Talk:Boabom

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[edit] Controversy

What is the supposed controversy about?

It has been claimed that Boabom is the same art as something called Sung Thru which had a school somewhere in Chile. It's hard to find anything substantial in this connection. Users here were having an opinion/hearsay exchange.
What are the similarities between Boabom and Sung Thru? —Preceding unsigned comment added by M. Wynner (talk • contribs) 18:05, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
Ok, I'm pretty sure the "similarities" are omnipresent, that is to say, they're probably the same thing. This is the controversy in short: There was in Chile a school that taught an art they claimed was Tibetan in origin and dubbed "Sung Thru". The main school was located in Viña del Mar, a 10 minute walk from my house. I know because I attended their classes for a year. There was a HUGE scandal back in 2000, because they were accused of being a dangerous sect involved in sexual slavery. This was jumpstarted by the "kidnapping" of a young girl who escaped to Spain with one of the teachers. After the big commotion, the girl returned, no one was incarcerated and the sung thru school faded away from media attention. Eventually, the resurfaced under a new name: Boabom.
How do I know they're the same people?
For starters, ads advertising their school have the same address than the previous school, which was a privately owned house, not a rented place. People who've been to boabom demonstrations have shown me the same moves I learned in their school. The boston boabom website features a picture of a young woman in an low stance with her arms out stretched: she used to teach at the sung thru school. The greeting they use, both hands joined at their thumbs and index finger forming a triangle, which you can see in the group picture of the boston boabom site, was the standard sung thru greeting as well. And most prominently, lots of references to sung thru on their website which disappeared a few days after my first references of them on this article. Of course, I cannot really prove any of this, which is very frustrating, but this is all first hand information.
Now, is Boabom/Sung Thru a sect?
Not entirely. They did have some sect-like behaviour, when I attended, they were very critical of pretty much everything: Martial Arts, Christian Faith(and Catholic Church in particular because it is predominant in Chile), the Dalai Lama, homosexuality. They generally maintained this air of superiority about their art, which was "enlightening" and "the real thing", and encouraged not listening to friends/family critics of sung thru. However, you could perfectly attend and not get involved past being a regular student, unless you were a young woman.
where they sex slavers?
No. They did however enjoyed bringing young women to their "inner circle". Rumours of strong sexual activity have circulated but nothing that I know have been proved. This young women were usually approached and told they were special, "the chosen one"(not kidding) and so on. They were sometimes offered a trip to Spain where the head of the school lived. If they refused, they were shut off. This I also know somewhat directly(I'm a not so attractive male, but I did talked to one of the "chosen ones")
was sung thru a tibetan martial art?
no way. It is a pastiche of movie kung fu, low stances, circular movements, aerobics and a capoeira like fighting exercise. It is good cardio, but most of its tradition is made up. Actually, after you delved more deeply in the tradition of sung thru, the falseness of its tibetan heritage became quite obvious, and other explanations began to surface, involving dreams and extraterrestrials(again, not kidding).
hope that helps, and doesn't get deleted(as my past contributions have been)
-differentSmoke

[edit] Is this for real?

If this is really a Tibetan martial art, what are the Tibetan equivalents of the words that are used here? It's hard to be certain, but they could be made-up. Who are the Tibetans that teach this art?

In any event, I'm going to chop out some unsourced material.—Nat Krause(Talk!·What have I done?) 02:46, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

An interested example, which I removed: "This Art has been described in Sanskrit as Alayavijnana, or the Art of Eternal Youth". Is this a randomly selected Sanskrit word? Alayavijnana means "base consciousness" and has nothing to do with arts or youth.—Nat Krause(Talk!·What have I done?) 02:53, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
There is a difference between "being a Tibetan martial art" and "originating in the area that is now Tibet", which is how it is talked about on the boabom.org website.
I'm not sure I follow you. You mean to say that Boabom originates from what is now Tibet, but was established by some group of people other than Tibetans? Who?—Nat Krause(Talk!·What have I done?) 03:35, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
What we can call Tibet is an area of 2.5 million square kilometers. To speak of it as possessing an homogeneous culture or language at a single point in time is extraordinarily short-sighted, and becomes exponentially more so when considering the whole of its history. To say something originated long ago in the area that is now Tibet is not the same as saying it is "Tibetan" in the sense of being part of the main stream of modern Tibetan culture. If it began there as long ago as they say, the people who invented it would not have thought of themselves as Tibetan. They would not speak a language that would be recognizable as Tibetan. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.60.193.89 (talk) 18:52, August 24, 2007 (UTC)
That's all well and good, but it's pure speculation unless you or somebody else will state the point more directly. If "Boabom" and other foreign words on this page are not Tibetan, what language are they?—Nat Krause(Talk!·What have I done?) 14:50, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
If Tibet is such vast and diverse area that "Tibetan" cannot be used to accurately describe it, it would then stand that "Tibet" is also a misnomer for this region. It then begs the question, why is the Boabom organization using "from Tibet" to describe their martial art, and why is "Tibetan Martial Art" a category that is used to tag this article? The previous commentor's assertion that what we know as Tibet is too heterogenous, and has too much history to bear a label is a moot argument seeing as the authors of the Boabom article use "Tibet" and "Tibetan" to describe their martial art. This is the most ridiculous argument I've heard in awhile and is reminiscent of Bill Clinton's obfuscation of the meaning of "sexual relations". —Preceding unsigned comment added by M. Wynner (talk • contribs) 18:03, 28 October 2007 (UTC)