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Can Kung Fu be used for fighting?

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  • #31
    Originally posted by drunken boxer View Post
    Good points guys.

    I too had the eye opening experience the first time I saw real kungfu.

    And Mike's points about the glass wielding thugs are very relevant.

    And the point about the HK police is relevant too I think. As I said I used to think martial arts techniques usually didn't work against streetfighters or boxers but once had a job in a factory where a couple of my colleagues had been ex-bouncers, policemen and prison officers and they showed me a few locks that they said had worked against some extremely tough streetfighters.
    I still wouldn't fancy them against Mike Tyson though! Actually I think that is an interesting point, in my part of the world and in my own mind, the frame of reference for a fighter for a long time has been Mike Tyson. How many martial artists do you know who could beat Mike Tyson (at his best?) I have only met a couple who I think could beat him, and I'm talking the level of masters and MAYBE their very best students. If anyone says Royce Gracie or whoever the latest UFC exponent is, please allow me to have a little chuckle to myself!
    Maybe this should be a poll in another thread?
    Hi all my first post!!!!.May I respectfully add my 2p ? May I say Mike Tyson was at the very top of his game ,the very top.

    The outright power and fitness movement punching ability of top Pro boxers is as good as it gets when it comes to punching power.

    If you go on you tube ,you will find Marius (the polish world strongest man)
    cage fighting.He is hitting his opponent who is on the floor.

    They really are powder puff punches (mind you with 20+stone behind them!!).Compared with Top boxers.........

    Interesting ,when I was a young teenager I joined an amateur boxing club.Every kid in that place was a "Hardnut" tough fellas.Quite intimidating.

    When I was older I joined a Kushinkai(spelling,long time ago!!)Karate school.The people in there were with respect just "Normal" or maybe a bit "soft".However the brown and black belts were tough fellas thats for sure,different class.

    Just rambling!!! Lots of luck all.

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    • #32
      Value of Fighting

      The aspect of fighting called avoidance generally surpasses that of intimidation, which surpasses mere harm, which surpasses mere injury, which surpasses mere maiming, which surpasses death. The Art of War reveals that without an aspect of reality familiar one loses confidence to fight. Wushu effective Gongfu!

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      • #33
        I'm glad to see that the general consensus on this question is: YES!

        And I must admit that I was surprised to see this thread here. I have always considered Kung Fu effective for fighting.

        I think that the reason this question comes up so often is threefold:

        1): The prevalence of modern combat sports on the big screen, like Boxing, Judo, BJJ, Muay Thai and MMA is a very visceral way in which to pressure test certain techniques. The public (and by public, I mean fans and fighters of those sports) rightly wonder where all the Kung Fu men are.

        Of course, there are a few answers to this. The first is that no combat sport allows for completely free range of techniques, nor do they allow for a realistic approximation of real combat, including multiple opponents, weaponry, crippling / lethal techniques or the use of certain psychological / special tactics such as utilising the element of surprise, blinding an opponent, or trying to resolve conflict non-violently.

        Many Kung Fu styles are predominantly interested in real life fighting, and so (although undoubtedly they can fight under such rule sets) they are not specialists in those rulesets. Likewise, many Kung Fu men simply aren't interested in competitive sports. These are the same reasons you won't see a Krav Maga enthusiast, Ninja, or practitioner of military self defence take part in the UFC.

        The second answer is that Chinese martial arts already have their own combat sport competitions. In place of Muay Thai or Boxing they have Sanda and Sanshou. In place of Judo or Jujitsu, they have Shuai Jiao or Push Hands competitions (I do not, personally, rate the push hands competitions in China as being indicative of the type of skill push hands the exercise should produce - it looks more like Judo - but that's besides the point for this competition). In place of MMA, traditionalists often have full contact fights on the Lei Tai. So, there are plenty of full contact sports fighters active within Kung Fu - they're just not generally as well known as their non-chinese counterparts in the west.

        2): Kungfu is composed of techniques at various levels. An untrained person - or someone who may have a background in martial arts, but ones less sophisticated than traditional Kungfu - will probably only recognise very basic Kungfu as combat effective. For example, a Pak Sau and Sun punch counter (common techniques in Wing Chun) to a western jab makes sense to the untrained - it's recognisable as a clear and easily effective response that anyone, provided they were fast and strong enough, could perform effectively.

        A Biu Jee technique (thrusting fingers) from the same art looks less effective to the untrained eye. It is a higher level of skill - Biu Jee contains (as well as other things) the keys to regaining control of combat that is going against you and the Dim Mak (Dian Xue or pressure point) techniques in Wing Chun.

        But to use Biu Jee, you have to have acquired a high level of basic gong (which is why it's the third and final hand form in the system). A person who has not seen this gong in action, much less developed it themselves, simply can't evaluate the often incredible combat effectiveness of high level Kungfu.

        If we're talking 5 animal, this is why Tiger looks more combat effective than Dragon to non Kungfu people. They're both effective and both necessary for high level Kungfu, but one builds upon the attributes of the other.

        3): There is a lot of Kungfu that is simply ineffective for combat. As well as the charlatans that populate any martial art's practitioners, Kungfu has a long tradition of display, or performance based, arts. This may irk some people, but it's undeniable. You have Chinese Opera, which (as anyone who's seen a Jackie Chan film will tell you) looks amazing, but is definitely not combat efficient (Jackie's fairly skilled in traditional Kungfu too - I'm not disparaging his Kungfu, just using some of his movie stuff as an exmaple of Chinese Opera house Kungfu).

        You also have Kungfu / Qigong circus skills, most famous today with travelling Chinese circuses. These skills have existed for centuries (at least) - check out Leung Ting's book 'Skills of the Vagabonds' for a simple and fun layman's guide to their history.

        Lastly, of course, you have modern Wushu. Love or hate it, it's not a martial art - it's a martial art inspired type of acrobatics, and the most modern expression of Kungfu's long relationship with performance arts.

        None of these arts have any bearing whatsoever on the ability of traditional Kungfu as an effective (probably the most effective) martial art - but non Kungfu people are often unaware of the distinction. And Kungfu people who are ignorant about Chinese culture or history may also be unaware that, in China, these arts are not held up as effective martial arts. The real problem with display arts comes when someone trained in a modern reconstruction of Shaolin, the emphasis of which is often athletics or performance, or maybe a modern Wushu practitioner, tries to pass off what they do as traditional Chinese martial arts.

        Just my two cents on why many people today don't equate traditional Kungfu with effective martial arts.

        PC
        Check out my Pao Chui kung fu blog and website to learn more about this ancient style:
        http://gmevans.wix.com/cannon-fist

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        • #34
          Depends on how do u use itt

          I have been reading you guys, and my feelings about kung fu are quite similar to the things you have been saying above.
          For most people, is not useful to try to fight with kung fu, eventho it might work. Anyway, if it is a real kung fu master the one fightting, Kung Fu can be lethal for the oponent, leaving him with no choices.
          Nuevos avances publicados acerca del sindrome de patau y las consecuencias que genera en los bebes que lo sufren.

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