Posted by: djemboy2
The Difference between Bruce Lee and Steven Seagal - 07/04/07 07:23 AM
Ok i know i am going to get ridiculed for this, and who knows maybe even banished to a sonny chiba forum, but i thought i would post this and see the response, a lot of people slag off Mr seagal for whatever reasons they have and are quite within their right to do so, but i think a lot of people miss the point of what he has done for Aikido, i have read how he uses uki's that know what he will be doing and therefore only serve to make him look good, well dont most if not all demonstrations follow that same path, perhaps it is just me but isnt that what a demonstration is for, to show what aikido is about, i think steven seagal deserves a little more respect insofar as his ambassadorial role in promoting Aikido as a system of defence via the movies, the same as Bruce Lee did with chinese Gung Fu, i wonder how many people started Aikido after seeing a Seagal movie.
i think that a lot of valid points are made about whether Aikido Works as an effective system of defence, against multiple attacks or weapons, well i can only say that if done correctly i believe it does however how many Aikidoka's can truly say that they have the right mindset if found in such a situation?, the correct mindset is basically the most important weapon you have, and i think that without it then Aikido WILL fail, there is a video on you tube showing Seagals blackbelt training and it shows how he has 4 attackers run at you with the intent of taking you down, if you watch it you will see the glaring mistake that ALL his students make, they back away from the Attackers thus allowing them to continue to focus on their target, you then see Seagal perform the same excersise and instantly you see how he has the correct mindset, he goes thru his attackers, forcing them to have to refocus on their target, also i noticed a lot of comments about resistant uki's well most techniques are performed on the attacking limb, there is another way and that is to go for the passive limb, when someone throws a punch, generally they use one hand and their focus is on delivering that punch, the other arm is doing nothing and will generally be more relaxed than the attacking limb, thus less resistant to resisting, if done quickly enough and with a soft enough touch several locks can be placed on the passive limb, and if a pulling away motion is initiated by the passive limb then the motion initiated can help to guide the passive limb further in that direction.
the point is that steven seagal and Bruce Lee both brought their respective arts to the world and both are superb ambassadors for their arts, they showed us the path to travel, how we travel that path is our own responsibilty, Aikido DOES work, physics and logic cannot lie.
i think that a lot of valid points are made about whether Aikido Works as an effective system of defence, against multiple attacks or weapons, well i can only say that if done correctly i believe it does however how many Aikidoka's can truly say that they have the right mindset if found in such a situation?, the correct mindset is basically the most important weapon you have, and i think that without it then Aikido WILL fail, there is a video on you tube showing Seagals blackbelt training and it shows how he has 4 attackers run at you with the intent of taking you down, if you watch it you will see the glaring mistake that ALL his students make, they back away from the Attackers thus allowing them to continue to focus on their target, you then see Seagal perform the same excersise and instantly you see how he has the correct mindset, he goes thru his attackers, forcing them to have to refocus on their target, also i noticed a lot of comments about resistant uki's well most techniques are performed on the attacking limb, there is another way and that is to go for the passive limb, when someone throws a punch, generally they use one hand and their focus is on delivering that punch, the other arm is doing nothing and will generally be more relaxed than the attacking limb, thus less resistant to resisting, if done quickly enough and with a soft enough touch several locks can be placed on the passive limb, and if a pulling away motion is initiated by the passive limb then the motion initiated can help to guide the passive limb further in that direction.
the point is that steven seagal and Bruce Lee both brought their respective arts to the world and both are superb ambassadors for their arts, they showed us the path to travel, how we travel that path is our own responsibilty, Aikido DOES work, physics and logic cannot lie.