From: svoboda@rtsg.mot.com (David Svoboda)
Subject: Re: A few questions and observations
Organization: Motorola Inc., Cellular Infrastructure Group
Distribution: usa
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 16:56:47 GMT

In article <1go68eINNla7@smurf.sti.com> alaric@sti.com (Alaric Tekiahyn) writes:
|
|For starters, I don't pretend that SCA, paintball, or BattleTech represent
|the real world.  Paintball and BattleTech are mere games; SCA fighting is
|almost as formalized as competitive fencing, albeit in different ways.

SCA and competitive fencing are games, both of them.  Just as is paintball.
Paintball participants certainly have the element of make-believe that
SCAers do, and they have the strategy, tactics, athletics, and mind-games
that SCA sometimes does.  There is very little difference, other than the
period of warfare they are emulating.

Modern fencing is a sport different from that.  Most fencers do very
little pretending.  In order to become a good fencer, one must in large
part concentrate on the fencing, rather than the tradition and history,
except perhaps as a point of intellectual interest.

|Now your comments lead me to strongly doubt you'd deny that the modern
|fencing salle is an artificial environment.  It is, as you say, a sport.
|It is bound by strict rules, both for reasons of safety and for reasons
|of making it possible to score it, 

Yes, right so far.

|and thus determine who has won a bout
|without the necessity to draw blood.  

The concept of "necessity to draw blood" is as foriegn to fencing as it
is to baseball.  Blood is sometimes an accidental occurance, but it, or
the simulation of it, is NOT part of the sport.  That "blood" mentality
can be dangerous on the strip, and is certainly not very common among
modern fencers.  Experienced ones, at least.

|These are factors which are not
|affected in the least by whether the participants choose to make believe
|they are the Three Musketeers.

They are affected.  If someone has a three-musketeers headgame going on
when he is fencing, he will never become a really good fencer.  It's
that simple.  That's just not a legitimate part of the sport.

|Now, for just one example of what I meant:
|For the purpose of the sport of fencing, it is possible to score a point
|by the 'foil whipping' or 'flicking' technique.  

Sure, that is one fencing tactic.

|However, if you were
|carrying your fencing gear back to your car, and someone chose to try to
|mug you, would you consider 'flicking' to be a viable defense?  I think
|not.

No.  My fencing gear is not a weapon in the sense of defense against
criminals.  It is in fact less useful for that purpose than a hockey
stick or baseball bat, other sports for which violence is not part of
the game.  (Okay, hockey is a bad example. :-)

Asking me whether flicking would be a viable attack against a mugger is
like asking a volleyball player if spiking is a viable attack against
a mugger.  It's not relevent.

If I wanted to defend against a mugger, a really viable weapon might be
a billyclub, or the cop's version, a five cell maglite.  Or a firearm.
Certainly not a fencing weapon.  That's ridiculous.

|Similarly, in the example of the sabre attack, if you defended yourself
|with a technically perfect saber attack as described in the post I first
|replied to, but your assailant unfortunately managed to insert his
|switchblade into your left eye a half-second before your blow landed,
|you would probably immediately forget all about your sabre and your
|uncompleted attack.

That's because a sabre is not a fighting weapon, it is a fencing weapon.

BTW, if a mugger attacks you while you carry a claymore, don't even think
of hitting him with it.  We live in litiginous times, and there is ample
precedent for you to lose everything you have if you use a sword to 
actually hurt someone, even in "self defense".  A sword is just not a
viable weapon in today's world.

|That's the 'real world' I was referring to.  The 'real world' I meant
|is that one in which you aren't wearing a fencing mask or lame, there
|are no rules, no-one is keeping score, and losing means a whole lot
|more than dropping a rung in the ladder.

When is the last time you were in the "real world", then?  SCAers are
not.  Those play-actors I see at the renaissance fair are not.  Fencers 
are not play acting.  They are competing in a fully modern sport, with 
specific sporting equipment.  There is no element of make-believe.  Who
is in the "real world"?

|I have no illusions as to whether fencing represents this 'real world'.
|In fact, I contend that in its present form, it doesn't represent it
|enough.  The degree of abstraction has become too high, if you understand
|what I mean, for it to fully retain its relevance.

Fencing is relevent on it's own terms.  It does not need the approval of 
those who would lay claim to historical perspective.  

For that matter, you are not even a fencer.  How can you possible expect
those *inside* the sport to care about the disapproval of someone outside,
especially one with obvious misconceptions about the motives of fencers?

		Dave Svoboda
Newsgroups: rec.sport.fencing