Phil Elmore Owned? Hardly.

Fraud in The Martialist! Alert the media! Phone the lawyers! Retract the drawbridge! Close all the shops in the mall! Shut down the three ring circus!…Dogs and cats… living together… MASS HYSTERIA!

Sorry, I got a little carried away there.

Shortly after the release of The Martialist’s
2005 Mega Issue
subscriber content (our largest issue yet and what has already been characterized as our best work), I got an e-mail from a concerned reader who had found yet another thread about me and The Martialist at
The Children’s Network (where I do, indeed, have my own cute little icon, so important am I in the minds of the participants there). The originator of the thread had, he proclaimed,
‘owned’ me by submitting a false article and succeeding in getting it published.

Leaning back and steepling my fingers in a fashion that would do proud Montgomery Burns, I allowed myself a
quiet word of triumph:

“Eeeeexcellent.”

Now, at the risk of uttering a Pee Wee Herman-esque “I meant to do that,” I did, indeed, mean to do that.

Given how well-known is my publication and how frequently discussed a figure am I, I’ve known for some time that this was a possibility. I’ve waited patiently for the day that someone submitted a fraudulent article specifically to get it printed so they could then claim to have proven… well, whatever it is doing something like that is supposed to prove. I’ve also not been terribly worried about it, given that when an article crosses my desk, I don’t care who wrote it (as long as it isn’t stolen from a
source that’s not attributed) and I don’t care what that person’s credentials might be.

I’ve argued for a long time that an idea should be examined on its merits, rather than dismissed or considered on the basis of the resume of the person presenting it. For me to then cross-check the credentials of everyone submitting articles to me would be the height of hypocrisy. I believe everyone has something to offer. Amusingly, this means that someone who was trying NOT
to offer anything of value managed, instead, to contribute something useful.

When I evaluate an article for publication I ask myself if the ideas it contains have merit. Will publication of the article help people, or won’t it? If the answer is yes, I perform however much editing is necessary to make it presentable and I publish it. You don’t have to be a teacher or a self-defense expert to offer something worthwhile. The Martialist is intended for ordinary citizens, mere mortals, who are sharing ideas as they work towards the goal of success in self-defense. Along the way we help a lot of people, some of them military and law enforcement professionals who have taken the time to write or call me and (often surprising me) tell me they have found value in The Martialist.

I wrote back to the reader who alerted me to the attempted fraud, in part:

…I knew the guy was full of shit when he sent the article.
The skinny dude doing the “fence” stance wearing the bulky vest was a
dead giveaway, as was the rather florid tone of the article.

The joke, however, is on him – because while he thinks he’s putting
one over on me, he has managed (with my editing) to create an article
that’s actually a worthwhile idea. Sure, it’s a little cheesy – but
precisely the same idea was forwarded in The Sicilian Blade, a sort
of cheesy book…

I meant that. I meant, from the very beginning, to include the article,
deliberately springing the poorly laid “trap” left for me by this particular
young fellow. It’s not a bad article, which is why I included it.
It has already inspired a couple of readers who’ve written back to me with their own variations on the theme of improvised body “armor.”

As I said, I figured from the outset, given the melodramatic tone of the article and the pictures of the scrawny dude imitating a “fence” type stance, that there was a good chance this was that article, the one for which I’d been waiting. I also concluded that
it didn’t matter. If it was legitimate, fine; if it wasn’t, fine again. The joke’s on the author
(who, if you’re curious, confirmed his
attempt online).

As I’ve indicated, I first read of the concept of improvised anti-knife padding in
The Sicilian Blade, a little stiletto-fighting book by “Vito Quattrocchi.” While crude (and while I didn’t think much of the book when I first saw it), it turns out that the book does contain material of value. A variation on the theme of padding against a knife assault is one of these. I even mentioned this to “Jason Devon” when he first wrote to me.

I did, in fact, save all of my correspondence with “Jason Devon,” because I believed him to be a fraud. You may
read the e-mail log if you’d like to confirm this. The slavering and
overwrought tone of both Jason’s e-mail and the text of his article pretty much revealed him for what he was from the outset, but the article came together well and his intentions were immaterial to this. 
I hoped I was wrong, but I knew, deep down, that I wasn’t.

As you can see from the log, the original article was not quite
the article you see published; I edited it thoroughly and added some material at the end extracted from an e-mail I sent “Jason” asking him some follow-up questions.

What resulted is and was, amusingly enough, a decent article with well-executed photos, regardless of the author’s intent. (I loved the stabbing-Leonardo-DiCaprio picture, for example.) I did, however, perform a wink and a nod at the end of the text, by leaving an editor’s note stating that you may or may not be able to make the idea work (but that it’s worth considering for worst-case scenarios). Even in my
earliest correspondence with “Jason” I hinted that I would need to leave an editor’s note, though I was careful to guard my language with “Jason” lest my impression turn out wrong and he proved to be an earnest if somewhat misguided contributor.

Interestingly, I get a lot of e-mail from students of self-defense and a surprising quantity of it deals with this same issue. One guy shared with me his rather elaborate plans to build some kind of improvised armor from aluminum plate, or some such thing. (I even referred him to “Jason’s” article.)

Ultimately, the article offers what I think is an interesting idea that is worth considering
– an idea that isn’t original and with which I a was previously acquainted. I gather that the “ownage” here is that I’m supposed to have been taken in by an article I did not “verify”
– as if I’m going to retire for the evening to the field laboratories of The Martialist, where James Bond-esque technicians spend their days shooting knives from spring-loaded wrist sheaths, practicing body posturing on captive hobos, winos, and panhandlers, and turning out homemade koppo sticks on industrial lathes when they’re not out on the street solving crimes with paracord-wrapped flashlights gripped in their fists.

I guess I was supposed to wrap myself in coffee table books about shipwrecks
or Hungarian cabinet-making and then do my best to stab myself; this might
constitute the “verification” in which these ridiculous children seem to put so
much stock. I guess I’m supposed to have determined, through testing, that the idea was offered dishonestly and I would then, one presumes, rush from the PhilCave in the PhilMobile, screaming “Stop the presses!” as I hurtled toward the seven-story glass-and-steel building wherein the mighty PDF Printing Presses of my magazine hum away twenty-four hours a day.

The only problem is, the concept is workable and the article’s not bad at all.

Rather than become an exaggerated empiricist, I prefer to use reason
and apply logic to the data of my senses. This process tells me that the
article, regardless of intent or provenance, forwards a useful idea. Now, how
you choose to build improvised padding of this type is up to you; the exact
construction will vary from person to person and the scenarios in which you
might be able to use it will definitely vary. (That doesn’t make it stupid, however, nor does it make it dangerous, nor does it mean anyone’s managed to perpetrate anything that I didn’t allow to be perpetrated deliberately.)

The fact is that such padding, however you choose to apply it, does provide resistance against being stabbed. Are any of us paranoid enough or in enough danger to have to construct such a suit and go about wearing it for any length of time? I hope not
– but it’s within the realm of possibility. I never dismiss any idea I think can be of use, even if it seems a little cheesy or if the relevant applications are limited and specific in scope.

It is perhaps a delicious irony that the only time people like “Jason Devon” can offer anything useful to the field of self-defense is when they’re deliberately trying to do just the opposite. If that is what it takes to get them to contribute positively to society, I think we can all live with that.

Remember that whenever you read something in The Martialist, it goes without saying that you should do so with a critical, active mind. Bear in mind, however, that I will
never publish something that I don’t believe is useful. I don’t always agree with the opinions expressed in my publication (sometimes I will say this and sometimes I don’t bother), but everything that goes into print is something that I believe will be of benefit to the reader. I cannot track down and verify the intentions of every prospective author
– I can only examine each article on its own merits and determine if reading such material will provide the reader with useful entertainment, information, and fuel for further study and research.

Sorry, kiddo.  Phil Elmore publishes
useful ideas identifiable on their own merits,
regardless of provenance.  What’s more, The Martialist saw through
your
transparent and ill-conceived attempt from the beginning.

This article, however dishonest in its inception, does those things and I am proud to have included it. I am proud because I have managed to squeeze something worthwhile out of an otherwise worthless human being
– and in the process I have, in the spirit of guerilla marketing, yet again managed to use my critics as a tool for publicity. I must, therefore, admit to a certain amount of mischief in knowingly making use of my detractors for this purpose, but I think that’s a genuine case of, “It’s not a bug, it’s a feature.” 
(For more reverse-double-backflip “ownage,” take a look at
this rebutted criticism of Shorthand Empty Hand on the SHEH webpage.)

As of this writing I’ve spent the entire morning feeling smug. I am, in fact, insufferably pleased with myself. It’s not every day I get to
“own” someone who was looking to do just that to me.