filtering the bull

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Kung Fu Forum
1

I feel that Chinese Martial Arts has problems. I feel it is time we open our eyes to the bull in kung fu.

The crazy chi claims and demo are stupid. I am not saying get rid of chi. However, that chi blasting some one to the other side of the room crap when you can see it is bad acting.

The bad demos need to go, too. I am tired of going to a demo and watching bad chin na, knife multiple and gun demos. And just because the master in famous I have to kiss up and say how good it was.

I remember a while back I went to a tournament. People were doing push hands. A little bit famous master (I wish I remember his name) sneaked in and push with this a smaller guy (not a master). The guy did not know the other guy was a master. The guy beat the master 5 times in a row. The master was getting p!ssed. Another master stepped in and stopped them. I think is was a good thing. It showed that “master’s” push was garbage. I bet if that if that guy knew he was have subconsciously let the master win.

My brother teaches BJJ. when his teacher comes to his school (Renso and Royler) he tries to get them. And they want him to try to get them, but he can’t. They know what they know. You may say it is the same subconscious thing. However, knowing the way my bro is, he is really trying. He has embarrassed masters before.

The point of this post is this:

If you are at demo, and you see BULL, seriously ask them to demo on you or someone besides their student. If you see a bad knife or gun demo, say so. If you see something that is crazy, call them out. It does not matter if they are a famous master or not.

I remember hearing about a dude who did not believe in the pressure point Dilman thing and he said that he would sign any release so that the PP master would demo on him. Of course, the PP master said it was TOO DEADLY.

This does not mean pick on an 80 year old master doing a demo because it looks weak because of his age. Let’s just try to weed out the crap.

2

I am with you man it is time to put a stop to the crap

3

Bull or cheating in demo is everywhere.

There are pre-cut boards held together and not even glued on.

When the TKD or whatever kid barely touched/punched/kicked or not even got anywhere close. the assistants dropped the “broken” board on the floor.

I examined the boards. They looked like nicely “cut” with smooth edges.

What do they call the style or school, again?

:smiley:

4

I don’t teach or represent everywhere. Kung fu is what I do. I want to clean out own bull.

Saying that it is everywhere does not make it right.

5

For every 10,000 regular schools that do regular kungfu type exercise, there will be one of te types of schools you mention.

why do people think that this aspect is the predominant one? Because you see a clip of it on youtube of one charlatan or another pretending to have mad powers with his all too compliant and halfwitted student accomplices?

lol. These types of people are the smallest portion of martial arts. So obscure you would really be hard pressed to find their nonsense anywhere really.

And how do you propose “stopping” them? Why not go and stop Ron Popiel and his salad tossing magic machines taht are made with 30 cents worth of plastic and sold to the consumer for 4 easy payments of 19.95?

Or how about stopping the liars that tell you cream will remove fat from your thighs?

Or how about those filthy frauds who sell sauna belts and tell you it will spot reduce weight?

what about ma schools taht tell you that after their 8 week program you’ll be a lean mean fighting machine even though right now you are a scrawny awkward teenager that is about as aware of the world beyond his extended hand as much as the titanic was aware of an iceberg in its path.

:stuck_out_tongue: :rolleyes: and for holding chi strength :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

lol

6

At one time, I saw a demo of chopping ice blocks, boards and bricks.

They are all pretreated. They let me examine before and after. I did not see anything wrong.

Later, he told me some secrets about how to “soften” these materials.

–

7

[QUOTE=David Jamieson;701427]For every 10,000 regular schools that do regular kungfu type exercise, there will be one of te types of schools you mention.

why do people think that this aspect is the predominant one? Because you see a clip of it on youtube of one charlatan or another pretending to have mad powers with his all too compliant and halfwitted student accomplices?

[/QUOTE]

I disagree. That number is way off. Actually, I think it is kind of backward. I feel there are more clowns than masters. Yes, I have seen bad demos in other martial arts, but i am worried about my own (kung fu). I don’t want to mention names, but i have watched bullsh!t demos from masters who are highly respected. And it is not because of age. it is just stupid. I have seen masters do chin na demos where the student easy pull the master’s leg from underneath him. I saw one highly respected master do a live knife demo, and the technique was so bad that if the attack was just a normal person with no martial skill would have cut his throat. that is one reason I cringe when masters try to do fight demos (just stick to forms if your KF is bull).

I am a young new teacher. I do not name names because I will make enemies before i get a foot in the door.

8

flying monkey, my numbers weren’t concrete. and I don’t know where you live so I can’t speak to how much sillyness is available in your area compared to mine. But all I can say is that around me, most ma schools are just ma schools and don’t go out for that sort of thing that you are talking about.

and demos are demos are demos, they do not represent reality in the least.

9

True. If I took a survey of all the martial arts schools in the area, I doubt I’d find very many at all doing this kind of junk. Most would be pretty average. Good exercise, some limited sparing and partner drills for basic self defence, but not producing pro level fighters, and nothing too crazy or cultish either. The internet and watching a few public demos isn’t enough to come to solid conclusions about, as only a few of the best, and a lot of the laughably worst will get any significant attention :wink:

10

There is a lot of bs in the Kung Fu world I agree.

I recall one time in SF when a Chinese Group was touring the U.S. doing their demo’s, and this one guy grabbed a long sword and wrapped his hand around the blade. he then took some cloth to tie his hand to the blade. Then he was going to slide the sharp blade back and forth over his palm and show he didn’t get cut.

Well, my angle was just perferct enough to see the guy slightly open his hand and then began to slide the blade at blinding speeds, but because he opened his hands he wasn’t going to cut anything at all. He then took off the cloth and showed the crowd his hands and at that point i had enough.

in another instance, this one famous ma master was holding back this group of people with his chi, (the master was standing at a distance) when one guy gets up and accidently walks through the line of the masters chi and nothing happened. If this masters chi was holding back this group of students, then why didn’t it knock down the guy who just walked through his chi?

Also, there are a lot of Paper Tigers out there as well. I mean masters on paper only. Get them into a real deal street confrontation and their gung fu goes out the door. Personally, I would never learn a fighting art from someone who has never been in a real life and death situation. But that’s just me.

However, some of us gung fu people “ARE” realists, and only focus on true self preservation by training reaslisticly as possible.

So, not ALL kung fu people are Charlatans.

peace

11

The point of this post is for us to start calling out paper tigers and fakes.

12

why bother?

they’re not going to go away now anymore than they have for however long they’ve been around.

every field of endeavour will have it’s less than truthful and less than capable exponents. And frankly, there’s a lot of granola heads who wouldn’t have it any other way.

13

Calling people out exposes them but it certainly doesn’t do anything positive for kung fu.

If you want to improve kung fu then why not turn your energy in a positive direction.

Why not perform demos the way they should be done?

Why not participate and promtoe tournaments that display good kung fu?

Why not teach good kung fu?

It’s easy to spot things that aren’t the way you think they should be and call them out. But don’t stop there. Do something to make a difference. Do something to make kung fu better instead of just complaining about it.

14

I’m gonna render down what Chief Fox just said into the simplest possible terms because i agree with it:

“Be the change in the world that you want to see”

15

f you try to filter out the Bull from CMA you’ll be left with very few teachers…

A few CMA lies:

a) All you need is forms. You don’t need partner practice. When you need it, it will ‘come out’ in the fight.

Complete and total B.S. Assume if you haven’t done it in partner practice that you can’t use it.

b) You aren’t ready to learn that. It will take many years.

Complete and total B.S. Means the master probably doesn’t know what they are doing, can’t teach, and is trying to string you along.

c) I don’t want to show you, I want you to figure it out for yourself.

This means the master most likely doesn’t know, so they’re ‘saving face’.

Saving Face is paramount to Chinese culture. They don’t like to ever be wrong, and they want to always be right. They are mainly interested in their status in society.

A few translations:

a) That guy ‘stole’ from me. Means he’s teaching without permission, or picked up things watching a demo, etc.

b) That guy is ‘stupid’, that is ‘stupid’, that style is ‘stupid’, etc. Means that it might not be stupid, just that the other master doesn’t agree with it, or is jealous of it.

c) They’re not ready to practice with yet. Means that he doesn’t want you to practice with them and share stuff because he is trying to string all his students out as long as possible to make $ off of them.

16

No wonder kung fu is going down the pipes.

17

[QUOTE=Chief Fox;701442]Calling people out exposes them but it certainly doesn’t do anything positive for kung fu.
[/QUOTE]

It got rid of Paulie Zink. Sigung Chan Sau Chung called him out by showing what he did was garbage.

People like to point out what is bad about Shaolin-do. I think we should point this critical eye at ourselves too. Even people with the so called “good” lineages.

18

[QUOTE=Chief Fox;701442]Calling people out exposes them but it certainly doesn’t do anything positive for kung fu.[/QUOTE]

Perhaps, but there are hordes and hordes of newcomers to martial arts in general that don’t know the difference between good and bad teachers. If we never expose the bad ones, then they will continue to remain in the shadows, suckering the ignorant and unexpecting…

If you want to improve kung fu then why not turn your energy in a positive direction.

That’s only half of the equation… It’s like dieting - you can’t just eat less calories, you have to burn more, too. If you just exercise, but you eat like a pig, you might lose weight. If you eat less, but don’t exercise, you might lose weight. Do both, and its guaranteed.

Why not perform demos the way they should be done?

Why not participate and promtoe tournaments that display good kung fu?

Why not teach good kung fu?

Again, half of the equation, but definitely worth repeating… I know several people who’ve retreated from public venues out of disgust.

It’s easy to spot things that aren’t the way you think they should be and call them out. But don’t stop there. Do something to make a difference. Do something to make kung fu better instead of just complaining about it.

50/50. You have to both uphold the higher standards personally, but you have to make the effort and take the steps necessary to inform the uninformed.

19

[QUOTE=Flying-Monkey;701476]
People like to point out what is bad about Shaolin-do. I think we should point this critical eye at ourselves too. Even people with the so called “good” lineages.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=YiLiQuan1;701480]
50/50. You have to both uphold the higher standards personally, but you have to make the effort and take the steps necessary to inform the uninformed.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, I’m not saying “if you don’t have anything good to say, then don’t say anything at all”.

Point the critical eye at ourselves, uphold the higher standards, inform the uninformed.

20

[QUOTE=Flying-Monkey;701409]I feel that Chinese Martial Arts has problems. I feel it is time we open our eyes to the bull in kung fu.

The crazy chi claims and demo are stupid. I am not saying get rid of chi. However, that chi blasting some one to the other side of the room crap when you can see it is bad acting.

The bad demos need to go, too. I am tired of going to a demo and watching bad chin na, knife multiple and gun demos. And just because the master in famous I have to kiss up and say how good it was.

I remember a while back I went to a tournament. People were doing push hands. A little bit famous master (I wish I remember his name) sneaked in and push with this a smaller guy (not a master). The guy did not know the other guy was a master. The guy beat the master 5 times in a row. The master was getting p!ssed. Another master stepped in and stopped them. I think is was a good thing. It showed that “master’s” push was garbage. I bet if that if that guy knew he was have subconsciously let the master win.

My brother teaches BJJ. when his teacher comes to his school (Renso and Royler) he tries to get them. And they want him to try to get them, but he can’t. They know what they know. You may say it is the same subconscious thing. However, knowing the way my bro is, he is really trying. He has embarrassed masters before.

The point of this post is this:

If you are at demo, and you see BULL, seriously ask them to demo on you or someone besides their student. If you see a bad knife or gun demo, say so. If you see something that is crazy, call them out. It does not matter if they are a famous master or not.

I remember hearing about a dude who did not believe in the pressure point Dilman thing and he said that he would sign any release so that the PP master would demo on him. Of course, the PP master said it was TOO DEADLY.

This does not mean pick on an 80 year old master doing a demo because it looks weak because of his age. Let’s just try to weed out the crap.[/QUOTE]

I can see what you’re saying here and agree with it, but in the example you gave, you didn’t mention what this guy is a master of. perhaps he was an iron palm master. maybe he was a weapons master. it’s a matter of context, to an extent. take royler and put him in a thaiboxing match with pramuk and see what happens…