home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- Path: sparky!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!caen!ftit
- From: ftit@ob.engin.umich.edu (Sergej Roytman)
- Newsgroups: rec.martial-arts
- Subject: Re: Fights and blackbelt confidence
- Date: 22 Jan 1993 23:34:11 GMT
- Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor
- Lines: 64
- Distribution: world
- Message-ID: <1jq09jINNktr@srvr1.engin.umich.edu>
- References: <memo.881091@cix.compulink.co.uk> <30324@optima.cs.arizona.edu> <C19zr4.4xA@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>
- NNTP-Posting-Host: ob.engin.umich.edu
- Originator: ftit@ob.engin.umich.edu
-
-
- In article <C19zr4.4xA@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>, shulick@navajo.ucs.indiana.edu (Sam Hulick) writes:
- |In article <30324@optima.cs.arizona.edu>, hogue@cs.arizona.edu (Justin C. Hogue) says most sayishly:
- |>In article <memo.881091@cix.compulink.co.uk> bburgar@cix.compulink.co.uk writes:
- |>>I'd be interested to know (from a wide sample of people) how fights start.
- |>>
- |> This oughta make you think....
- |> At an arcade, two guys my size hog the game from me and some kids. After
- |[story]
- |
- |While we're on the topic, I know blackbelts aren't invincible or
- |anything, but I think it's a confidence thing. I know that, personally,
- |after I had gone through years of training and had become a blackbelt,
- |I'd feel pretty good about myself and sure as hell wouldn't hesitate to
- |talk back to someone who was giving me a hard time. Now I'm just a
- |white belt, and when someone starts hassling me, I remain unobtrusive
- |and just take it, which I don't really like doing. This doesn't mean
- |that when I'm a blackbelt, and someone bugs me, I'd throw them across
- |the room. As our instructor said, avoid a fight at all costs, but if
- |you have to fight, do what you must. I don't think I'd be egging him
- |on, but if someone started making rude comments about my best friend,
- |I'm not going to sit there and not say anything (as I do now. me wimp!
- |:). Any one else feel this way?
- |
-
- My experience with black-belts is very limited, but it seems to me that
- the more advanced one is, the less likely he is to be drawn into a
- fight. I don't know what the idea behind your art is, but in my dojo
- we are sometimes told (and sometimes figure it out for ourselves -- it
- ain't hard) that this technique, applied thus and at full strength, can
- kill a man. Now to geek-out for a moment, ability to kill is a
- symmetric relation; if I can kill you by doing something you can kill me
- the same way. When I think about whether or not it would be worth it
- to fight in a given situation, the question becomes, would I be willing
- to die for this? After all, if you're fully comitted to a fight, severe
- damage to one or both of the combatants is the most probable result.
- Sometimes the answer is yes. More often it isn't.
-
- I guess what gave me these ideas in the first place was something that
- Master Funakoshi said in one of his books: "When two tigers fight, one
- is certain to be maimed, and one to die." Sometimes it's worth it and
- sometimes it isn't, but it seems that more and more things begin to seem
- too trivial for someone to die over as one becomes more experienced.u
- Anyway, I haven't done anything regrettable yet, and hope that my mental
- discipline will keep pace with my physical development to prevent me
- from doing something rash in the future, when I'll actually *be* an
- advanced student.
-
- I study Shotokan karate, by the way; I believe you were the one who
- asked about it?
-
- |--
- | // Amiga 3000 ___ \ Sam Hulick: shulick@indiana.edu (NeXTmail OK!)
- | // 68030 25 MHz /__/\ \ )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
- |\\// OS 2.04 \__\/ / (((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((
- | \/ / )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
-
- --
- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
- | ftit@engin.umich.edu | "... a stainless steel rat in the |
- | (Sergej Roytman) | ferroconcrete wainscoting of Internet" |
- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
-
- Say no to four-line .sigs.
-