. Usually this involves distracting him, especially by making him think of food, but also invoking other things such as Creator/JohnWayne. He also once confused him by shouting back to him as if to an inferior or at most an equal, which he can't handle since it's so much out of the norm. That said, Beetle ends up being beaten into a pulp more often than not, sometimes in spite of an attempt at Verbal Judo.

* ComicStrip/BeetleBailey has lots of tricks for avoiding Sarge's incoming rage. Usually this involves distracting him, especially by making him think of food, but also invoking other things such as Creator/JohnWayne. He's also confused him by shouting back to him as if to an inferior or at most an equal, which he can't handle since it's so much out of the norm. That said, Beetle ends up being beaten into a pulp more often than not, sometimes in spite of an attempt at Verbal Judo.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Putting Your Hoof Down", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is verbal karate, which, while effective, turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild physical violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy -- not being mean, just standing up for herself and not backing down. She tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue and so leaves peacefully.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Keep Calm and Flutter On", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is verbal karate, which, while effective, turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild physical violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy -- not being mean, just standing up for herself and not backing down. She tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue and so leaves peacefully.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Keep Calm and Flutter On", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is verbal karate, which, while effective, turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild physical violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy -- not being mean, just standing up for herself reasonably and not backing down. She tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue and so leaves peacefully.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Keep Calm and Flutter On", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is verbal karate, which, while effective, turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild physical violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy. She tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue and so leaves peacefully.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Keep Calm and Flutter On", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is verbal karate, which, while effective, turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild physical violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy. She tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue, and leaves peacefully.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Keep Calm and Flutter On", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is an effective form of verbal karate, which turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild physical violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy. She tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue, and leaves peacefully.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Keep Calm and Flutter On", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is an effective form of verbal karate, which turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild physical violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy, who tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue, and leaves peacefully.

** Fluttershy continues to be able to stand up for herself only on [[LetsGetDangerous special occasions]], and in "Keep Calm and Flutter On", she seeks help from an assertiveness trainer, a minotaur called Iron Will. However, what he teaches is an effective form of verbal karate, which turns Fluttershy into a bully and the opposite of her normal self. Eventually she [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone breaks down]] when she realises she'd just given a BreakingLecture to two of her best friends, and locks herself in her house. However, when Iron Will comes to collect his fee, aggressively and even using mild violence to get past her friends, he's met with a ''properly'' assertive Fluttershy, who tells him that he had a satisfaction guarantee and she's not satisfied, period. He's surprised but can't argue, and leaves peacefully.

** An almost completely different example in "Dragonshy": Rainbow Dash pulls a LeeroyJenkins on the giant dragon and provokes him to attack the ponies. [[CowardlyLion Fluttershy]], finally forgetting her own fear of dragons when she sees her friends being attacked, flies right up to his face and starts telling him off for it, instantly changing the anger to shocked surprise. Combining the surprise effect with that of her DeathGlare and absolutely steely assertiveness, she eventually has him crying and then leaving peacefully.

Ways in which this can be achieved include but are not limited to confusing the aggressive party with something completely unexpected, NonSequitur or otherwise, which tends to deflate the aggression; or calmly persuading them to look at the situation from an objective point of view and make them realise starting the fight is not in their interests. The important thing is not to continue in the normal track that would lead to confrontation, but to turn its course around to a different direction. Note that though "Judo" in the name specifically implies a "soft" self-defence approach, being meek in face of aggression isn't automatically Verbal Judo -- in some cases, showing fear may only provoke further. And techniques used for Verbal Judo as here defined can involve a certain degree of controlled aggressive assertiveness, as long as it comes from a surprising angle that leaves the other party off-balance rather than stoking their own aggression.

The trope name comes from the RealLife technique and book by George Thompson, which are basically about how to achieve this trope. Thompson contrasted it with "verbal karate", where you respond to hostility with hostility and only escalate the situation -- this being the way people are more often naturally inclined to react. "Verbal Judo" or [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verbal_self_defense "verbal self-defence"]] is defined more broadly in real-life usage, but the trope is defined only as stated above.

* ''Webcomic/OrderOfTheStick'': Haley, while being chased by a rival she'd killed turned into a golem, tells her that she'd only killed her fair and square, but the person who had the golem made is responsible for her current state. The golem then turns against its master.

* In ''Literature/ABrothersPrice'' the princesses are RoyalsWhoActuallyDoSomething. As a result, they are good at verbal judo. When Princess Ren hears that the Whistler family, who saved her little sister, has been found to be armed up to the teeth (though they ''did'' turn in all of their weapons, she tells a servant to make sure her mothers know that Jerin was in incredible danger just a short time ago, to explain their nervousness.

Compare TalkingTheMonsterToDeath. Has only a little in common with PolitenessJudo. Contrast BreakThemByTalking, a less nice technique, though it ''could'' theoretically overlap with this. Situations where this might be needed could involve HairTriggerTemper or BerserkButton; if it involves a PowderKegCrowd or other mob, it's probably also an instance of ShamingTheMob. This makes a good technique for the BadassPacifist.

* In ''The End of Faith'', Sam Harris recounts walking the streets of Prague at night and seeing some men trying to force a woman into a car against her will. Thinking on his feet, he realized that their command of English was probably poor, and that he could probably use this fact to confuse and distract them. So he told the men that he was lost, using sentences that were grammatically coherent but made little sense regardless ("I am looking for a specific building. ... It could be filled with marzipan.") The men became so confused and engrossed in discussing his case amongst themselves that they didn't even notice the woman take off. Harris thanked them and left, and no one else present probably ever had a clue the real reason that he approached them.\\

* Many a DrillSergeantNasty has employed this technique in various ways. It helps that military training is often aimed towards getting troops to reflexively respond to commands. The Verbal Karate variant is also seen, given that the instructor is often also in a considerably stronger position than the recruit, both physically and socially, thanks to both the nature of the training environment and military hierarchy.

* In ''BlackHouse'' by Creator/StephenKing and PeterStraub, Judy Marshall's husband tells a story about her that involves her having prevented a fight between two strangers after a car accident. The driver of one car is aggressively bearing down on the other, who is only provoking him by backing off. Marshall gets so angry at the aggressive man for his being about get into a fight he'll regret that she walks up to him and berates him about it, surprising him and ultimately calming him down.

* At the climax of AmericanGods, [[spoiler:Shadow diffuses an imminent war between the old and new gods with a short but effective speech laying out how it was all part of Odin's conspiracy to get themselves to kill each other in his name.]]

* {{Commissar}} CiaphasCain in ''For the Emperor'':

* As narrated [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NW3RLnXmTY here]], Reverend Wade Watts dealt with being repeatedly hassled by the KuKluxKlan by responding with unflappable good cheer and humour. This culminated when a group of them accosted him at a restaurant and told him they'd do to him everything he did to the chicken on his plate. He carefully picked up the chicken and kissed it, causing ''everyone'' there to laugh, even the people trying to harass him. They gave up trying after that, and the guy in the video eventually switched to his side to oppose the KKK.

* TimAllen claims to have gotten into comedy because of this. [[ItMakesSenseInContext When he was in prison for drug dealing]], he ended up running afoul of a big angry guy who was just shy of beating the snot out of Tim. Tim's reaction? He started doing P-P-P-Porky Pig impersonations, causing the guy to drop him and start laughing. He figured out that being the guy who could make people laugh went far for making his stay in prison better than it could have been.

* In AmericanGods, [[spoiler:Shadow diffuses an imminent war between the old and new gods with a short but effective speech laying out how it was all part of Odin's conspiracy to get themselves to kill each other in his name.]]