Sustainable Stalinism - Censorship and the Laozi Culture Summit

[Mickey Laoshu]

Edited November 22, 2009 by Mickey Laoshu

[Ken]

[松永道]

[Stigweard]

OMG !!!

 

I am not at all surprised that this particular person wrote this comment. If it is who I believe it to be then I met him personally and can diplomatically say that his nature was overall "caustic". What a shame he would write such a damning perspective of this event, if this is all he got out of it then he really got nothing at all.

 

True it is some westerners acted like Prima donnas, but then again so did some of the Chinese Daoists. There were certainly organizational aspects of the summit that seemed to take "liberties" of the Western attendants. The perspective could certainly be taken, if one chose to (which I am not necessarily saying I am), that the Western presence was simply a bit of "fluff around the edges" to make the organizers feel good about themselves and to promote some sense of Chinese superiority (i.e "See, if these scholars are coming to us then that proves our superiority").

 

However, these sorts of views only serve to polarize East and West further and is an antithesis, I believe, of the true heart of Daoism. From what I perceived it was only the attendants, Eastern or Western, who weren't practicing the virtue of Dao the indulged themselves in such childish sentiments and poor behavior.

 

I went into this conference with the expressed view of exploring new gateways and bridges between Chinese Daoism and Western students and, from what I saw, it is the undeveloped views like expressed in the OP that are one of the main obstacles of such unity.

 

Oh and by the way, I was the "self-absorbed Ozzy" who performed such "terrible Taiji" with Page from LA at the Longmen Grottoes We actually waited respectfully for the area to become vacant before starting, though true enough crowd arrived by the time we finished (a crowd of Chinese mind you who enthusiastically applauded us by the end). Our musical accompanist was Pages friend Kim who had a Hang ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hang_(musical_instrument) ) along with him. Got some vid of it and will post it asap.

 

<-- I have removed an inappropriate comment that I have apologized for below -->

 

Anyway, as I said, unfortunately for some like the OP commentator, this summit, instead of creating new bridges, only served to widen the chasm between Eastern and Western Daoist scholars. Fortunately though there were those amongst our numbers, and there were many contrary to our commentator's perspective, for whom this event was a momentous occasion that formed new connections and links between all the interested parties. I know that I will continue to apply all my effort to continue the groundwork that was established at the summit.

 

[findley]

Jesus, stigweard... you are trying way too hard.

 

the 'heart of taoism' has no concern or recognition of the 'west' and 'east'.

 

--The irony is that the chinese invited these people. While there were some their I really, really respected... hmmm...

 

and it's not like I am exactly eager to speak with a monk, either. Wearing a uniform means less than nothing, and tends to a worse first-impression. (a monk? I hope they're not practicing celibacy. half the fun in life is getting (or at least trying,) to get laid. It's instinct ! really, going against the Dao, you know?)

 

They should experiment and sneak off and smoke some marijuana. I'd love to see a giggling/anxious-paranoid monk =) Give their qigong whole new meaning !

 

In fact, I bet 'monk-hood' is an effect of buddhist influence.

 

I wonder what chuangtze would say about monks.

 

probably that they needto get laid.

[markern]

Sustainable Stalinism=not sending so many people to labour prisions in Siberia each year that the poppulation eventually dies out.

[Dreamingawake]

Was the OP supposed to be serious? God I'm slow today; I took it for satire

[Pandit Tree]

<<< But as always with these self-proclaimed Taiji "experts" I say, "Come push hands with me. Don't give me that theoretical superiority stuff, let's push and if you can whoop my ass then I will humbly submit to your tuition." >>>

 

 

 

THE BUZZARD OF OZ does "WHITE CRANK SPREADS HE'S WIMP"!

 

What a two-faced purveyor of bovine manure you are! Are you speaking in pidgin Chinese or with forked-tongue? I am the person who took the decisive action to try to quietly impress upon you the kind of embarrassment you were causing the rest of us foreigners in China. That was not just about your "Taiji".You thanked me for that but now you feel your fragile ego cannot even take a few harmless words! "Mr Talk Tough!" Where is your command of Taiji or street-level Daoism, I ask! Don't make us laugh about your "gateway" - are you trying to revive a dead computer brand, owat?

 

I was led to this site both by friends from in and outside China. There were more than just myself who were not impressed by the likes of you, son, so don't try console yourself - you yourself were aware of that! I take no side, I am a foreigner to the Chinese and a foreigner to the foreigners, though unlike some of them I do take seriously cultural sensitivity. I also feel I have a right not to be offended by any two-bit plonkhead who goes out to perform stupidity on tbe behalf of anyone else just because the time said he ought to go on a streak of juvenile exhibitionism. You were a blot on the landscape to one and all and when you grow up do have another look at your video of how bloody awful your "Taiji" was, hopefully, by then you would have done enough (real and hard) work to rectify your primitive level of "Taiji", Daoism and Chinese culture. Your "Taiji", like your person is utterly tensed, paranoid and ignorant. I do not know know which influence which but being from "Grandmaster" Chu's line, his descendent stable has produced the expected donkey!

 

I hear your kind of brag from time to time. It is a cover for insecurity and inadequacy designed to hype yourself into thinking you are getting somewhere when you know full well you are not. I have pushed hands with your "Grandmaster" and found him to be lacking in basic understanding of Taiji. He is ok with me, I have nothing against ex-kitchen hand turn "Taiji" expert for a Western audience, but intellectually he is not there. Master Yang Shouzhong thought same, he was only a minor student thought the hype had us all thought different! I have a dim view of the kind of nonsense he does to show his "command" of his "Taiji" - holding back a line of people, jacking someone up giving the impression it is due to "Taiji" and "qi". The antics he does can easily be duplicated within minutes by anybody without any knowledge of Taiji or qi. Every now and then I am sent an URL or two which show the very latest of his "skill". The clips should be everywhere else on the Net, study them carefully and intelligently and if you fail to see that they have nothing to do with Taiji or qi, your understanding is sadly very lacking. No master of any martial arts should resort to the kind of shabby hoodwinking he does to prove lacking in real skill in a martial art and to attempt to fool the public. If you do not understand what I mean, I mean there is no integrity or character behind that kind of stunts designed to impress the mentally stunted.

 

Your boast about your "Taiji" should have been done on the spot when you were in China - the buses were laden with many people from the martial arts who saw your appalling "Taiji" and saw you talking to me. If you remember, a tour-guide came by and wanted to say something but left. The next day she told me what you were doing was rubbish and embarrassing, the lady had training in martial arts in her childhood and could see through your wasting everybody else's time and space. It was a chilly afternoon that was, most chose to stay in their buses after running away from your ego trip near those giant Buddhist statues (what on earth did you smoke?). If I had heard your boast about your "pushing hand" prowess I would have woken up those bored Chinese in the buses, some of them were from the Yiquan fraternity who would have eaten you for dimsum though you were more dim sum that breakfast! A few were from the Zhaobao Taiji fraternity. I would have loved collecting bets and made a packet but I chose to let you humour me and the Chinese to stay bored of your type. You should think hard (may be painful) why over the years all have left Chu either openly or for those with fragile egos, sneakily. Chu himself left for France for fresh pasture of those wide between the eyes but the same phenomenon is taking place - mass desertion. It is because there are those honest to themselves who want to learn real Taiji who find that covering gaping holes in either knowledge or skill is not done by lifting up the skirt to hide the face! Or by shallow boasting - if your skill is there it will show in your person but it was simply not there - your "form" was clumsy, rigid and oaffish! A bloody pain in the eyes, sorry! Good pushing hands skill is totally dependent on the form and you don't have that and neither Chu who could not afford more lessons from Master Yang to even have the form, you are talking like a twack who thinks hanging out with other Chu losers and doing "pushing hands" is the answer to staying ignorantly bliss! Chu's herd always talk the same way as you (cheap arrogance, inadequate) - but most end up training with my students!

 

Do try to grow up and give all that addiction to ego-tripping a good rest. Your childish showing off in China and now here is not helping your quest to a few minutes of fame. You bored the Chinese and others to sleep. Your intellectual performance is sorely non-existent as your appalling display of "Rigid Michael Jackson on cheap Taiwanese batteries" a familiar description for your the "Taiji" of your "Grandmaster". Worse of all for someone from a country where you could have learn much from Aboriginal culture you stood up like a sore pussy with your inability to cross a simple culture "divide" in China. Your "gift" of your own "work" to Prof Hu was much joked about and so was your "speech" at which the Chinese laughed off that you should learn Chinese rather than expect them to provide you with anything on Daoism presumably in English! All the while you showed a very tensed and nervous defensiveness which lasts all the way here where you display your ignorance of basic k Daoism: "Sticks n stones..." they say, but you find a few words about your crap "Taiji" is enough for you to disintegrate into shallow ego bolstering!

 

Are you unleashing some kind of WMD on us not unlike your "Grandmaster" making us watch your kind of "Taiji" and killing us all off as we die laughing?!!!

 

I do agree with quite a lot of what the Chinese said about "the foreigners" though I must say I met a handful who were more effectual. I do not agree with some of the things said all over the Chinese internet and elsewhere but I feel they have a right to their opinions no matter how hurting they may be to others, I did come across a good bit of rather hurting stuff about the Chinese too - straight out of the whores' mouths!. It was all a bit sick especially when there were no effort to rectify the situation. The Chinese have no problem with Asians at all I think it was due to their ability to be more culturally sensitive and to adapt to a different environment. The Southeast Asian got on very well with all, some of the Koreans were a bit wild but were well=liked by the Chinese. I had a nice time, I met a lot of old friends and made a lot of new ones. I was given a lot of material and promised research work for the near future. I have already been invited to other conferences etc and an opening of a new temple next year - all paid for by the Chinese side. The Chinese looked after me very well always making sure I had a room to myself, meet others, they always insisted on carrying my luggage, provided me with food in the buses otherwise with free-flowing booze in the hotels, and catering for my idiosyncracies in very tolerant manner. Back in Beijing some Daoists took to paying for the remain of my stay in China and introduced me to more contacts. All I did fo the trip was to stay in the background and be last in everything, though I did make effort to cross the "divide" and not to hang around some moaning minnies and bizarre turd-rate Kung Fu movie wannabes! I humoured the Chinese by winding up those terribly easy to wind up and why not, we all thought we were dealing with matured grown-ups.

 

Yes, I did have a good laugh too and I am glad many Chinese too! I would ask you to relax and those others who caught your disease to do same. You all did well in China, you provided us with laughs so do now sit back and let your hair hang loose. Remove that Ned Kelly helmet, let air circulate and allow things to get into your skull, sunshine! Keep off your Castlemaine XXXX and remember vote Barry Humphries your ambassador of culture!

Edited November 26, 2009 by Pandit Tree

[Stigweard]

Pandit Tree,

 

You are right on a couple of points. I should have asked at the time to push with you, and I should definately not have made the comments above in retrospect. I was wrong and I humbly and sincerely apologize and ask for your forgiveness in this regard.

 

The comments in the opening post were yours then yes?

[松永道]

 

Longhu Shan right?

[Pandit Tree]

Pandit Tree,

 

You are right on a couple of points. I should have asked at the time to push with you, and I should definately not have made the comments above in retrospect. I was wrong and I humbly and sincerely apologize and ask for your forgiveness in this regard.

 

The comments in the opening post were yours then yes?

 

 

Sickweird, esteemed disciple of Croc Dundee,

 

Unlike in certain quarters where it is highly desirable for the pervs to see the hidden tatooes on others' it is considered very bad manner to ask to "push" with anybody even after a few meetings! This is usually 'formally' asked for after a person got to know the someone else he is itching to test his ego out on. When 'personal space' is so protected with many in some culture, these people do not seen to know pushing hands with a stranger is intrusive (a fight is something else!)? I used to have to, until I got really fed-up, arrange for friends to be used as free one- or two-arm bandits for twacks to try on. Like playing tennis (or pingpong) the better players do not want to play with the upstarts, nothing to do with being afraid to put them where they belong. Once I had to tell a perv someone didn't want to push hands because he was already overwhelmed by the body odour of the upstart and not by as the upstart imagined a fear of his skill!

 

I already told you, short of a head-butt I showed you I could have done on you, the poor postures of Chu's is that there are a lot of faults with his "Taiji"! It is full of holes that can be penetrated I cannot even begin to begin pointing them out. Not only the postures are wrong with points I made, the whole "form" is bizarre! Totally contrary to Taiji as taught by even Master Yang Shouzhong! Chu's "Taiji" and his stunts are in a world of its own. A totally different class called no class! I pointed out to you and this is not my opinion alone, there were others among the delegates who quickly saw the abberrations on you that is Chu's unique gift to the world - a sure guarantee to produce stiffness, rigidity and brain-numbing ignorance caused by the incestrous effort among his thickheads to praise each other for their grasp of the "gift". I told you to watch your knees in particular, there are plenty more you should watch out for. The best thing is to try other forms, other teachers, other styles let others tell you a thing or two, relax and listen and not go on the defensive that others are being "superior". With Chu's "Taiji" it is so inferior that it is a vomit! Only thing I can praise is the cultish stupidity of students who utter the same stock phrases for their "art" and adopt that same smug attitude that they are the "real works" - just the stuff marketing people like! Few bother to exercise their freedom to look beyond their coven and to wonder why there are like no one else from among the YSZ lineage, not that lineage is everything..!

 

I do not say what I say because there is that tendency among practitioners of martial arts that their's is the "best", Chu's herd is famous for this attitude too. As said, I have nothing against him personally, we come across each other from time to time and I have not retracted any of my remarks about his "Taiji" or his circus stuff. Many of his instructors jumped his lee kee boat and join us after our seminars on Taiji in the past - soon as they saw the vast difference that had they remain little frogs in a drainpipe they would have become that sycophantic yesmen willingly participating in those demos of "Taiji" and "qi". As there are plenty of evidence of such "power" on the Net I also have plenty of videos of shocked instructors and senior students of Chu's waking up to reality. Give yourself a chance, venture a bit afield. Be brave, confront yourself go out to the wide world and learn more. "You ain't seen nothing yet!" Like for a meet-up I wanted to organise between the Chinese and the foreigners for the "intellectual" sidepfthe conference I wanted to do one for the martial arts - the very able daughter of the late Master Wang Xiangzhai was among the delegates but in the end I found the gulf was wider between the eyes of some than between two groups of people! Good sense told me that I would be wasting everybody's time, especially mine!

 

No need for that humbly, forgiveness apologising stuff, I am happy to claim my right to free speech and do not give a monkey to how grown men's ego taking a bit of bruising! Much of advancement of a martial art is about the ability to find as many mistake as one can of one's practice and then making up for that.

 

Some of the comments of the original post were mine, but not solely mine. Most were from the Chinese and some were from "the foreigners". I have been doing the groupie stuff with a lot of Chinese huddling around one or two computers reading posts on all sorts of forums and all trying to make comments. Sadly, I have to hold onto many of those views in the original post. There are more than those in the original post which we have all patched together. Good news is nowadays the Chinese are not inhibited as in the past about giving it back half as good - washed out foreign visitors are washed out foreign visitors. When the washed out have all the four cheeks to make their opinion about the Chinese and China, they should start learning to take it from the Chinese or anybody else. It is about confronting themselves, their shallowness, and their inability to turn their right cheeks. Laozi would have said "What a cheek!". A good start would be to start treating others as they would like to be treated, to travel more, to open mind and absorb more, to be courageous when mum is not around to wipe their asses and they become emotionally crippled! As this is my own post I would like to act that some behaved like some downright selfish little sods which did not get them anywhere. I also have to say some people from among the organising/management of the conference needed their rear ends kicked.

 

Watch this space - more to come!

[Stigweard]

Pandit Tree (though I know I can equally call you Mickey Laoshu or LongHu Shan),

 

I have apologized for and recanted on my comments that were inappropriate.

 

However, I maintain, very much, my view that your derisive comments in regards to the Western delegates at the Beijing summit are representative of the biggest impediment to the wholesome growth of Daoist culture. So long as the Chinese and Western fraternities both maintain their immature positions of superiority over one another the longer it will take to share with the world whatever benefits Daoism has to offer.

[Pandit Tree]

<<<

Pandit Tree (though I know I can equally call you Mickey Laoshu or LongHu Shan), >>>

 

 

Sickweird,

As an expert Taoist you must surely know that "I know" are mighty dangerous words! Meaningless too! But you sure can call me anything else too, you must be psychic first you rate yourself superior to a stranger in pushing hands in the typical Chu lineage ignorance and therefore arrogant manner, then you think I am equally some persons else too! I already told you there are plenty others with their opinions about "the foreigners" who are taking part here so please don't flatter yourself that only one person may think some of "the foreigners" are small-time nobodies. I help those Chinese who prefer I write their opinions for them who are not comfortable with their English and that's about it. Unlike some foreigners lazy about learning Chinese, many Chinese do make the effort to learn English - in time to come their English would become good and you can get them to be "caustic" directly to you! The problem for most Westerners would be these Chinese can then communicate directly with Western audience and may deprive some erstwhile authorities of their lustre and fried rice!

 

 

 

<<< However, I maintain, very much, my view that your derisive comments in regards to the Western delegates at the Beijing summit are representative of the biggest impediment to the wholesome growth of Daoist culture. So long as the Chinese and Western fraternities both maintain their immature positions of superiority over one another the longer it will take to share with the world whatever benefits Daoism has to offer.

>>>

 

I haven't elected myself nor do I know of any other Chinese (or even other "foreigners") who has done so for the purpose of seeing to the "growth of Daoist culture". The Dao follows nobody so don't make its growth the "white men's burden" or cross to bear, please! "My" "derisive comments" are not proprietary - they are shared with and influenced by the Chinese and other foreigners. I do not think the "biggest impediment" to any contact between two cultures in the context of the summit was that "the Chinese and Western fraternities both maintain their immature positions of superiority over one another". Some may think or behave like that but I haven't met any among the Chinese. You can name them. But I have met a good plenty many Chinese both inside and outside the summit who do not display any immaturity or superiority. I can say same for some foreigners too. I do not think that there is enough scholarship (leave out practice) on Daoism among most Westerners to maintain any position of superiority even where they badly need that for their market. I think they badly do need so (for egos and bread n butter), the appearance of some Daoists among them did a lot to cause the paranoia inducing their hallucinating about their intellectual floor being cut from right underneath their wobbly legs! I hovered between the groups during the presentation of papers and I did see (along with many others, Westerners included) very nervous, tensed, defensive experts cracking under the strain of their own fears! I did not come across any attitude of superiority among "the Chinese" - they were very generous with me, not immatured at all, very scholarly and expert in their fields, excellent practitioners of Daoist arts and so on.

 

 

<<< the longer it will take to share with the world whatever benefits Daoism has to offer >>>

 

I won't worry about that! The Dao follows nobody so even if there are the "immatured" and the "superior" it means nothing. It is not the job of those who have appointed themselves to bring Daoism anywhere! Smacks of Christian evangelism and missionary zeal! Why not leave the donkey work to the Chinese? But of course we cannot trust the Chinese to be able to do that - the last time the Chinese did that with Christianity there was the Taiping "Rebellion" and the defenders of the faith had to come in to tame the natives! The world is not exactly waiting for a select bunch of messiahs to bring them Daoism. If it is about "whatever benefits" there only appear in certain quarters the benefits of some bread and butter and intellectual or other posturing. This is going to change in the near future as "the others" and the Chinese are going to speed right past those who stay stagnant in their refusal to change and make available the "whatever" Daosim has to offer (actually Daoism offers nothing!).

 

The outcry this time heralds the change on the Chinese side that was not something I have ever noticed of the usually reserved people when it comes to cultural sensitivity. They do not like others to lose face. I have said that the Westerners are not blandly similar in their attitude or expertise, there were some who were above the usual who like to stick their heads out more. There were complaints about the poor choice of experts for whom invitations were issued. There was a lot of mutual handjobs for both the Chinese and Westerners who were friends of each other, never mind their standing. That said, there were plenty of opportunities for Westerners to meet with the Chinese but the majority were just plain clueless and helpless because mum wasn't around though some simply want to come and chalk up some points to shore up their sagging "Daoist" credential to impress those outside China with. Just have a look on the internet in the weeks to come more and more comedians would appear to do exactly that! Blaming the Chinese for whatever is not going to help them if these Westerners are ineffectual in the first place.

 

I would want to get straight back to the drawing board and redesign myself if I belong to that category of hapless fools who simply seize up in a foreign country. In the very near future and internationally, more and more Daoists from China are going to appear alongside and mostly in front of these contemporary Western "experts". I would worry about that if I still insist on sticking to that old habit of thinking the rest of the world revolves around me. I saw plenty of that. I saw people who thought the Chinese should remain Uncle Tongs, should provide them with the means to their bread n butter, should remain in the shadow while the "civilised" tell the rest of the world how their countries should be run and what Daosim should be. Unfortunately for them I noticed the Chinese were not so happy about playing the "happy natives" nowadays and that caused a fair bit of resentment among the Lord and Lady Jims. The Chinese were not particularly interested either in any of the others who had that uncontrollable urge to get their eroticism from exhibiting themselves or indulging themselves fantasizing they were some kind of "intellectuals" the Chinese would be keen to suppress. Nevertheless I thought the Chinese did well struggling to be mildly amused and trying not to fall into deep sleep around these latter day saints from the Western Daoist pantheons.

 

My son, just when are you going to liberate Ayers Rock for the natives, eh? Do that and impress the rest of us first! Then you might just have the experience and the cred to save Daoism from the Chinese! The Chinese would like more to know where the Oz native reservations are, you do the "rain dance", play the digeridoo, ride a kangeroo, speak Abo than you pretend you are any authority on Daoism! If you do go up Uluru try not to do your "Taiji" on it, you might scare the spirits and the natives might just push you over it before you ask to push hands! We may be deprived of yet another saviour for Daoism!

 

There's piss under Heaven, indeed!

Edited November 26, 2009 by Pandit Tree

[bindo]

what a complete waste of cyberspace!

[sherab]

what a complete waste of cyberspace!

Shhh, this is entertaining.

 

Pass the popcorn!

[Tao99]

Edited November 26, 2009 by Tao99

[Stigweard]

Pandit Tree / Mickey Laoshu / LongHu Shan,

 

Exactly who are you representing with your words? In the opening post you said: "Some Chinese (and they do add up to plenty when we do a percentage-wise count)." Exactly who are these Chinese? Are they the Chinese Daoist priests and Masters themselves? Or are they part of the peripheral group of Chinese who attended?

 

To add some perspective, have a look at how you are portraying this "group" with your representation here. In your attempts to present this group, of which you obviously claim membership, as somehow superior to the Western delegates, you have merely portrayed them as a bunch of half-brained giggling school-boys puffing themselves up with a false sense of superiority. If your reporting is correct, and we only have your word to go on, then their comments equate to no more than the school-yard antics of the "in-crowd" who think they have the right to condemn and criticize those that they declare are "lesser".

 

So exactly whom are you being the voice for here? Let's hear some names. Which Masters directly expressed or agree with your comments? Without this list then all we can assume is that these views and comments are yours and perhaps a few of your drinking buddies.

 

And if it is the Daoist priests and Masters who expressed these views then I consider them as frauds and an embarrassment to the good tradition of which they are meant to be prime exemplars. But if, as I suspect, these views are merely those of small group of the Chinese periphery, then the relevance and weight of these comments are, quite simply, inconsequential.

[thelerner]

Pandit Tree, I don't know about your Taoism or Tai Chi skills, but you come off as a very angry guy, hungry to insult and create as much bad feeling as you can.

 

Is this what you offered at the Summit and the only thing you have to offer here?

 

 

Michael

[Pandit Tree]

<<< Exactly who are you representing with your words? >>>In the opening post you said: "Some Chinese (and they do add up to plenty when we do a percentage-wise count)." Exactly who are these Chinese? Are they the Chinese Daoist priests and Masters themselves? Or are they part of the peripheral group of Chinese who attended?

 

 

Hold your donkey, Sickweird, you are beginning to read like you are interrogating me/us/"they" in my/our/them "various manifestations" and according to your psychic inability. I, or my "other personifications" do not need to click my heels and stand to attention just because you have got your jackboots on (kinky!) and posturing with your quarter-baked "Taiji" "push hands" stance on (*puke*!). I won't let my imagination run riot to find "Chinese Daoist priests" and "Masters" or "peripheral group" just because you are paranoid! What "exactly" are you smoking this time, eh? The work is for you to do yourself and you had plenty of chance to do that while in China. You didn't and I don't intend to be your "Abo". I won't sell out my Chinese (and other) friends just because you are dreaming you've got the kind of (conman's) "power" from the "Grandmaster" Chu pedigree! Either go find out for yourself and by yourself or take a running jump off Uluru, I am not going to play "coolie" to you even if you are leather-clad, with whips and have a peaked cap with skull and crossed bones!

 

 

<<< To add some perspective, have a look at how you are portraying this "group" with your representation here. In your attempts to present this group, of which you obviously claim membership, as somehow superior to the Western delegates, you have merely portrayed them as a bunch of half-brained giggling school-boys puffing themselves up with a false sense of superiority. If your reporting is correct, and we only have your word to go on, then their comments equate to no more than the school-yard antics of the "in-crowd" who think they have the right to condemn and criticize those that they declare are "lesser". >>>

 

 

"To add some perspective" - "exactly" whose? Yours?! Stop hallucinating about the "group" - words do not fully describe them. Suffice to say, it is "all sorts" ("10,000 things", haha) of Chinese who attended the summit. They do not need to report to you and frankly they have not paid any attention to you other than to be "entertained" in ways by your very comical representation of cultural myopia which you disguise in a rather ding dong way - you acted with a script for protocol from old "Charlie Chan" flicks when you dealt with the Chinese. Then during the bulk of time you were nowhere near them you went into a primary narcissistic mode! You are just a lost little boy trying on victimhood at the same time cannot resist the ego trip of "brute" arrogance ("my Taiji is so good that I can thrash one and all, no need to tell me anything about errrmmm your "superior" stuff!). I think Australia's attempts at eugenics is getting the better of you, you are too much into the Nazi phraseology of the untermenschen - that "lesser" kind of stuff which got the "Abos" where they don't belong in "White" Australia! Try not to see the world like that and if you do then do something about it. Try Australia first.

 

We have a problem with explaining "in-crowd" to those hempen homespun among the "lesser"/"superior" folks here.

 

I am happy for us all, the "group" to be called "a bunch of half-brained giggling school-boys". We can live with that. "Yield" so the good book says, and that goes for Taiji too. At least we can tell you are playing the role of the much misaligned victim properly while you massage your weak ego. I think those "Daoists" ("priests", "Masters", whatever) among us would be delighted with the label. I am for them/us/me/Mickey/Dame Edna. Show us up as human with mirth and relaxed, and can see through your act in its schizophrenic manifestations: sometimes paranoid and with juvenile need to go on the attack, other times the need to draw attention to yourself (Me, me, me!). Make up your mind, son, if you want to be a "tough" Chu lineage "superior" "Taiji" expert no-one-should-tell-me-anything or you want to be amenable, remove that huge chip off your shoulder and stop making a big meal out of your "superior-inferior" more diabolical than dialectical paranoid thinking. You don't always have to split that one into two and all that. "We" all love you and all, you make us laugh, you are a joke on two legs errrmm almost two, you do that "superior" Taiji, remember? (wobbly, wobbly, Stiffy Wonder with vacant gaze...). You are a laugh and a half, me old son! Try laughing, mate! Go on! Don't be afraid to let go!

 

 

So cut out that "superiority" crap, son! I have already said no Chinese that I have heard from felt anything like that about themselves. They could hardly fathom the intellectual depth of those "inferior" among Westerners who presented papers and dodged discussions. They hardly had anybody to show stupidity as very few spoke Chinese to them that can be understood. So there wasn't really any chance to pronounce anything superior or otherwise. But it does seem some people have to feel inferior. We wonder why. For some with an Intel on the shoulder one childish technique is to play at being treated as "inferior" then accuse someone else for thinking that. Usually these people have that dire need for some kind of assurance that they are not seen in the wrong light. No one among the Chinese felt the need for that superior/inferior thing, I heard all addressed and listened to each other respectfully, were relaxed and enjoyed a bit of good humour. To think and insist there was that "superiority" is rather disturbing, smacks of that "good breast, bad breast" thing some expert child psychologists talk about of those with self-esteem problems. That is how Western psychologists think and they can only be right.

 

No Chinese acted or attempted to act "superior" so please don't comfort yourself and turn this into your private "battlefield" that people are out to make you feel inferior. No one bothered about that and that includes me/me/I. As much as you did not reach out to the Chinese, they were politely switched off when you were out to impress them (and everybody else). Please don't draw me/us/Mickey/"Grandmaster" Chu into that infantile stuff about your hurt feelings and people are out to offend you. I repeat, no one bothered or much noticed your contribution to mankind. Save when you humoured us. You stood out like an ostrich and it is your own doing. Everyone else has a right to his/her opinion and not to have their landscape fouled. You were culturally myopic. Even when you are here you are more interested in lifting up your skirt to hide your face, you still really need to heal that bruised ego. You seem to think like especially for yourself others are bothered about being seen as "giggling schoolboys" - we are not! It is a lovely description for those who delight at being themselves, making the most of a perpectual youthfulness and do not appear to come from some kind of ordered or controlled life that some do. Was your father a hard man? Did you go to one of those fascist schools which warp children's adult life? Choose to answer if you want to, this is not an interrogation, son!

 

I like you as a person even if you can't take yourself as a joke! You cheer us up over here as we entertain ourselves with this board. Have to say many have to switch their "bored.no amused" mode and enjoy! It's cold and when no one buys booze but brings a dissertion in a carrier-bag advertising booze, we burn his book to warm us up. It is not as good for Climategate than warming ourselves with a hearty laugh! Keep the juice flowing here, mate! Thanks!

 

 

 

<<< So exactly whom are you being the voice for here? Let's hear some names. Which Masters directly expressed or agree with your comments? Without this list then all we can assume is that these views and comments are yours and perhaps a few of your drinking buddies.

 

 

"So exactly whom", "Let's hear some names", "Which Masters", "Without this list then all we can assume"...

 

Yassuh Massah! Yassuh! (Heels clicking, fear that riding crop!).

I don't know who the "we" is that wants to make that assumption. Would that be your thinking that others are as paranoid and thin-skinned as you? One moment you are the epitome of "superior" in Daoism and "Taiji", the next you are the epitaph of superiority in actual practice. Please make up your mind, your "Taiji" show the same schizophrenic tendency. Lay off the devil weed, son! And stop doing all that handjob on words, son, you'll go blind if you come from one of them fascist schools or a hard family which I think you do! For your information, my "drinking buddies" are all white folks - that should be all right with you. You huddle with them for your "safety" in a China that saw you as an arrogant bungling culture=blind comic, please don't insult who I drink with just because you hope they be Chinese who have hurt your feelings. Take heart (and liver) I am trying to get more of my Chinese buddies to drink too. I am saying this because it seems I may need your approval! Cheers!

 

 

<<< And if it is the Daoist priests and Masters who expressed these views then I denounce them as frauds and an embarrassment to the good tradition of which they are meant to be prime exemplars. But if, as I suspect, these views are merely those of small group of the Chinese periphery, then the relevance and weight of these comments are, quite simply, inconsequential. >>>

 

 

<<< And if it is the Daoist priests and Masters >>>

I know you are itching terribly to know but what if they are not what you imagined? Would you still chastise them with whips and scorpions? Put the fear of "G*d" in these bad "giggling schoolboys"?

 

<<< then I denounce them >>>

Who's "I"? Norman Schwartzkopf?! You gonna lead an expeditionary force to punish the heretics? You having a trance you've become some kind of superior Supreme Master or a mother superior?

 

<<< to the good tradition... prime examplars >>>

What's that? Ego-tripping? Culturally myopic bungling? Going defensive by being offensive? Slagging? Dictating, playing the Big White Chief Number One Daoist Shaman to the damn natives? "Superior" push hands of "Grandmaster" Chu? Confusion by profusion of "superior-inferior, them-us" mental disharmony?... Why should those priests and Masters need be anything even if they be forced by your edicts. They need hoohah over "Wu Wei" not a ticking off by that glass-eyed leading the sheep in the land of the blind! The Lord is my shepherd, son! You are being a bit too nasty to those who deviate from your "Taiji" "footwork"! Show us the way, we all wanna go back to our reservations, Massah! Show us what "prime exemplars" should be, we do love to be lions led by a donkey!

 

<<< I suspect... small group of the Chinese periphery >>>

"I" suspect, therefore "I" can only be right! Is that paranoia again? Can you give flesh n bone to this "group", please? Any size of "samll" would do! I like to know these friends whose voices you are hearing in your head!

 

<<< then the relevance and weight of these comments are, quite simply, inconsequential. >>> Hahahaaa..... The Good Lord has passed judgement! Praise be! Hallelujah, Amen! A true latter day saint from the Hallowed Order of the Western Daoist Pantheon ("Superior" as described on the export version of soysauce).

 

Sickweird, we/I/Mickey/"giggling schoolboys" are a bit confused who's who among the "foreigners" you all do look alike to most of us - might you post a picture of yourself here, we will then know who's who among the holy order of enlightened saviours. We don't want to be bowing to the wrong false idols. We might not even be talking about the same person and you need not go kangaroo hopping mad after all! Better still, post a clip too of your "Taiji" I/we/"them" can then show that to "Grandmaster" Chu at his expense.

 

Looking forward to your further guidance!

 

 

p.s. Please add "schoolgirls" to "giggling schoolboys" - you shouldn't be sexist and miss out the Sheilas! We shall be deftily handing around your slags all over China. What fun!

[Pandit Tree]

Pandit Tree, I don't know about your Taoism or Tai Chi skills, but you come off as a very angry guy, hungry to insult and create as much bad feeling as you can.

 

Is this what you offered at the Summit and the only thing you have to offer here?

Michael

 

 

I don't know about my Taoism or Tai Chi either. Depends on what those are compared to, I suppose. You need a long to see the short, and so on, I think old Laozi wrote about that... or at least his secretary did...

 

As for your diagnosis "come off as a very angry guy, hungry to insult and create as much bad feeling as you can", I don't know either but if that exist, that is only natural. Surely not a crime, surely no punishment needed. Suppressing them is not good. Good and bad and all that can coexist and do come together. No need to have purity here, it doesn't exist. No need to have segregation for the holy and the others.

 

I can only look to elders like you to guide me out of whatever way you identify as erroneous.

 

Dunno what I should have offered at the Summit. Don't pay much attention to "should". Organisers didn't ask for a handout, were happy not getting any offer from me. Treated me better than some of those who offered. Dunno what they offered, neither did organisers.

 

Haven't done any audit about whether anything or nothing is the only thing I have to offer here. Didn't know there are parents collecting wedding presents at door of this church.

What else is this site?

A bleeding altar?

Uncle Wong's bargain basement of offers?

Bargain hunters' Daoist Seventh Heaven?

A place for people cataloguing offers?

For assessing offers?

Grading offers?

There a Gestapo dictating what is and what is not an offer?

Everyone must make an offer?

Edited November 27, 2009 by Pandit Tree

[sherab]

Pandittree is my new hero.

Not only for giving some opposition (this forum seems to be all agreement and not wanting to hurt others in the quest of truth), but because he expresses how he feels.

 

Which, whether right or wrong, in this area, seems admirable enough. Yes, he rants. Yes, i'm sure he's wrong on some points. But the fact is - I can feel a resounding sea of truth - not at Stigweard, but at myself. It let me look at myself, like a mirror.

 

thanks Mr.PanditTree.

 

PS. Any response to my PM? Trying to fins alternative taoist schools/systems in my area, or at least online. I'd like several to comapre.

[Capital]

Wow, I didn't feel quite like saying it (haha, only the bandwagon got me to speak up), but I felt the same ring of truth in Pandit Tree's words as sherab.

 

I think Pandit Tree is more laughing at 'Taoism is Serious Business in the West!!!', rather than calling the Chinese superior to us 'Westerners'.

 

Then again, Pandit Tree, you've done your share of shit talking. I know nothing about Taiji, tbh, but Taiji is not Taoism. It's an expression of Tao, like anything else. You getting all uppity about your Taiji (and its ZOMG VICTORY over Chu Taiji) is the only place where I think you're definitely being something of an a-hole.

[Stigweard]

Pandit Tree / Mickey Laoshu / LongHu Shan,

 

You obviously come from the school of: "Whoever throws the most insults wins the debate." In this you are indisputably my superior and so I concede defeat and bow out.

 

[sherab]

Pandit Tree / Mickey Laoshu / LongHu Shan,

 

You obviously come from the school of: "Whoever throws the most insults wins the debate." In this you are indisputably my superior and so I concede defeat and bow out.

 

You get my props for humbly bowing out.. I'm sure there's more then one reason then the above, but hey. Whatever.

 

Shall I roll the credits?

[Pandit Tree]

Pandit Tree / Mickey Laoshu / LongHu Shan,

 

You obviously come from the school of: "Whoever throws the most insults wins the debate." In this you are indisputably my superior and so I concede defeat and bow out.

 

 

 

Insults???!!

 

You, I/We/Mickey?Damn Edna/Laozi all know I am telling the truth the way you can't take it!

 

You tried agreeing, you tried apologies but still couldn't resist firing salvos of rot at me?us?we to salvage your sagging front. I/We/Wong came in for turkey shoot in OP with scatter-gun, you grabbed gun and pointed it only for yourself - you couldn't resist identifying yourself! You were glutton for my "caustic" cleanser, now you slink out attempting to blame me for making you a "martyr"!

 

No sense of honour or humour, I says!

 

What would Laozi do in your circumstance? - as the evangelicals would say.

 

 

Still, the world is a small place, things do turn their full circles... I/We/Wong/Sheila look forward to meeting you all over again!

 

Might even meet you in China - will assemble all those "manifestations" for you to inspect (and slag off and chastise). Learn Chinese this time!

 

Watch them knees!

 

And "toss the prawns in the barbie", mate! Quote from Western Daoism...

 

 

 

 

 

See you in a bit in another post!

Edited November 28, 2009 by Pandit Tree