Geniouses on the Internet

Back when I was online WAY more than I am now, I used to read a Chiefs fan forum called Chiefs Planet (it's still around - I started reading it way back in 2003-ish or so).

One of the many inside jokes there is that they'd refer to opinions or posts that were obviously, well, absolutely stupid as being "genious" (misspelling intentional).

Since I first saw that reference, I've kind of kept for myself. When I see people dumbing on the internet, I think to myself, "What a genious".

It amuses me.

Recently I got exposed to a plethora of geniouses (all on Facebook go figure), so let's talk about it.

Recently, we posted to our Kindred Protective Arts Facebook and Instagram pages a short, 13 second clip of myself doing an isolation drill where you go as fast as you can with the abaniko strike on two levels.

Here's the clip:

I'm the fat lady fighting two sticks (that'll make more sense later in this blog). The other guy is one of my black belts. And yeah, if you've never done this drill, it's fun.

The class where we filmed this had mostly newer students - one on his first trial class - and we were working on what we Modern Arnis people call "classical strikes".

These are ocho-ocho, "reverse" ocho-ocho (some people call these "equis" due to the x pattern, whereas to us it looks like a figure 8 in the air, so, "ocho-ocho"), sungkiti, rompida, up and down (aka taas-baba), banda y banda, and of course, abaniko (fan strike).

A way to get people new to hitting stuff with sticks (or tools of any kind) is to use isolation drills hitting stationary targets (it's part of the chunking philosophy we use to teach with at KPA). For most strikes/pokes, we use our standing bags, but for abaniko, we have them hit sticks.

First, a stick held vertically, then a stick held horizontally, then we use this "L" shape drill I posted above to teach changing levels, then, when they get confident in controlling their targeting, we have them hit high/low with the horizontal abaniko on a single stick (the partner holds it in the middle), and then we hold it in thirds to REALLY work precision (that one has a hell of a pucker factor even though we aren't putting power into the strikes here).

Once precision is pretty decent, we add power, using footwork (and the hips, especially).

Long story short, the video is from a progression of drills we generally show new students as they learn classical Arnis striking.

Mr. Chick recorded the "L" shape drill as I demoed it for the class, and uploaded it to KPA's Facebook and Instagram pages as a post and reel.

And for some unknown reason, it took off. I mean, at last count, we are closing in on 100K views, we've gained 918 new followers, it's been shared 108 times. That's not normal for us - we are a very small school and our content is focused on local people here in Kansas City.

Usually, if we get one or two comments and 100 views, we're thrilled.

Most of the comments by a wide margin were complementary, and that was so nice, especially from people we don't know personally. It's always cool to connect with our larger FMA community, even in a short little video clip like this one. Most of those understood what I was doing here, and why I was doing it, even though it's a very short clip of a single isolation drill.

Others... not so much.

So I'd like to address some of those genious comments here, in order of most stupid to least stupid (and one that's not stupid at all). I'm not doing it on KPA's pages because arguing on the internet is a waste of time (and I don't have a lot of it, obviously).

But.. I have the time to put to it here on the blog, don't I?

GENIOUS MYSOGYNY

Men who train often wish the women in their lives would join them. Here's one reason why many of us won't. Asshats like these.

Nope, I'm training to beat your ass, genious. And given I train a weapon art, I'm not training for you to tap.

I included Coach's rebuttal here (thank you), because he makes the serious point of why men should consider training with female coaches and instructors in physical activities of all kinds (not just martial arts).

At KPA, my students call me the "technical one" (the nice way of saying I'm a raging martial arts nerd who will annoyingly correct which way their foot is pointing at the drop of a hat) compared to Mr. Chick (who is a big, strong guy with lots of reach and is a walking encyclopedia of different ways to train a specific skill).

I can't overcome opponents with strength or reach, so I better have good technique. The nice thing about good technique is that it ages with you, because everyone - EVERYONE - will become weaker, smaller, and have opponents who are bigger, younger, faster, stronger, or smarter than they are.

MANY a tough male fighter finds this out as they age.

As for the fat comment - "Oh noes, some pathetic balding geezer called me fat!"

Well, Danny boy, you must have made some bank in your life, because no way in hell that pretty young second wife of yours is with you because of your looks, your hairline, or your absolutely sparkling personality.

This next comment actually is genious in two different categories, so I'll post it twice. Let's take the second sentence first.

Ah, the ever-so-clever "woman get in the kitchen" type comment. How original.

By the way, a wooden spoon is an excellent improvised weapon, genious. Haven't you ever seen "Everything Everywhere All At Once"?

Sure, that's a scripted movie fight. But it's plausible.

In any case, dumbass mysogynists is what women who train have to cope with. Yes, my male comrades ALSO have to deal with general dumbassery, but they don't have to do it by default based on their gender. It's just an extra layer we have to deal with - the idea that because of my gender alone, I can't be a good martial artist, win a fight, or instruct men and boys in my chosen martial art.

I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M LOOKING AT SO I'LL MAKE A GENIOUS COMMENT

This sort of thing is something EVERY martial artist who puts a video out on the internet has to cope with. I'm not special in this by a long shot.

I'm not fighting anything, actually.

You... do know what a fight looks like, right? And in that clip there isn't a fight happening... right?

Here's my favorite in this category:

Apparently this guy is kind of an actor or something? There's zero indication that he trains on his FB profile, mostly just pictures of cats and one of a Bruce Lee quote and some of he and a pal posing with firearms in a very dangerous way and what looks like him in a ninja outfit, so obviously, this guy's opinion is one to take oh so seriously.

And yeah, we charge money for lessons, mainly to have a place to train indoors and out of the park, because damn, it gets COLD here in January.

GENIOUS.

Remember Andre up there? Let's address the first sentence in his comment.

Ok, I know many of you have heard Arnis players - especially Modern Arnis players - vent frustration about people who don't train what we do making this exact comment. "What if you don't have a stick? You can't fight then!" as if it's somehow clever and something that didn't occur to anyone who trains in weapons or the Filipino Martial Arts specifically.

WAIT, YOU MEAN I CAN'T WALK AROUND WITH A 28" STICK EVERYWHERE I GO!?! OMG, I'VE WASTED MY TIME TRAINING IT SINCE 2008, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE BREAKING NEWS!!1!!

Or maybe, genious, we train the stick to represent a lot of things, INCLUDING empty hand techniques. The stick can be a stick, a knife, a sword, an umbrella, a pen, a rolled-up magazine, a tire-iron, a baseball bat, a broom, a walking cane, or whatever you find in your environment that you can use to protect yourself.

Or rather, your lack of one.

Maybe we talk about this specifically in our classes (including having "improvised weapons" night a few times a year applying what we learn to tools found in everyday life), and in other drills I didn't show you in this clip, we discuss and train with all sorts of objects (and without one at all).

One more thing, Andre, do tolerate random strange old men denigrating your granddaughter the way you did a perfect stranger like me?

PEOPLE ASSUMING THINGS

I'm going to grant two things without researching all y'all too deeply: 1) you know what you're looking at and 2) you train yourself. Although in Jason's case below, I personally have some doubts.

You should know that we don't put a LARGE PERCENTAGE of how we train on the internet. Mainly because of geniouses making comments out of context and we only have so much time in the day to deal with it.

As y'all can see, I have some time today.

If you look closely, I'm not using my wrist all that much. I'm using my shoulder. Using the wrist too much will strain it (or get you a tennis elbow).

As for the body twist for snapping power, I couldn't agree more. We do that in another drill (and in application). Because you didn't have the context when you saw our 13 second video, you made an assumption that we DON'T do that.

We do that.

Mabuhay!

Michael, it would be "nice" if you understood that this was a drill specifically dealing with the striking mechanic of an abaniko, versus everything that goes into an effective abaniko strike or a full-on fight. You do understand the difference between a cooperative training drill, and a fight, right?

We use a training method called "chunking" (sometimes called microlearning). Take complex subjects and break them into smaller pieces for students, then as competence gets better, put them all back together again.

It might not be how you train, but it's how we train. It'd be "nice" if you accepted there's more than one way to get to the destination.

Jason's reply to Michael's comment is MUCH more genious in nature. You can question the utility of the drill, sure, but I don't think you actually understand what's happening here at all. You want me to do another completely different drill (you call it "the 4 drill" but that's not a universal term, my friend) to develop something that I'm not trying to develop in the video I posted...?

And as someone else commented, we were making a short video on the fly in class, so we wanted to stay in frame, BUT, it's not a big footwork drill at this point anyway.

You made another comment, Jason:

Not only do I know how, but we do that, all the time. Just not in this specific drill. You... do realize that one 13 second clip is not indicative of everything we do training literally six days a week?

Okay, so I will wrap this up with a comment that isn't genious at all.

NOT GENIOUS. ACTUALLY SMART.

We do, but this specific version of the drill was intended to work multiple levels and to change from horizontal to vertical strikes and back, so a single stick (or a long pole) wouldn't do the trick. But your advice is well taken, from personal experience and a purple knuckle or two from getting hit.

I'm sure we'll get more comments, good and genious, over time, because we're still getting lots of views and shares. Who knows, maybe it'll result in some new students here at KPA. I won't write about them again unless they're absolutely hilarious.

Now if you'll excuse me, I gotta go learn MORE POWER!