Arnis- an indigenous art originating from the Philippines and was used by known Filipino warriors and revolutionaries to defend and protect their native land. Some of the well-known practitioners of Arnis also called Kali are Lapu-Lapu, Jose Rizal, Gat Bonifacio, and many more known heroes who fought against foreign conquerors.

Arnis today is very degraded by its own people. It is an art, which has almost lost its fame because of the colonial mentality of Filipinos. If you will ask a Filipino about martial arts the first thing that will come from their mind would be Karate or Taekwondo. Filipinos often mistakenly conceptualize Arnis as Karate; they even discriminate it and make fun of it. In a given situation, if you would ask some Filipinos if there were a martial arts gym that they would like to enter and what would it be, and given the choice between two gyms. One would be an Arnis Gym 1 mile from their home and the other would be a Taekwondo gym 3 miles from their home. The choice will be to take lessons from the Taekwondo gym.

Another situation that is commonly encountered by Arnis, Estoque, or Kali propagators are those individuals who would answer to a practitioner that he would rather buy a gun and use it against an opponent than to train hard. This people are those people who are dumb and most commonly insecure of them selves, that when they see others doing something that they don’t understand they would make fun of it. They don’t know that military persons both here and abroad trains Filipino martial arts (ARNIS) or any combative system of martial arts, and not only that from the main fact that these men always carry a gun, not only a single gun but more than one gun or machine guns and they are licensed to carry those guns but still they train because they know the importance of hand to hand combat. These men are not ordinary citizens they are hired by the government to protect the citizens of a country what more would you expect from an ordinary citizen who cannot always carry a gun. What do they have to say about that?

Some Filipinos take Arnis likely and misunderstood the real essence of it. They would discriminate and comment about Arnis only using weaponries and believe that when an Arnis practitioner has already lost the weapon the bout would end not favoring the Arnis practitioner. Little do they know that Arnis has a much deeper essence than that, they don’t know the deep importance and the knowledge behind the art. Neither do they know that Arnis is not the weapon but the system used by the practitioner. They don’t understand that the weapon is not the treat but the one who wields the weapon.

Some of these misconceptions that are brought about by wrong impression of the media and at different schools that offer Arnis as a P.E. subject. Some schools would just let any P.E instructors teach Arnis as a subject without any prior training about the art and any fact based experience about the art. Some of them would just study the dose teros (twelve strikes) without studying the history and the deeper techniques, which composes the art.

We all know that the media has a big responsibility when it comes to information dissemination. They have a great deal of influence when it comes to information but sometimes they neglect this responsibility and the end result would be is a reaction that can either destroy or promote something with their power of information broadcasting. For an instance, little issues gets bigger; sometimes they can even make a situation get worse. This was another problem faced by Arnis propagators; this issue was also experienced by the Filipino art “Arnis”, for instance the media created the impression that Arnis-Kali is actually the weapon and not the system, this made the impression that an Arnisador is weak without the weapon, but actually the term Arnis is the system of martial arts used by an Arnisador, just like on how the media describes the katana of a Samurai Warrior. They termed the sword as “Samurai” but actually the term Samurai describes the warrior or person who wields the sword that is properly referred to as the katana.

They say that the media needs freedom of expression but with this freedom also requires great responsibility. They must first understand their role and not just for the sake of broadcasting gossips, entertainment, and acquiring ratings.

ARTICLE WRITTEN BY LAKAN RODRIGO BONZERR LOPEZ

WHY TRAIN WEAPONRIES FIRST RATHER THAN TRAIN EMPTY HAND

We Arnisadors are always discriminated by other martial artist or ordinary individuals because we train with weaponries first before we shift to empty hand training. This is always a common problem faced by Arnis instructors or propagators. Little do they know the importance of weaponry training, they don’t understand that the reason why we first train weaponries is to acquire speed, power, accuracy, timing, distance training, efficiency, and basically to understand the danger that weapons brings in an actual combat situation. They don’t know that weapons associate much greater danger than empty hand combat brawls. This article aims to provide basic understanding on the importance of weaponry training when it comes to CLOSE RANGE COMBAT SITUATIONS.

Weapons can be classified into three divisions; it can be an IMPACT WEAPON such as a rattan stick, baseball bat, a tonfa, retractable baton, and so on. Another type of weaponry is classified as EDGE WEAPONS examples of this are swords, daggers, balisongs, knives, scissors, cutters and any pointed tools used in the house. The third type of weapons is called FIREARMS, which are used in long-range combat. Weapons are mainly used to gain advantage over an opponent; all associates a greater treat to any individual because any type of weapon increases the capability for an assaulter to inflict a more lethal injury to their victim because weapons in reality are more lethal than our bare hands.

Some people don’t know the importance of weaponry training because they don’t know the reality when it comes to an actual combat situation. They think that by acquiring high kicks they can already defend themselves when it comes to street fights or in actual confrontation with an assaulter. Yes, they can defend themselves with those tactics, I wont say that they can’t, but they must also understand that in real close range combat situations it is not wise to underestimate an assaulter carrying a weapon specially any kind of edge weapon.

We study weaponries for us to have the basic knowledge that we need to understand the danger that an encounter with an assaulter would bring when they carry any type of weaponry specially edge weapons when it comes to close range combat. An encounter with an assaulter who has any kind of edge weapon can be considered as the most dangerous situation that an individual would face when it comes to real close range combat and must not be taken likely. Every time you get into a fight in such a case one must take great caution, because a combat situation involving no weapons is very different with situations involving weaponries.

In a normal fight or brawl an individual could only end up in the hospital with bruises and black eyes, but when weaponries are involved the result would be much worse because weaponries increases a normal individual capacity to inflict more serious injuries to a victim. Weaponries especially edge weapons can cause serious injury, and the worse scenario is that it can cause instant death.

Underestimating such situations can endanger an individual’s life. If one is not properly trained or oriented with its dangers, it can result to useless lost of life instead of saving one. Teaching martial arts is a big responsibility, an Instructor must orient his students with what is really happening in the real world of combat and must not based their teachings on movies and fiction, because when they teach self-defense it involves savings one’s life.

I myself would not suggest to my students to fight back against someone who has an edge weapon, I would suggest that if possible they must first even up the odds by acquiring their own weapon to defend themselves unless the situation really requires them to fight empty handedly. I would even suggest that they don’t fight back unless they are sure enough that their life is in danger. Retreating is not coward ness but a wise decision to make to save one’s life.

One must know the danger of any combat situation to make a practical survival strategy when it comes to a real street fight - close range combat encounters.

“Self-confidence is good but overconfidence can make you weak, careless and can even cause you your life when you are in a fight.”

ARTICLE WRITTEN BY: (Lakan) Rodrigo Bonzerr S. Lopez