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kenjgood
8th November 2001, 20:58
I have posted an interesting set of photos.

I don't have the details as to the weapon sizes, but I vaguely recall they were folders.

http://www.swordforumbugei.com/ubb/Forum16/HTML/000087.html

Kit LeBlanc
8th November 2001, 22:05
Ken,

Excellent. I have been frustrated with repeatedly going over the same things in posts and opinions to counter the the faith-based martial arts mindset that so often pops up in the budo world. But a picture is worth a thousand words.

There is no magic bullet. No training, firearm, edged weapon, or empty hand technique is more than an EDGE in an actual combative encounter in earnest. That edge can be honed to a fine degree, but often the outcome of a combative encounter is based on not how good we are, but how quickly and with violence of action we can convince the other guy that we dominate him....be it with a hard throw, a cut to the throat or two rounds center mass. There will always be some people who for whatever reason simply will not be impressed.

Doubtless many will argue that if the man who caused these wounds had any kind of TRAINING in a REAL BUJUTSU, these pictures would have been taken at a morgue instead of hospital. Possibly, but I submit that the results very well may have been the same. Some people will drop and die of shock getting cut in the hand, other people will be Ginsu-ed, shot repeatedly, have multiple bones broken and WALK into a hospital. When I mentally prepare myself walking up to that door and think I'll be dealing with an actual encounter, it is always with the latter in mind. Keeps me on my toes.

Many of the techniques, strategies, preparation of mindset and understanding of principles that are passed on in the dojo (after all, we are ALL doing dojo budo) DO HELP, but the caveat is that they must be applied in a radically different environment with people who come from very different places than our typical training partners. Understanding the capricious nature of that environment should be the first goal of anyone who believes they practice or teach "combative" martial arts. It is not enough to call on hundreds of years of samurai history, a romantic notion that we are heirs to the lifestyle of a warrior brotherhood by virtue of our practice alone, or to TRY to convince ourselves that we live, think and breathe "like they did." Unless we do things to people like what was done to this guy, we don't really live, think and breathe "like they did" at all.

I have been recently struck in reading the koryu literature made available through the fine work of the American Kobudo Shinkokai (couldn't resist). In reading about all the varied practices of the bushi, their mudra, spells and incantations for invisibility and invulnerability, the Mikkyo used to control the enemies' mind, the techniques for checking and regaining one's composure under stress, the surprise attack kata that never give the enemy a chance to fight back, the spirit of sacrifice, the concept of aiuchi, the idea that you may not win but you don't have to lose, that budo is really all about perseverance and cutting one's way out of a difficult situation, and that you basically have a 1/3 chance of getting out of a serious physical encounter alive, it has not been demonstrated to me that these guys thought that they were all that deadly or effective. Rather they seemed to understand how vulnerable their very dangerous profession made them, and used EVERYTHING they possibly could, from incessant training to psychological aids to just plain magic spells to give themselves that edge and make those odds a little better than 1 out of 3. I suspect it was because they saw the sort of thing that these pictures show all the time, and knew that they may have to face somebody who just wouldn't go down as well.

But we should all take heart, for there is another lesson in this. We too, could one day be that guy. Cut to ribbons, YET STILL HERE. Now I don't think for a minute that our strength of will to stay in the fight with wounds like these will come from the obviously dark, twisted, domestic violence fueled place that this guy's did (y'see, ya don't need no sam-ur-eye training to be one tough S.O.B, some people are just so pissed off at the world they don't friggin' care....) but these photos are proof positive that the mind WILL carry us through, we CAN take a LOT of horrific damage and keep going, and we damn well better see to it that we do. We simply need to expect the same of our adversaries and carry the fight to them.

Kit

tcasella
9th November 2001, 23:58
Thanks for those shots...just when a guy starts to get lax, stuff like this surfaces and makes you want to train that much harder.