The topic we're talking about today was inspired by my ruminations on Bullshido martial arts promo demonstration videos. These are the videos where a martial arts master shows off their skill in a patently fake demonstration, usually starting with breaking concrete slabs or wood and then progressing to a performance where they show how easily they can defeat all of their students who try and attack them.

The really bad ones will pretend to channel “chi” (a fake energy) and knock down their students without even trying! The thing is that often the teachers actually believe they can really DO this stuff because the reactions of their students make them believe that it's real. And the students believe it too because of motivated reasoning (they WANT to believe), and they are influenced by each other. It's all one self reinforcing bubble echo-chamber of belief.

There are two reasons I'm talking about this in terms of webcomics: 1. Bullshido is the origin of the amazing and silly martial arts and superhero moves and techniques in comics and animation and it's interesting to know where it comes from. and 2. this sort of stuff is why we have preconceived ideas about why a lot of pop-culture is good or bad: We fall for a sort of tribal thinking that's created by our tendency to follow the beliefs of others without examining them for ourselves. It's the sort of thing that results in cults, conspiracy belief, and our opinions on political figures. It's even why we believe that valve amps, Les Paul guitars, Stradivarius violins, and vinyl records sound magically better than the alternatives. It's a fascinating and fun topic and we go deep into it!

This week Gunwallace wasn't able to make a new theme so I re-issued the theme to Kirsha Brackets - A warm rush of frenetic activity! Modern, bright, shiny, new, fun, action, happening, moving, going, bouncing, bubbling, hopping, motivation!

Topics and shownotes

Links

Featured comic: Jalek and the Starbook - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2024/sep/03/featured-comic-jalek-and-the-starbook/

Featured music: Kirsha Brackets - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Kirsha_Brackets/ - by DrawingGenius, rated T.

Special thanks to: Gunwallace - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Gunwallace/ Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/ Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/

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