Re: martial arts

From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_yeats.ucc.ie>
Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2000 23:11:38 GMT

David Cake on Darudan martial arts:
> I don't think its a single norm, plus some deviations - more like a
> multiplicity of paths of greater or lesser weirdness. Even amongst the
> orthodox Darudists, there should be plenty of different styles, though the
> Darudists would avoid the really strange ones.

I said a norm, not a single orthodox path. If you will, some sort of probabilitistic, fuzzy envelope of 'what's hot and what's not', with a inner, somewhat more subtle, category of a range of traditions that's been preserved in recognisable form over a length period of time. If the phrase just conjures up a wholly assorted mish-mash, then that's not very successful, IMO. (Look how varied the Orlanthi are, for example, but we still have a powerful image of what 'Orlanthi' means.)

[assorted degrees of 'orthodoxy']
> I think all of the above should have access to effective martial
> arts magic of some kind, though not deeper mystic benefits.

Effective for what it is they're trying to do. If their ultimate objective is a mystical one, then martial effectiveness is just an 'optional extra'.

> Bear in mind the wuxia spirit - the bad guys, no matter how
> demented and insane, also have cool martial arts power

I haven't said you can't have mystic bad guys; I haven't said you can't have non-mystic martial arts; I have said non-mystical is necessarily bad.

Cheers,
Alex.

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