Bikewer
Penultimate Amazing
I suffered through one of those History Channel efforts last night, one of their "ancient technologies" series. They seem to be currently hung up on stuff like death machines, torture devices, and the like.
This one dealt, supposedly in a "scientific" manner, with a variety of Chinese weapons and techniques associated with various eras and Kung Fu styles.
Absolute rot, for the most part. Recounting "ancient" legends and beliefs, they set about (rather like Biblical literalists) to show how they might be true.
Some of the stuff was alright, a section on the rarely-seen "meteor ball" was actually decent.
Then they got into Dim Mak.
Their "expert" was some Englishman who has studied various kung fu forms for some time. Evidently, English speaking Chinese masters are hard to come by. We got the standard stuff on chi, meridians, and the like, and explanations of how the Dim Mak strikes would "obstruct" ones meridians and cause your chi to get all clogged up and we know how bad that is....
Then, for some odd reason (likely because there was no way to actually demonstrate clogging...) they veered off into Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and demonstrated how a properly-applied carotid artery strangle would render someone unconscious. Wow! What a revelation! The point was, we were told, that the pressure applied to the arteries is THE VERY SAME spot someone would apply the "death touch".
Then, our Englishman took the whole thing down several notches further, showing how his well developed ability to "flow" his chi could prevent him from being injured when....
Let's all say it together....
CONCRETE BLOCKS were broken while they lay on his chest!
I don't know if the producers of these shows are merely credulous dolts or they simply don't care what drivel they put out.
This one dealt, supposedly in a "scientific" manner, with a variety of Chinese weapons and techniques associated with various eras and Kung Fu styles.
Absolute rot, for the most part. Recounting "ancient" legends and beliefs, they set about (rather like Biblical literalists) to show how they might be true.
Some of the stuff was alright, a section on the rarely-seen "meteor ball" was actually decent.
Then they got into Dim Mak.
Their "expert" was some Englishman who has studied various kung fu forms for some time. Evidently, English speaking Chinese masters are hard to come by. We got the standard stuff on chi, meridians, and the like, and explanations of how the Dim Mak strikes would "obstruct" ones meridians and cause your chi to get all clogged up and we know how bad that is....
Then, for some odd reason (likely because there was no way to actually demonstrate clogging...) they veered off into Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and demonstrated how a properly-applied carotid artery strangle would render someone unconscious. Wow! What a revelation! The point was, we were told, that the pressure applied to the arteries is THE VERY SAME spot someone would apply the "death touch".
Then, our Englishman took the whole thing down several notches further, showing how his well developed ability to "flow" his chi could prevent him from being injured when....
Let's all say it together....
CONCRETE BLOCKS were broken while they lay on his chest!
I don't know if the producers of these shows are merely credulous dolts or they simply don't care what drivel they put out.
