Kung Fu Fighting on the Isle of Wight

Some of you may have missed this one. an Isle of Wight musician has been arrested following an allegation of ‘racially aggravated harassment’ in Sandown last weekend after a performance of the 1970s song Kung Fu Fighting.

Simon Ledger, 34, of Shanklin, said he was playing the Carl Douglas hit at the Driftwood bar, Sandown, on Sunday when a man of Chinese origin took offence at the lyrics and complained to police. You couldn't make this up; Mr Ledger was arrested later that day while dining at the Dragon Pearl Chinese restaurant in Shanklin!

Kung Fu Fighting was a one-hit wonder 37 years ago for Carl Douglas. It sold nine million copies around the world and was number one on both sides of the Atlantic. Until now, no one has accused Kung Fu Fighting of being racist. Carl Douglas is Jamaican and the record was produced by the Anglo-Indian disco arranger Biddu.

Isle of Wight police have since dropped all charges..........

Kung Fu is associated with the Shaolin Budddhist Monastery. Shaolin is a Chán Buddhist temple at Song Shan near Zhengzhou City Henan Province in Dengfeng, China. It is led by Venerable abbot Shi Yǒngxìn. Founded in the 5th century, the monastery is long famous for its association with Chinese martial arts and particularly with Shaolin Kung Fu, and it is the Mahayana Buddhist monastery perhaps best known to the Western world. According to the Jingde Chuandeng Lu or Transmission of the Lamp Shaolin is where Bodhidharma, a Buddhist monk from South India,famously meditated facing a wall for nine years, not speaking for the entire time in order to acheive enlightenment. He is credited as being the leading patriarch and transmitter of Zen to China. He is the patron saint of the Shaolin Monastery, and is attributed to, in Chinese legends, to have begun the physical training of the monks that later turned into Kung Fu.

The 1970s television series Kung Fu starred David Carradine as Kwai Chang Caine, a Shaolin monk on the run in the Wild West whose Zen (Ch'an) training is tested along his journey. Carradine's part was originally to be played by Bruce Lee. Ironically, Lee was pulled at the last minute before airing for looking "too Chinese" for an American public accustomed to white actors portraying ethnic minority characters for a mainly white audience. However, the character of Caine was supposed to be of mixed Chinese and European ancestry, a fact which may have also had an influence on this decision.