Exponents, not kung fu, to blame for blow

Many regard the defeat of tai chi master Wei Lei at the hands of mixed martial arts fighter Xu Xiaodong in 20 seconds in a contest in Chengdu, Sichuan province, last week as a humiliation for tai chi despite the outspoken Xu saying his intention was to challenge "fake masters", not Chinese martial arts or kung fu.

From 1899 to 1911, the Boxer fighters, convinced of being invulnerable to foreign weapons including guns, fell to the bullets of Western colonial armies and failed in their self-avowed mission to defend the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) against the foreign invaders. But the defeat of the Boxer fighters was dwarfed by the 4,000-year history of Chinese martial arts.

For long the entertainment industry has been spicing up the martial arts tales passed down the generations, adding to the myth that kung fu masters are invincible. As a result, many Chinese who believe kung fu to be the best martial arts in the world have ridiculed Xu as a "cocky and ignorant clown".