QUT Ninjutsu

When I was High School, I was the science stream and invariably studied high level abstract mathematics. I mixed with all the student groups at school, so many of my friends were the in the baseline mathematics stream. During one afternoon break, a friend of mine found out I was in the science stream and asked for help with his mathematics homework. I was happy to oblige, but wasn't really prepared for what he showed me. His class was covering addition and subtraction with large numbers. I taught him how to do the sums, but at the back of my mind I was developing the realisation that this was the highest level of mathematics the majority of people were ever exposed to. To be fair, beyond high school 99.99% of the population don't use anything more complex than simple arithmetic. It simply isn't necessary for most jobs. If had shown my mathematics homework to my friends it would have all been jibberish and hieroglyphics. The scope of my friends mathematics education wer...

The adage 'the best defence is a good offence' has echoed through history in various forms and has appeared in writings from Machiavelli to Sun Tzu. Also known as the strategic offensive principle of war, it states that active offensive action instead of a passive attitude will pressure the opposition and hinder counter offensives, which lead to strategic advantage.  Although this is a well known concept, many martial arts around the world prefer to focus on reactive defence for one reason or another. In Judo for instance, I was told that Judo (for self-defence) is the 'Gentle Way' and should not be used to attack - ever. In Aikido there is a similar mentality, wait for the opponent to attack and use their power against them. The only martial arts you won't find this trend is in combat sports like Boxing or Muay Thai, where being passive will cost the participant points or possibly end up in a knock-out.  Many combat sports practitioners know how to attack effec...

Martial Arts have always been a niche skill. In the middle ages only Nobles and the wealthy could afford to dedicate any time to martial pursuits. The common foot-soldier or mercenary just made do with some on-the-job training, and were often completely outclassed by Knights or Nobles on the field.  It's difficult to generalise, because there were many different environments and situations in history. It is easy to point out situations in which common folk or groups (like monks) took up arms and dedicated themselves to martial skills for some goal or another, but this is a different situation from today.  In the modern world, close combat skills are idealised in media, but are taboo in society. Even raising a fist, or threatening to do so, could ruin someones life with legal proceedings and fees. We have come to a point in society where people with good jobs and reputations are better off being physically beaten without fighting back and going to to hospital, than...

Andre asked me about the Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu schools and whether I teach them. The answer is yes. The 9 schools of the Bujinkan are akin to martial arts university courses, there is a great deal of prerequisite martial arts knowledge before the kata of the individual schools can even be attempted. In simple terms, as I demonstrated last night, if the attacker (uke) can't attack effectively, the one completing the technique doesn't need to go out of his way to do the kata, because he can do something simpler. Before I joined the Bujinkan, I had 10 years of Judo under my belt. You will find with many of the older Bujinkan members that they had significant martial arts training already, which served as a solid foundation. The issue with this is, if I only allowed well trained martial artists to join I wouldn't have any students. Realistically, 90% of people who want to train will have no training, and that is something I need to work with. Unfortunately, throwing people w...