The irony of anti-athleticism of the taichee hippies

[CaliG]

Yeah, I've been there too. Years ago when I trained with a teacher in the States and I'd hear stuff like that too.

"Stretching hyper-extends the joints, working out only makes you "externally" healthy, tension is bad, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah..."

All I can say is that I'm glad I broke away from that school of thought and hopefully others will too. There's no need to lie about the other stuff to push your own stuff.

[oldtyger]

The whole taichee hippie thing has probably been talked about before. My Yang and Chen style teacher 10 years ago called them "granolas." Those were the students who had no clue that taijiquan was originally a martial art--before it became a hippie/New Age fad. My teacher had a lot of students who never came back after the 1st day.

If you are going to train a martial art, then you need to condition and develop the body. In fact, there are several kicks in the forms as well as very low postures--best to work on flexibility before attempting to do these without a warmup. Also, if you work your push hands past the basic drills, you need to know how to take a fall. One of my first teachers always had us do some falling on mats every so often to keep our skills up and we almost always pushed hands on the mats--for our own safety. The drawback of "too much muscle" is sometimes you rely too much on it. But the same can be said of peng for example. I once relied only on this in a push hands with someone--I was so determined to "win" even though my skill was poor. I "beat him" but he was like a foot shorter than me and probably 30-40 pounds lighter. My larger physical mass gave me the advantage--even though I used internal strength. The key is to train correctly and always try to practice correctly in order to gain higher level skill.

There's a reason why 90% of tai chee is New Age. That's what is popular and what sells. The same problem in any art/skill/industry. One of my friends( who used to do Yang but now Chen style) once told me "if something's too popular, it can't be good." I don't completely believe that but he has a point.

[Areios]

http://www.abelsmartialarts.com/images/ ... hi%204.JPG
http://dyn.ifilm.com/website/ver2/Ryan_ ... 01_lrg.jpg
make your bet please!

edit: ok I did something that didn't worked out. but insted I post two little pic

[Darth Rock&Roll]

I bet the old guy buys him dinner, then gets him drunk, gives him a roofie, then, buggers him while he's unconscious.

later on, if the young guy found out, he'd beat the old guy, maybe to death.
Or he'd love him and they would live happily ever after on the Mediterranean.

[klonk]

Well, some people like to shoehorn things into their own preferred views. Hippies, by and large, think viloence is BAD, non-aggression is GOOD, and their moral sense cannot fathom exceptions.

So when hippy meets martial art, of course the art will be re-invented in his image and likeness. Arrogance? That's one word for it. Same sort of thinking killed Aikido, in another country far away. I don't want to blend and unify with some asshole who is trying to kill me, okay?

[klonk]

Hey Areios, I've got a request. Knock down the pixel count (lower the resolution) when you post pictures. I'm on a DSL and thse pics are still way slow to load. Anyone on a dialup is still waiting!

Edit: Thanks, Areios! The new pictures show up right away!

[fuga]

Don't your back on them hippies.

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/jul/17/rainbow-family-brawl-spurs-arrests/

[CaliG]

Well, some people like to shoehorn things into their own preferred views. Hippies, by and large, think viloence is BAD, non-aggression is GOOD, and their moral sense cannot fathom exceptions.

So when hippy meets martial art, of course the art will be re-invented in his image and likeness. Arrogance? That's one word for it. Same sort of thinking killed Aikido, in another country far away. I don't want to blend and unify with some asshole who is trying to kill me, okay?

I don't think it really has much to do with politics.

As much as the times. When Aikido and Taiji came the States it was the sixties, people were doing drugs, Americans were burning down villages in Vietnam, etc...

The teachers at the time attracted people who wanted to believe that they could defeat their opponents with their own power, which these arts do but only with proper training which includes some hard style training.

But since most people only do a martial arts for a couple of years and move I believe the teachers never got to the hardcore stuff. But who knows maybe they never knew it themselves, in some cases anyway.

Today we have the opposite happening with 9-11, Irag, etc.... American men want to see blood and the UFC has really skyrocketed to success after 9-11. I remember before 9-11 when BJJ and the UFC were still part of the underground.

[affa]

some 70,000 odd hippies just descended on my hometown... manchester, tn... for the bonarroo music festival.



goddam hippies.

[everything]

if they can dance like this guy: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=5136 then they might be taichee hippies. if not, you need to get out there and start the party and convert them to our ways

from watching this guy, i know just what it feels like to be John Travolta in the 70s, Michael Jackson in the 80s, or MC Hammer in the 90s.

[Juan]

I don't know if you've guys ever had the pleasure of meeting a Capoeira hippy. Holy shit are those guys annoying! They are usually white guys with smelly, nasty looking dread locks that love the Angola game because it lets them me one with the earth and detest the regional game. When they are in the roda they generally do these weird movements and are usually totally disconnected with the game (some hippies actually catch on and become fairly decent at playing). They love, love, love doing llamadas (sp?, these are when one guy stops and then the other guy has to come to them slowly then they walk back and forth together in a sort of dance), and generally have no clue to martial aspects of Capoeira. Looking back, I was a bit of a dick back in those days, and I would kick the shit out these types of dudes and sweep them without mercy to show them that the roda was not a dance about mother earth.

*Note: I'm not saying that all Angoleiros are hippies, just that hippies are more drawn to the Angola game. There are also a good number of hippies in Regional schools as well.

[everything]

Angola Kitteh dabbles in gymnastics, too:

[Kelley Graham]

when a taichee hippy comes to check out our school, i say... "kinesthetic awareness is developed through vigorous partner training and free, playful 3 dimensional movement through space" (athletics). somehow, all the gobblygook-speak to avoid the word 'athletics', seems to be ok...

just look at how puppies play with each other. we civilized folk stop our children from wrestling WAY too early and as a result our populace is 'kinesthetically challenged'.

martial arts are one antidote.

best regards,

[everything]

cat was about to say: "line them up like dominos, and i'll fajin all of them!"