Yesterday I spent a brilliant afternoon at a martial arts seminar for childrens charities, I met loads of great, friendly people, learnt a little Lau Gar,a couple of wrestling moves, some new SD techniques, watched a display of Gatka which was amazing and generally had a great time. However and I feel funny about writing this because it was for charity and the people concerned were genuine and nice people but a couple of techniques have me truly puzzled and frankly cynical.
They were from a group who say they train reality based SD, no reason at all to doubt them and they have some good simple techniques along the lines of the stuff we do but, and for me this is a big but, they did a demonstration of how to throw an attacker off without laying hands or feet on them...by chi power. Now what I saw was the sensei shouting at his student who then fell over. The 'attacker' cam close to the sensei and it was so fast I wouldn't swear in court that hands weren't used but they said thats what it was, frankly I don't believe in chi repelling attackers, I think a loud kiai in your face would cause you to pause for a tick but not fall over. They also did some pressure point stuff which 'stopped the attackers heart/KOd him' and they rushed to sit him up cross legged then slapped him on the back of the neck and rubbed his back. There were oohs and aahs at this from most but us cynics just kept quiet!
It didn't seem the place to question it tbh with it being for charity etc and as I said they guys were cool people and their techniques otherwise were solid. They lined us up ( it was the black belt group) and said they'd do a pressure point technique on us to show us how effective they are. We do some pressure point work in our club, my instructor is good at them but when on the doors etc won't bother too much with them when a solid punch is needed if you know what I mean? Anyhow, the guy pressed one of my chin and while it was uncomfortable it wouldn't have stopped me hitting him back, he looked disappointed then said he was only putting it on softly anyway. Ok, for the sake of peace I accepted that.
So the question is what did I actually see when the guy fell over after being shouted at? It wasn't done to any of us as I suspect it wouldn't have worked, I'm right aren't I? They said it takes 30 years to learn this technique. The trouble is they are very believable.
My instructor is still in Thailand so I'm going to have to wait to see what he says, he has far more knowledge than I have, it's not an area I know anything at all about but as these guys train with an American chap Dillman, though they are English I was wondering what you guys thought?
I can't reconcile the solid techniques they showed with what seemed to me to be 'magic' but I can't believe it works either, it goes against my logic.
They were from a group who say they train reality based SD, no reason at all to doubt them and they have some good simple techniques along the lines of the stuff we do but, and for me this is a big but, they did a demonstration of how to throw an attacker off without laying hands or feet on them...by chi power. Now what I saw was the sensei shouting at his student who then fell over. The 'attacker' cam close to the sensei and it was so fast I wouldn't swear in court that hands weren't used but they said thats what it was, frankly I don't believe in chi repelling attackers, I think a loud kiai in your face would cause you to pause for a tick but not fall over. They also did some pressure point stuff which 'stopped the attackers heart/KOd him' and they rushed to sit him up cross legged then slapped him on the back of the neck and rubbed his back. There were oohs and aahs at this from most but us cynics just kept quiet!
It didn't seem the place to question it tbh with it being for charity etc and as I said they guys were cool people and their techniques otherwise were solid. They lined us up ( it was the black belt group) and said they'd do a pressure point technique on us to show us how effective they are. We do some pressure point work in our club, my instructor is good at them but when on the doors etc won't bother too much with them when a solid punch is needed if you know what I mean? Anyhow, the guy pressed one of my chin and while it was uncomfortable it wouldn't have stopped me hitting him back, he looked disappointed then said he was only putting it on softly anyway. Ok, for the sake of peace I accepted that.
So the question is what did I actually see when the guy fell over after being shouted at? It wasn't done to any of us as I suspect it wouldn't have worked, I'm right aren't I? They said it takes 30 years to learn this technique. The trouble is they are very believable.
My instructor is still in Thailand so I'm going to have to wait to see what he says, he has far more knowledge than I have, it's not an area I know anything at all about but as these guys train with an American chap Dillman, though they are English I was wondering what you guys thought?
I can't reconcile the solid techniques they showed with what seemed to me to be 'magic' but I can't believe it works either, it goes against my logic.
