How fake can something be before it's considered fake?

Edmond

Wuji
There is a lot of questionable stuff out there, but this one was an eye opener to me. Apparently, Yan Fang has some connections to be a respected master tracing back to Chen Fake.

It's not new, so maybe old news around here?


 

Brad Johnson

Qinglong
All that kind of Kong Jin is just complete BS. Those people are idiots.

But to provide something maybe productive to the conversation, what I was told is that the idea of kong jin is, in fact, to get your opponent to move without touching them but not as portrayed in the puppet videos. As a very crude example, the idea of Kong jin as it was explained to me, is if I flicked my hand toward your face and and you moved your hands to block, but I don't actually touch you to get you to move - you provoke movement in your opponent without touching them. Nothing magic. That explanation always made sense to me and it has obvious martial applications.
 

angryclown

Jingang
I heard it explained as things that people saw but didn't understand, and a mythology grew up around it. So maybe someone did something that was small or in close and watchers couldn't see it, so they assumed it was some kind of special skill. Or it could be that someone did something that actually didn't make contact, but because most people didn't understand the mechanism, they just ascribed it to "chi", or whatever. I once heard chi defined as anything a 17th century Chinese peasant didn't understand, so there's that...

I personally saw two "no touch" knockdowns done by the late, great Don Angier, who practiced a Japanese sword art. The first was he tipped over a friend of mine who was a former thug and professional kickboxer, just by moving his hand in front of my friend's body. Angier explained it as a matter of understanding people's natural responses and balance to the point where he could manipulate it. Angier wasn't doing it to say how great he was, or claiming to do it in a fight, it was more in the lines of "if you want to be really good at this art, this is the kind of stuff you have to study and understand."

Later that day I saw him Kiai (yell) and cause an attacking black belt to fall on his face. There was context, though. He had just thrown the guy to the floor (hard) four of five times; when the guy went to attack again, he timed his yell so that the guy basically flinched and tripped over his own feet. Angier used his stuff while working as an undercover cop back in the day, and was adamant that he didn't believe in ki. He said it was all just physics and understanding people.
 

Brad Johnson

Qinglong
Damn. The first of your stories is intriguing. I would love to have someone do that to me. I remain skeptical that they could, but I love to be wowed. The second story reminds me of one I heard, that was ascribed to the power of "chi in voice". I've never heard any other reference to "chi in voice" but the notion makes intuitive sense to me. For instance, getting away from Chinese martial arts, this is one reason why people are always yelling in military training (as I have been told, I was not in the military); That is, they desensitize you to yelling so you don't freeze up when someone is yelling in your face in battle. That makes a lot of sense to me. That is,; train to not look like a deer in the headlights when someone is projecting a lot of energy vocally, and conversely practice to make untrained people trip over there own feet when you project your own energy vocally.

I see this as another example of useful concepts that get perverted into mysticism. That always pisses me off. I'm going to go yell at the Youtube now.
 
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Edmond

Wuji
But to provide something maybe productive to the conversation, what I was told is that the idea of kong jin is, in fact, to get your opponent to move without touching them but not as portrayed in the puppet videos. As a very crude example, the idea of Kong jin as it was explained to me, is if I flicked my hand toward your face and and you moved your hands to block, but I don't actually touch you to get you to move - you provoke movement in your opponent without touching them. Nothing magic. That explanation always made sense to me and it has obvious martial applications.
This version of Kong Jin sounds familiar to what I read about how Mikhail Ryabko explains his Systema's "no touch" method. It's using the understanding of psychology and reactions to manipulate people. It sounds plausible, and it's the most believable explanation so far. Although, I could imagine it failing when you try it on someone who just doesn't react the same way (e.g. a drugged up guy on a rampage).

Anyway, Mikhail Ryabko's also being tagged in the list of "bullshido", so it's not any more credible.
 

Brad Johnson

Qinglong
This version of Kong Jin sounds familiar to what I read about how Mikhail Ryabko explains his Systema's "no touch" method. It's using the understanding of psychology and reactions to manipulate people. It sounds plausible, and it's the most believable explanation so far.
That Systema stuff is total BS. It is stupid. I looked into this a long time ago and just briefly reviewed a video to refresh myself. It's as embarrassing as I remember it. Look at footage of it critically for a moment. Is that how people fall or move when they lose control of their bodies? That kind of stuff is a form of willing, group manipulation.

The words used in the Systema explanation are reasonable, but not the supposed application or results. How often does someone make their opponent dance around during a fight? Never. Getting your partner to dance is only a useful skill on a date.

Kong jin or touchless power, might make someone trip over their own feet or perhaps even somehow make them fall down, like Hassler wrote. More often its goals are less ambitious; that is, to get the opponent to shift weight, go for a feint, or move their arms to expose a target. That's good. That's enough. It's a martial skill. It's usually small and subtle. Probably the smaller the better. A very common theme in BS martial arts is to grossly exaggerate a subtle skill and use that as evidence of special power or knowledge. If you see this happening, protect your wallet and run away. Such people are charlatans and nothing more - this is in my experience. Everyone is welcome to do what they want, though.
 
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Edmond

Wuji
Love your point about taking a small, subtle "icing on the cake" supplementary skill and blowing it out of proportion. Learning to apply that skill on top of the foundational skill is one thing, but focusing solely on it is a fantasy. A fantasy that many look for, and hope for its existence.

On the topic of subtle skills, it reminds me of another one someone showed me recently called Prana Dynamics by Huai Hsiang (Howard) Wang. Howard talks about "opening Fascia". It looks too easy to believe without feeling it firsthand. Sounds like the trend of mixing in new/esoteric biological terms is the new form of mysticism?

 

angryclown

Jingang
Talking a bunch of nonsense is a good way to distract from what you're actually doing so as to maintain an illusion of... whatever it is those guys are presenting themselves as.
 
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