Off Topic "Mall Ninja" : Is just mere ownership of certain types of blade enough to earn the title ?

chevyrulez1 said:
I think it is more to the mall ninja than just thinking the equipment makes them capable. Even if you are skilled with said equipment, the true essence of a mall ninja is relying on a ridiculous concept for self defense or combat effectiveness because they think it is cool or to mimic something they saw in a movie, etc.
As an example, telling on myself again, when I was young and the movie Raiders of the lost ark came out I thought it was the coolest thing ever. Wanted a fedora and a bullwhip. I found and ordered a bullwhip from the Johnson Smith company. It was the coolest thing ever, and I went out in the yard to learn how to snap it. Managed to lay an impressive whelp on my shoulder once that brought tears to my eyes 😂
Eventually through messing around with it over time I got really good, and could snap clothespins off the line consistently with it. It was a lot of fun, but if I had decided to coil it up and walk around in public with it on my hip thinking I could use it for self defense, to snap a gun out of a bad guys hand Indiana Jones style? 🙄 mall ninja extraordinaire. As ridiculous as that sounds there are people out there who are still relying on ineffective methods for self defense, survival, preparedness, etc. because they are mimicking something they saw somewhere that they thought was cool.
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There was an older film student kid, when I was in high school, who dressed up for Halloween as Indiana Jones, complete with full-sized bullwhip. After he gave us a cool demo, there was zero chance I wasn't going to ask to have a crack at that bad boy. I talked him into letting me have a try and after a couple cracks slapped one of my hands. Still better than the kid who hit himself in the face. I'd used improvised whips made from kelp on the beach, but that was something else.
 
I saw a youtube video of a small lady cop in China take down a good sized bad guy with a pair of nunchaku. It looks like she used them for joint locks, trapping, and flipping but not as a primary impact weapon. It was also obvious that most of her work involved great hand to hand combat skills with the nunchaku being used only as a supplement. It all went down very fast from begining to end too. She really took him down with authority no kidding.

The police in the US have noted the value of nunchaku as grappling and restraint devices (an idiot even fractured a female peaceful protester's wrist.) There are several US police forces that use them (plastic connected by cord I think.)

I think nunchaku are very good for applying joint locks and holds and that is often overlooked. It's more cool and movie like to flip and twirl them before bashing something.

I love flipping and twirling but I know it's just fun and using them for defense requires first and foremost a good solid foundation of hand to hand combat skills in which case a pair of nunchaku may or may not be handy to have.

I have a bunch of nunchaku both purchased and home made. They are fun and I find practicing with them is like a form of meditation, at least for me, so I keep the thoughts clean, nice, and positive while having fun.

Does that make me a super mall ninja. I even have a pair that lights up with colored light.:)
 
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There seems to be a pause. Are you guys deliberating whether to promote me to grand master super mall ninja status. How about if I throw in something from Frost (80's era Seki Japan high quality steel OK not 420J2 but it's not my fault that's how they came back then.)
 
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greater said:
nunchaku
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In the late 60's and thru the 70's , at college in Columbus , OH , I studied and practiced various hard style karate systems .

My main club was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shōrin-ryū .

One of the weapons taught was nunchaku .

When I first started , these were not known to popular culture or law enforcement ...at least not in Ohio .

I could just casually walk about the OSU campus , styling with my chucks and nobody cared .

Campus cops once stopped me and said " Oh ...those are musical sticks , right ? "

"Yup !" I wisely agreed . ;) The good old days of innocence .

Years later , chucks became notorious as "gang related " lethal martial arts weapons and the cops were told to consider them as a lethal threat .

Until then , I often carried a compact pair . Afterwards , did not usually seem worth the hassle/risk .

With proper training and lots of (sometimes painful) practice they can be a very effective impact weapon as well as a pain compliance / leverage devise . :cool:
 
what do we think about people who take special interest in tactical knives? God forbid carry them!! But seriously it can come down to a design preference but then does it go to quality or how the user act to determine the mall ninja-ness. We need some sorta measurement system ffs
 
greater said:
I saw a youtube video of a small lady cop in China take down a good sized bad guy with a pair of nunchaku. It looks like she used them for joint locks, trapping, and flipping but not as a primary impact weapon. It was also obvious that most of her work involved great hand to hand combat skills with the nunchaku being used only as a supplement. It all went down very fast from begining to end too. She really took him down with authority no kidding.

The police in the US have noted the value of nunchaku as grappling and restraint devices (an idiot even fractured a female peaceful protester's wrist.) There are several US police forces that use them (plastic connected by cord I think.)

I think nunchaku are very good for applying joint locks and holds and that is often overlooked. It's more cool and movie like to flip and twirl them before bashing something.

I love flipping and twirling but I know it's just fun and using them for defense requires first and foremost a good solid foundation of hand to hand combat skills in which case a pair of nunchaku may or may not be handy to have.

I have a bunch of nunchaku both purchased and home made. They are fun and I find practicing with them is like a form of meditation, at least for me, so I keep the thoughts clean, nice, and positive while having fun.

Does that make me a super mall ninja. I even have a pair that lights up with colored light.:)
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Nah, nothing wrong with enjoying something, or practicing it for the enjoyment of it, and I’m not saying they can’t be used for self defense because obviously they can, but if if you wear a Bruce Lee style headband, do flips through Walmart and then try to subdue a purse snatcher with your light up nunchucks, then sir you are guilty as charged 😂
 
BootlegPolisher.17 said:
what do we think about people who take special interest in tactical knives? God forbid carry them!! But seriously it can come down to a design preference but then does it go to quality or how the user act to determine the mall ninja-ness. We need some sorta measurement system ffs
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I don’t think tactical knives apply, but they may when paired with BDU’s and Night Vision as evening wear for a night on the town 😂
 
chevyrulez1 said:
Nah, nothing wrong with enjoying something, or practicing it for the enjoyment of it, and I’m not saying they can’t be used for self defense because obviously they can, but if if you wear a Bruce Lee style headband, do flips through Walmart and then try to subdue a purse snatcher with your light up nunchucks, then sir you are guilty as charged 😂
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At least the hypothetical guy in your example actually wants to help lol. The typical mall ninja is a blustering idiot that couldn’t care less about the safety of others. All about looking cool lol.
 
DangerZone98 said:
At least the hypothetical guy in your example actually wants to help lol. The typical mall ninja is a blustering idiot that couldn’t care less about the safety of others. All about looking cool lol.
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Hey, the Mall Ninja can't be bothered by normal bad guys. If ninjas, terrorists, or cyborg soldiers show up; he has you covered.
 
chevyrulez1 said:
I think the term “mall ninja” is actually a dated term and doesn’t fit the modern tacticool movement. I guess because I came up as a teenager in the 80’s, we were born into a Post Vietnam/Pre War on Terror time in the final days of the Cold War. It was a time of peace but with the threat of war. Thanks to movies like Red Dawn we were convinced the commies were going to come parachuting out of the sky’s at any time and nukes would be flying. We grew up watching “Kung Fu Theater” on Sunday afternoons. Rambo, Chuck Norris, Bruce Lee, and Ninja movies were as mainstream as Superhero movies now. We were all convinced we needed to be prepared to take on the commies/bad guys at any moment, and ordered Ninja books and books on improvised weapons from Paladin press, were we learned just enough to endanger ourselves 😂 we bought ninja swords, nunchucks, throwing stars, big wicked looking knives, balisongs, etc. but didn’t have any of the real training and such to actually use them effectively. It was a time of fantasy, we were fascinated by it all and it made us feel really prepared and ready for whatever may come. But the only thing we ever really did was go circle the mall without meaning and ultimately end up dropping money on arcade games which is the closest thing to combat many of us would see. Now I am 52 years old and wish I had bought more Old Timers and Case knives instead of that stupid stuff.
Gone are the days of Kung Fu Theater and American Ninja, and enter the age of YouTube. So the modern equivalent in my mind is all the tacticool gear junkies and “Bushcraft Boys” who are only impressed by beating their knives through a whole tree.
Perhaps it is time to coin a new phrase for a new age? Central Park Tarzan? Amazon Commando? Walmart Warrior? YouTube hero? Coffee Shop Spetsnaz? Any other ideas? 😂
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I think "Meal Team Six" still has some legs left. 😄
 
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