Friday, November 30, 2007

Animal Styles

Animal styles have always been big in martial arts. In some ways it's a lot like the furry subculture. There are lots of tigers and dragons and praying mantises. Precious few moles or pangolins. In response to a thread on another forum here are my martial animal inspirations:

Martial inspirations from animals....
To start with, since I'm actually a large amphibian Here are some important lessons from The Way of the Toad
  • Kill and eat anyone smaller than you
  • Run away or hide from anyone larger
  • If you get into a fight with someone larger, poison them
  • Praying Mantis is over-rated
  • White Crane is terrifying
From my cats
  • You'll never stay in fighting shape if you don't get your 16 hours of sleep a day
  • Kill from ambush
  • Killing goes better with torture
  • Eat what you kill but leave the not-so-tasty bits all over the house
  • Learn knife fighting first
  • If you're not afraid of a German Shepherd you must be as big as a German Shepherd. If you know it, so will everyone else
From sloths
  • The best defense is being so still and covered with moss that nobody sees you
  • Haste makes waste
  • The most vulnerable time of day is when you climb out of bed to defecate.
From bonobos
  • Make love, not war
  • Make more love, not war
  • Make really inventive love with your friends and neighbors, not war
  • Make love swinging from trees, in large groups and with everyone except your mother, not war
From bees
  • Only the Queen uses her sex organs for sex
  • The rest of us fight with them
  • And then we die (bee stings are modified ovipositors)
From elephants
  • Size is everything
From amoebae
  • Pound for pound, the amoeba is the most vicious creature on the planet
  • Eat your enemies
From plants
  • Plants give amoebae a run for their money
  • If you're not using it to eat, build, or have sex use it to kill something
  • Strangle your enemies
  • Starve your enemies
  • Poison the ground that they live on
  • Once you kill them, eat them
From skunks
  • If you have chemical weapons you don't need to be smart, strong or tough
From ants
  • Mindless ferocity and large numbers beat everything

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