<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Steve-o @ Jul 17 2009, 05:23 PM)
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<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (C A Iversen @ Jul 17 2009, 07:06 AM)
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<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flux @ Jul 17 2009, 04:53 PM)
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I honestly can't see the problem with getting as close as possible during the Haka, aside from the fact that it could lead to an all out brawl, but it's up to the officials to sort that. It is a challenge and it should be treated as such, anyone who gets their knickers in a knot when the challenge is taken up needs to think about how intimidating the Haka must be to some. Although correct me if I'm wrong, Ka Mate isn't actually supposed to be a 'challenge' as such?
Quite a few schoolboy teams have their own school Haka or regions' Haka to perform and it is a big part of the New Zealand sporting culture. At this year's school swimming sports two of the houses did Ka Mate against each other and those at the front of each group were literally in each other's faces.[/b]
I am in agreement with it, but it's a matter of time until one of the arm swinging gestures hits a "challenged" player, who shouldn't be up in your face like that. Up in your face like a metre away, fine. Up in your face like 5 centimetres or more, is asking for trouble. Culture or not, we aren't wanting violence to break out, or the good reputation of the Haka to be soiled.
I mean how close is too close? Pushing heads together? The day that the first brawl happens because of "too close" has already happened in junior levels, it must not come to tests. A punch up prior to the kick-off is not what anyone wants.
Or is it?
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That's either fence sitting to the max or sarcasm. Nobody wants a fight before kick-off, nooo, that can only happen during the game
BTW I'm not saying challenging the Haka is a bad thing (not this topic again..) all I'm saying is that walking up to the Haka and getting tonked is as feable as if the AB's weren't good at rugby.
I know teams do this to inspire confidence, I call it 'chicken before the egg' confidence (except France). They acting confident eventhough it has no grounding aka optimism (except France). Which is all and well if it works! Soon it will become custom to walk up if you think you're not good enough, because the teams who actually do it get tonked (except France).
In fact, lets give the French the sole rights to it!
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Of course it's sarcasm Steve-o. Now I have to ask, how many of you are blind? Or too young to remember? The Haka has slowly and steadily grown in intensity over the years. It's nothing like the joke-like one from the 70's, It's nothing like the evolutionary jump it made when Buck Shelford helped give it the make-over and the mana it deserved. It's a little different from the haka it was in the 90's. It's far more intense. Thats not disputable or you just don't know rugby Hakas.
I'm not saying there's anything wrong with how it is done now, not saying that at all. I'm not saying that the opposition can't advance on it and get close. I just don't think that crossing the halfway line is the way to go. My perogative to suggest that and I'm not changing my opinion for the world.
Anyone who looks at the Rugby League World Cup final haka and can tell me that it was miles away from a potential conflict breaking out is blind to the evolution of the haka and the response over the last 20-25 years. At the end of it there was shirt grabbing and shoving, which is the next step before a fight breaks out.
It's a matter of time, if you guys all want them nose to nose screaming at each other and just to a hairs-breadth of touching each other and think it'll stay that way forever without a fight, then stay in the fairyland you live in.
I just don't get the obsession of pushing the experience to a newer, then a newer, then a newer level, something will give one day. Just don't say you weren't a part of it.
P.S. Well said Flux! I love a good Haka too! And intense, but lets keep a thin line a thin line aye?