When Block/Attack Becomes Natural

This post isn’t about me, but I’m going to use an analogy from my life. When I started martial arts I’d be paired up with more experienced students during training. I’d be told “punch like this…” and I would do my very best. My counterpart, well skilled in such things, would block or dodge my punch like they had all the time in the world; it felt like they could make a pot of tea and still catch me. I just couldn’t move fast enough.

It all happened in the fraction of a second between when my fist went into motion and when I found myself staring at their knuckles. And yes, the counterattack was inevitable and always a work of art. I’d see a flash of motion. Before it registered, a fist came to an abrupt halt a quarter inch from my nose, or just lightly touching my ribs… like a butterfly. I could tell what power was there and what it might have done. But it was controlled. Sometimes, if I’d done something incredibly erratic to give them even more time, there would be more elaborate moves. A block that spun me around putting me off balance, a combination of punches, or a big huge showy kick. A superb ballet like motion that planted a heel or toe right where it could surely floor me; should they have wished it.

I was impressed.

Exquisite control on their part. Ridiculous flailing on my part. My relative ineptitude was  obvious. You’d have to be a monkey not to see the difference between us. I’d been deflected, distracted, missed, blocked, shifted and the counterpunch (which never seemed to come from anywhere) surely could have taken my head clear off. Thank goodness this was training! I was safe… but humbled. How did they do it?

I kept at it. Eventually I was on the other side of the learning curve. Some new dude, often as not a hulking fellow who thought he was hot shit, would get handed to me. He’d be disappointed to get paired with the bearded geezer. He’d mutter something about “being careful not to hurt me” and then launch a punch that seemed to slow time. It would take forever. I’d see the muscles, the balance, the eyes. I’d watch it happen as if almost frozen in a peaceful and transparent version of time and motion. I’d have ample time to evaluate my options. I could block or dodge or any of a dozen combinations. I could block immediately or wait until the last minute or anything in between. Almost as an afterthought I’d respond with a counterattack that felt like it came from the center of the earth to a millimeter from a wide open exposed target. I’d stop it just where I wanted. It worked every time.

I could do what I’d seen done. Once you can do it, it’s surprisingly easy.

Most students get it and apply themselves to the lesson. Some don’t. A few just couldn’t accept what had just happened. A decrepit backwoods hick twice their age wasn’t falling down like they’d seen in the movies. It made them doubt just how tough they really were. Most learned, some got frustrated. In the latter case, they’d lose what little control they had and get even sloppier. Regardless, I’d gently brush off the most testosterone laden, rage filled, death punch like it was a mild summer’s breeze. Which at some point, it was.

It’s a skill like any other. It took a lot of work to learn, but it’s not rocket science. Once you learn the proper use of mind and body, you wonder how you ever lacked that knowledge.

Why do I mention this? Because I’ve just seen an example in cyberspace.

Vox Day is a blogger, writer, and publisher. He’s well attuned to the winds of our era and simply loves to tack into them. Ideally suited in capacity and inclination to stick a pin in “the narrative”, he’s rare in our world of groupthink. I’ve always wondered “how long until some dipshit tries to deplatform this guy”.

In a world where Twitter had the power to override the president of the United States, an obscure blogger is toast. But is it really that way? Of course not! It only appears so.

Trump got kicked off Twitter… because he was on Twitter. What kind of flaming dumbass boomer moron puts his nuts in someone else’s vice? If anything could demonstrate failing to adapt, that was it.

I’m a rounding error compared to Vox (and I write far less provocatively), but even I have taken precautions. I moved from wordpress.com to my own hosting nearly five years ago. Everything is backed up on drives and cloud locations I control. I can’t get kicked off Twitter because I’m not on it. I don’t do YouTube. I don’t let Amazon’s kickbacks lull me into a sense of complacency. I don’t fret over Google rankings. (Don’t be evil my ass!) I love PayPal or Patreon donations (hint hint) but I also know they’re ephemeral; a sandbar in the river. A nice place for a picnic but you don’t build your house there. Plus, I’m always ready to just walk away.

Vox, has more grit than me. He has more motivation and a bigger budget. He has the character necessary to make wise preparations; his are wheels within wheels.

I clicked this morning on http://voxday.blogspot.com/. “This blog is under review due to possible Blogger Terms of Service violations and is open to authors only.” Riiiight!

So this is it? Some midwit fuckhead with a degree in under-employment had pulled a Karen. A fool barnacled into a bureaucracy finally pulled the trigger and they probably haven’t yet realized what they’ve done. Yet, his readers all knew it was coming. Like any intelligent person, Vox did not fall prey to normalcy bias.

So, was I defeated in my desire to get my daily dose of wrongthink? Nah! I went to https://gab.com/. There I found Vox Day in a few seconds. That led to his “emergency landing spot”, an alternate version of the main blog (dating back to 2003). It has been prepped and ready for years. There you’ll find his relevant post “Conflict is the air we breathe”. (I’m not linking directly because I don’t know if that’ll help or hurt Vox’s efforts. You can find it on Gab like any other person. It’s not hard.)

Google’s punch was slow, stupid, predictable, and telegraphed. Meaning it was ineffective. Google put it’s full force into stopping an obscure blogger and yet I was reading his post 30 seconds later. So much for the massive power of algorithms. All that power and bluster and bullshit meant nothing. It was the flailing of a fool. Vox’s dodge was instant and effortless. The groundwork had already been laid. As I described in martial arts, so it has played out with Vox’s intellectual pursuits.

A quote from today’s post (read directly from the blog Google blocked):

“There is nothing to fear here. This is a battle we have long anticipated, some more eagerly than others. Sadly, the hound dog who was Alphabet’s former head of legal is gone, so we can’t assume complete incompetence, but that will only make the eventual victory all the more glorious.

Remember, conflict is the air we breathe. It is the water in which we swim.”

I don’t think he’s worried.