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I am very sorry that the referee did not respond 'in kind' and visit a full scale beating on that guy. Where I come from, that is the proper response to an unprovoked attack... you NAIL them to send the message, "Do not strike me without good reason... if you do... you do so at your own peril because I respect myself enough NOT to let you get by with it." Had I been the judge... it's a foregone conclusion that the either he'd be face up on the mat with paramedics working on him... or he'd have been chased out of the arena screaming for his mommy. For the record, I think ANY official who is attacked without provocation, should respond in similar fashion, WITH HELP if needed. If the officials EVER let it be thought that someone can whop them without immediate and decisive reprisal... it's gonna keep happening until SOMEONE gets killed. Whether on the TKD mat, or a basketball court, or baseball diamond or football field. I'm glad the jerk is out of the art... I'm glad his coach is out of the art... and I'll tell you... if the WTF has any brains, and the IOC has any brains, they'll suspend the country of Cuba from ANY participation in Olympic competition for a period of 10 years... given Fidel Castro's response to all this. Suspend the country for 10 years... and then tell them after those 10 years are UP, if they want back in the Olympics, Fidel or the ruler of the country can publish a public apology through all world media outlets, with a public address on television and radio throughout the world, apologizing for their behavior and their attitude, which is not in keeping with the Olympic spirit. THEN once that is done, they can reapply to be admitted to the games. Until then... Cuba doesn't need to compete at anything. Betcha that'd send a message REAL FAST... to countries and athletes... as to what is acceptable behavior or not.
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Getting through life takes just a LITTLE bit of insanity!*g*
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Totally agree with you about suspending Cuba from anything for ten years. How about twelve? That's three Olympics worth.
And though I am loathe to do so, I disagree about the ref fighting back. Security is there to pull the guy off and most refs are not physically equal to the athletes they are reffing for. All that the ref fighting back would have done was add one more person to be pulled from a fight by security and a prolonged debacle.
I do agree that the ref has the right to defend him or herself from harm, but should only do so to the extent that they need to to keep from sustaining further injury. Now if the attacker gets injured in the process, thats okay with me, but that should not be the goal of the ref in an arena full of security and witnesses.
The ref did the right thing, as loathe as I am to say so. I am a firm believer in utterly destroying an attacker, but on live television at the olympics? Not the time or place to do so. I dare say that the fines and penalties against that jerko will be greater with the ref not fighting back and letting security do their job.
Daniel
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교사 Yidan kumdo, Ildan taekwondo
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I agree with most everything that has been written on this topic. I too have been in a position of being so out of control you black out and have no grasp of what you are doing until you are done. Why do you think it's called Blind Rage? That's why my father put me in the Martial Arts to begin with in 1969. To say I was an angry young man doesn't come close. This is part of the reason I have never agreed with only having sparring represent our art, that's not an accurate representation of what we are about!
We have 5 or 6 events in Gymnastics, 50 in swimming and to many in track and field to count representing their sports, why don't we have the other aspects of our "sport". I don't usually refer to it as "sport", because that doesn't express the spirit of what we spend our lives doing in my opinion. Everyone makes mistakes in their lives or you aren't human. Just most of us don't do it on such a large stage. The most unfortunate part of the whole thing is what you saw is what sells tickets. How much attention do you think this has gotten on the International level since it happened. Everybody and their brother is trying to find the video because it's been talked about so much. They are not looking for it because their appalled by it, there looking for it for the same reason everyone on the highway has to slow down and look when there is an accident. It's the same psychological condition that sells tickets to a UFC event (personally I think these should be held in the Coliseum and they should fight to the death like real Gladiators did  ) where two grown men climb in a cage and beat the tar out of each other. It's the rage that lives in us all. I've trained most of my life to control it and make peace with it. Why do you think SELF-CONTROL is one of the Tenents? I haven't seen the video and don't want to. I refuse to be a part of the negative pandering of our art. We are faced with enough negative in everyday life we have to deal with, why go looking for more. I think Master Perry, one of the leaders of our Organization said it best when he quoted Mr. Miyagi "no such thing as bad student, only bad teacher". In this situation though I don't think this quote is talking about a single person as teacher, I think the teacher here is Humanity as a whole. What do we choose to believe in and stand up for with every ounce of our strength every day? Accepting responsibility for your actions is not part of popular sports anymore. How else can we have a Professional Basketball Player choke their coach and instead of going to jail they get a contract extension and then traded for even more money. There are examples of this kind of behavior in every sport if you look for them and they are all still on the world stage. Anyone who wants to naively believe the IOC is all about fair play and above reproach, don't look to deep. If you want to change it, don't buy what they're selling and tell all your friends not to either.  It's very sadly been about T.V. ratings and ticket sales not integrity for quite some time in just about all "sports".
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"Start by doing what is necessary, then do what is possible and suddenly you will be doing what you thought was impossible"
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| POSTED BY: IcemanSK on 08/29/2008 20:36:39 |
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ranger1100ky wrote:
I am very sorry that the referee did not respond 'in kind' and visit a full scale beating on that guy. Where I come from, that is the proper response to an unprovoked attack... you NAIL them to send the message, "Do not strike me without good reason... if you do... you do so at your own peril because I respect myself enough NOT to let you get by with it." Had I been the judge... it's a foregone conclusion that the either he'd be face up on the mat with paramedics working on him... or he'd have been chased out of the arena screaming for his mommy. For the record, I think ANY official who is attacked without provocation, should respond in similar fashion, WITH HELP if needed. If the officials EVER let it be thought that someone can whop them without immediate and decisive reprisal... it's gonna keep happening until SOMEONE gets killed. Whether on the TKD mat, or a basketball court, or baseball diamond or football field. I'm glad the jerk is out of the art... I'm glad his coach is out of the art... and I'll tell you... if the WTF has any brains, and the IOC has any brains, they'll suspend the country of Cuba from ANY participation in Olympic competition for a period of 10 years... given Fidel Castro's response to all this. Suspend the country for 10 years... and then tell them after those 10 years are UP, if they want back in the Olympics, Fidel or the ruler of the country can publish a public apology through all world media outlets, with a public address on television and radio throughout the world, apologizing for their behavior and their attitude, which is not in keeping with the Olympic spirit. THEN once that is done, they can reapply to be admitted to the games. Until then... Cuba doesn't need to compete at anything. Betcha that'd send a message REAL FAST... to countries and athletes... as to what is acceptable behavior or not.
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I appreciate the sentiment, but I disagree. Had the ref decked him, all of TKD would suffer. Lifetime ban for athlete & coach (before he was even off the floor!) is message enough |
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