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Shaolin Monks May Sue Over Tale of Defeat by Ninja
Socguy writes "A unique story on the CBC website details an even more unusual conflict. A Chinese Shaolin temple has demanded an apology from 'an Internet user who claimed a Japanese ninja beat its kung fu-practicing monks in a showdown.' A letter from the members of the temple, posted on the Internet on Thursday, denied the fight ever took place and called on the person who posted the claim under the name "Five minutes every day" to apologize to the temple's martial arts masters. Monks from the temple, which is located in the Songshan Mountain region of the Henan province, said they will consider legal action if he or she doesn't make a public apology."
Someone just won at Internet trolling.
Hear that, Slashdot trolls? When you get written up by Reuters, that's when you've arrived.
The monks also stated that this alleged ninja must be produced for execution by means of the five-point palm exploding heart technique.
The idea of a Shaolin Monk 'considering' legal action, in order to defend himself against a single bulletin board poster, just doesn't have the same impact, when we live in a day and age where another group of religious fighters abduct real reporters, cut of their heads, and post the video with all gurgling noises included, to the internet.
Ninjas couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper sack.
This is just a cover story to draw attention away from the fact that several Shaolin Temples, were in fact, recently plundered by pirates.
Pirates rule.
Both the showdown and the demand for an apology appear to be in stark contrast with the usual composure of both ninja and kung-fu practicing monks. Indeed file under "funny", and funny only.
What the hell do the Pirates have to say about all of this?
The eternal struggle of good vs. evil begins within one's self.
They're just threatening early to discourage people from getting the truth out about the Chuck Norris showdown.
1. Record the event
2. Post on YouTube
3. Have Large TV network steal it
4. Post that on YouTube
5. Get sued by TV network
6. Now you are a Pirate and can surely kick Ninja ass...
7. Profit (if you win the lawsuit).
TC - My Photos..
"I'm sorry but theres only one possible answer to all this"
Ninjas descend from ceiling and take a stance.
"Round one! FIGHT!"
[Much later]
And then, just as it seemed the fighting would come to a conclusion, a ship flying a skull and cross bones moored at the local pier...
"I may be full of crap about this game, and I may be wrong, and that's fine." -Jack Thompson
Ballmer, in the temple, with the chair.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
Rest assured that if the internet posting was about a *LAWYER* singlehandedly defeating and laying waste to all of the shaolin temple, there would be no refutal at all!
A lawyer would simply get end up showing prior art and a patent-in-progress filed on all of their techniques and get an injunction against the shaolin monks practicing their kung-fu!
Fear the deadly powers of a *LAWYER*!!!
These guys are cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet.
Facts:
1. Ninjas are mammals.
2. Ninjas fight ALL the time.
3. The purpose of the ninja is to flip out and kill people.
Especially note 3 above. The Ninjas probably just went to the Shaolin Temple to talk about tea n shit, and then they just totally flipped out and killed all the monks.
Anyway, here is some more things about Ninjas.
Q: Why is everyone so obsessed about ninjas?
A: Ninjas are the ultimate paradox. On the one hand they don't give a crap, but on the other hand, ninjas are very careful and precise.
Q: I heard that ninjas are always cruel or mean. What's their problem?
A: Whoever told you that is a total liar. Just like other mammals, ninjas can be mean OR totally awesome.
Q: What do ninjas do when they're not cutting off heads or flipping out?
A: Most of their free time is spent flying, but sometime they stab. (Ask Mark if you don't believe me.)
- Nothing to see hear.
If he retracts his statement, he'll have a bunch of angry ninjas after him. If he doesn't retract, he's got a whole temple of kung-fu masters on his ass. I can't imagine a more troubling situation.
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
"The parties are advised to chill."
On the other hand, Buddhist monks spend a decent amount of their studies on the subject of humor, so maybe this is simply the single greatest cultural practical joke ever perpetrated...a Zen masterpiece.
All the techniques ever used to make men moral have been themselves thoroughly immoral... (Nietzsche)
why not ask a ninja?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehQo7s_02sc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEmss2lg-ug
Grappling is suitably only for one-on-one, preferably caged and regulated, matches. A ninja would kill a grappler from a distance. An army of Shaolin monks would kill and army of grapplers in minutes.
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Ninja's do not do competitions. This is something that Maasaki Hatsumi has said - there will never be an official Bujinkan representative at any competition.
As for the past - why would a ninja be so stupid as to fight in a tournament? The way a ninja fights is not in the open - they sneak and kill in secret, and only fight hand-to-hand when there is no alternative.
Would a ninja beat an entire group of shaolin monks? You bet. Wait for them to go to sleep, then pick them off one by one. Easy as pie.
Ninjas were assassins used in feudal Japan and as such, if they were seen, they'd already failed.
What happened with a Ninja, you would simply be found dead the next morning. Or perhaps never found. That was a successful Ninja. I train in a Japanese system based on fighting styles used in the 15th and 16th century and just for fun, we'll try a few simple techniques that are/were attributed to Ninjas. Now I suspect there really were never Ninjas, but I'll play along for 2 hours to have some fun.
Typical is that as you walk by somebody (opposite way), if you grab their arm and yank straight down, they will fall. It seems like it shouldn't work, but it does. And it only works if the person doesn't expect it. If you fall backwards quickly like that, you'll be stunned for a second or two. If the attacker has a knife, you could be dead within seconds. That's (to me) the essence of Ninja stuff. Quiet, and striking when your guard is down, and then they're gone.
Again, I think it's a lot of B.S. but I think the Ninja myth is to Japan what the Cowboy myth is to the U.S. or what the King Arthur myth is to England.
Well ninjas use ninja stars and throwing knives so it isn't fair. C'mon, ninjas are assassins primarily, meaning, if you were to be killed by one, you probably wouldn't have seen him coming. It's like putting Fedor Emelianenko against a sniper.
As you touched on, one of the largest issues is that of regulated matches versus real life-or-death combat. Even with grappling - in a ring, a responsible fighter may put a lock on you that could easily destroy your joints, but only apply enough force to make you submit. The same goes for strikes.
As an example - a friend of mine is an assistant Kung Fu trainer. His Sifu has somewhere around 20 generations of Shaolin Kung Fu training behind him (as well as a style of Kung Fu that his great-great-great-great-etc. etc.-grandfather created). He started training basically as soon as he could stand, and studied under Bruce Lee for some time.
Get in a ring with him, and he'll destroy you - but you'll still walk away. Bruised, battered, and damn near ripped limb from limb, most likely wishing you had never even considered the fight, but you'll walk away in one piece. Someone who didn't know of his training tried mugging him - pulling a knife on him. By the time his attacker hit the ground he had 3 broken ribs, a fractured skull, a broken jaw, a broken leg, and an arm broken in three places (if I'm recalling correctly. I may have mixed up an arm broken in 3 places for a leg broken in 3, but the injuries are in general accurate). That was his measured response to assure that he was no longer in any sort of danger, the man could have been dead before his body dropped.
It's very hard to judge the effectiveness of one fighting style versus another unless you're looking at two people who are really out for blood.
Interesting you bring up this point. I have spoken with several very experienced martial artists (see my other comment, here), and one common recurring theme that came up was that a sniper was the closest thing to a ninja you could find today.
.45ACP handguns on him (to help him become one with his weapons...), I wasn't about to argue.
Use what's available, have the element of surprise on your side, kill without being seen, and get out safely. Sure sounds like a sniper to me. With that sentiment coming largely from someone who is highly trained in Kung Fu, has a few high caliber rifles, and sometimes carries 2
I know I shouldn't feed a blatant troll here, but I just have to say that this idea of the UFC being the de facto benchmark as to how "good" a martial art(ist) is makes me laugh. Anyone who's trained seriously in martial arts will tell you that true masters would have absolutely no interest in UFC not because they're incapable of winning or afraid to compete, but because it's obvious showmanship and goes against most martial arts principles particularly "leaving fighting as a last resort". Anyone who achieves master level certainly does not do so by "proving" himself in publicized "battles", but by years and years of disciplined study and practice.
Besides, a true master of any art would never let himself get into a position where a much larger and more experienced grappler (to use your example) would have a superior position, it just wouldn't happen. It might not make great tv, but there's no way one of the "big boys" is going to get a hold of a true master, despite how much he can bench press. People forget that strength and speed are only 2 of many factors in what makes a martial artist great.
The problem with UFC is it is an event designed to favor grapplers from the start. First my background:
Uechi-Ryu Karate (hard style, Japanese)
Kick Boxing
Hwa Rang Do (koren, has your normal stuff + pressure points, grappling, weapons)
5 years as a bouncer
Aikido
And a few other styles I did has my travels took me everywhere..
Grappling in a 1v1 controlled situation is VERY strong. If I faced the grappler the odds are I would lose, why? Because a lot of my moves are fingers to the eyes, strikes to the throat, kicks to knees, groin, palm strikes to the chins to snap the neck, etc. A normal response is well ya you are trying to have 2 guys fight not kill each other. Which is the point.
In a UFC type style competition they don't train to really defend themselves in the same as other styles. The rules are designed to favor those training just to compete in UFC.
As an ex bouncer of 5 years at a college bar (300+ people a night) if you grappled someone in real life you'd be dead. Got on top of someone and their friends WILL club you with bottles, or kick your head, stabbed, etc. I did see one guy grapple someone and see the guys friend pick up a chair and smash.
Grapple someone and land on the shitty floor on glass, cement, etc. you are very likely to hurt yourself also. Grappling also requires some room to mover and shot in. You don't have that in a crowded bar. You don't need room to take your fingers and jab it into someone's throat.
This isn't to put down grappling people. They are very strong, fit, skilled, etc. From my experience in the real world grappling is not what you want to use.
Even Shaolin Monks have to be scared of something.
Even if there is some truth to this, there's something else going on in the background, I seriously doubt any self-respecting monk would bother suing over some online comment. It doesn't make sense to me.
"we've got trenchcoats and bad attitudes" - John Constantine, HellBlazer
... until you can snatch the pebble from my palm, you will be pursued by lawyers and other creatures of the night.
I wonder what kind of process server Shaolin monks would use to serve notice to a ninja? I seems this might be the basis for a TV sitcom, with each episode having the hapless process server falling back to devise a new approach to sneak up on the ninja and serve the papers.
> If this is the case, how come shaolin kung-fu masters aren't winning UFC championships and such?
Ai yai yai. One of those YouTube arguments again? Shaolin Kung Fu is a "Martial" art. It was designed for the battle field (albeit in a firearm free era). There have been historical instances where the monks used their art to fight entire army (shaolin temple was destroyed when the army was not happy with the outcome of the first match and declared a rematch - without telling the monks first) and yes, pirates (despite an abundance of pirate jokes on this thread). The art itself has little to prove. However, it is not optimized for ring fighting (just like "powerful grappling" is when your opponents have spears, swords and bows) although it certainly had been used for the same. Besides, no single martial art style can win MMA style matches anymore. MMA is kind of a unique style now optimized for that rule sets.
Historically, most martial arts were meant to be used in conjunction with weapons (anything else was not practical at that time). In modern times, where the said weapons have lost relevance, we mostly use the unarmed aspects of the styles. Shaolin monks were great because these spiritual nerds trained early, trained a lot and trained to save their skin. Anyone who spends that much time in any rich martial art is bound to be awesome. The modern monks are mostly performers that the Chinese govt sanctioned after the success of the movies of the temple.
> There's no reason a clever ninja couldn't have also come up with clever techniques to beat monks as well.
Sure, Ninja's were said to kill silently - and that can be done on anyone. But one thing they never did was have challenge matches.
Lawyers? Hah. My monkeys will eat your legal documents and poop on your expensive shoes.
Fear the monkeys!
You are doing it wrong if you can't do sticky hand practice without a partner.
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
I heard there was this one *LAWYER* who just totally flipped out and started sueing people. There was guys that weren't even involved and he sued them before they could even get ready. He even sued pirates...
Remember:
FACT - laywers are mammals
FACT - laywers totally flip out all the time
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He may have been after more than just subduing the attacker -- he may have been trying to make sure that the attacker never came after him again. I know a family who got mugged during Mardi Gras this year. Like any normal citizen, they went to the police, filed a report, and gave a description of the attacker. And the attacker was actually caught. 2 weeks later he's out on bail, pissed off, and calling their house threatening them with bodily harm, etc., etc. Unfortunately, shit like this does happen.
Now, take the GP's post. If you were the mugger who was very soundly beat by this martial artist, would you have much motivation to try to come after the guy later, after you're healed up? Machiavelli said (and I'm paraphrasing here since I no longer have a copy of The Prince) that the only way to truly win a conflict is to beat your enemy so soundly and completely that they won't even entertain the notion of coming back for another attack later. The same can be said for a mugging as can be said for an actual war.
If Murphy's Law can go wrong, it will.
I have to say, being one myself, I don't think any ninja would have the time or energy to waste on little things such as pride. I would more so believe that some bystander saw something relating to a duel where there was a need for defense on some level and it is quite possible that a ninja could beat a monk or a monk could beat a ninja...depends on the level they are at.
A Koga region ninja could very easily beat a shaolin monk , but might have problems with a white crane kung-fu master....why, diff. styles, and diff. combinations, certain regions are closer, therefor have seen the other styles or have had influence on them.
I could even let you know that the present day GrandMaster Ninja Hatsumi sensei, not only is a ninja, but comes from a long line of samurai masters...his family were samurai, and he learned the ways of the ninja. SO anything is possible in this world, I have heard stories of how demeaning a monk could be to fellow peasants, and I have seen myself how family oriented and
how much value for life certain ninjutsu masters have,
I would hate to generalize as so many people do in their ignorance (and as in this article).
If it were a real shaolin monk , there would be no lawyers, as the duel would take place immediately afterwards, with the monk seeking out the indivdual (as it would be his duty)
and "finishing" the duel.
Both sides take no sh*t and I think it sad that someone could start this whole thing as a media frenzy, where if asked I bet neither side would really care about such clames.
The martial arts... Karate, Kung-fu, ju-jitsu and the rest were never designed as competitive sports. They were self defence systems. And they were and are brutally effective if trained and practised that way. The very idea that one is better than another is complete bullshit, they were never meant to be used against other martial artists, they were meant to be used against aggressive but largely untrained attackers.
However, the last hundred years many of them have turned into sports. You are no longer allowed to gouge out your opponent's eyes, fishhook their mouths or attack other dangerous points like the neck, throat, groin, back or stamp on them on the ground. Instead you score points, playing tag in the ring. This pretty much leaves you with punches and kicks. The original techniques that are encoded into the forms or kata are either hidden, forgotten or simply not trained.
Now, the concept that karate and Kung-fu are purely striking systems is utter, utter bollocks. The forms and kata of both systems have joint locks, chokes, strangles, throws, gouges built in for all to see, if you know what you're looking at. Yes, much of which can be used on the ground. You just have to recognise them and practise. Ju-jitsu originally had a fair level of striking in it as well.
If you're practising karate, kung-fu purely as a striking system then what you are practising is kickboxing, not karate, not kung-fu. Practising ju-jitsu without kicks and punches it's not ju-jitsu.
Deleted
Pfft. Just give Chuck Norris M16 rounds.
Fnord.
You foolish children, shaolin monks, ninjas, pirates, and monkeys are NOTHING compared to the horrendous and frighteningly destructive power of those godless killing machines without a soul....
BEARS!
*runs away*
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