I do love our modern caricatures of ninjas, dressed in black pajamas, cat burglers so stealth as to be invisible. When I am not indulging in cheesy ninja movies, I like to call myself a ninja of spiritual warfare.
Something that has always intrigued me about ninjas is how very NOT stealth they are. I mean everyone is just pretending they don’t exist! It’s a total gaslight! I have a sensitivity radar that likes to scream at movies when they present an odd juxtaposition that just doesn’t compute. Like, look out behind you, there are 25 guys actually wearing ninja costumes…
The first rule of stealth and subversive club is, do not wear a easily recognizable uniform that stands out like a sore thumb.
So why can’t anybody ever see them? Why are they said to be invisible? I happen to be intrigued by why people can and can’t see things that are right there in front of them, so you know I’m going to leap down this rabbit hole.
First of all, ninjas are sort of a real thing, or rather there is some actual warrior history that gave rise to our modern legends. IRL, they probably more resembled peasants or farmers and tried to blend in with their surroundings. I don’t wish to quibble over history, but only to address the modern caricature, the romantized version of the ninja that we hold dear today. I wish to explain why so many people look right at them and go, oh yep, they are completely invisible and nobody can see them.
They are made of shadow and they can walk through walls…..
That is because they come from the theater! They are the original stage hands. Mostly from Kubuki theater, but the tradition of the black clad stage hand is shared across many cultures. All those props needed to be moved during a scene and so stage hands would sneak around in the shadows all dressed in black so as to not disturb the play. Legend has it that one clever playwright decided to incorporate one of them into the play by placing a knife in his hand and using him as the secret assassin. If so, this was an incredible act of creativity and I highly approve. Absolutely brilliant to merge reality with fantasy and employ a bit utility all at once.
Alas, I cannot confirm that tale of an actual play that brought a stage hand into the scene through any substantial research, but you can certainly track the rise of the modern ninja caricature through art and history, back to the stage hands of the days of old, all sneaking around in their black pajamas. Whether or not someone once incorporated them into the play remains in the realm of legends, at least for the moment.
Interestingly, people were trained to ignore them. Hundreds of years of play watching actually trained people to disregard what their lying eyes where telling them. Those black clad figures and shadows you might see on stage are not a part of the story, not part of the drama being presented, so they don’t even exist. They are invisible. Forget you even saw them. Don’t believe your lying eyes.
Sometimes remembering the story of the ninjas helps me to be more patient and understanding towards people. I am a freewill, rugged individualist myself, someone who believes that if people actually wanted to change, they would. I think that’s a good life lesson to embrace, people are the way they are because they believe it is acceptable. Don’t try to fix other people because you can’t. However, there are also other factors at play beyond our control that do impact our lives, even the lives of people who believe in freewill and full autonomy. Even for me. So when other people just can’t seem to see the 30 or so ninjas gathering all around them, it’s not necessarily their fault, it’s not necessary willful ignorance or deliberate foolishness or outright evil.
Sometimes you just have to take a deep breath and blame the ninjas.
See, there's this thing called biology... 
Now I am confused. I always thought Ninjas wore black because they were assassins who killed at night. Of course, wearing black would make them stand out if there was enough light to see them. In the past, however, electric lights did not exist.
Your theory certainly applies to other things. When we are taught to accept certian items and beliefs, because these beliefs require us to faulty logic and flaw assumptions. Ninjas in uniform or stagehands ? Certainly comparable.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Lol! Actually somewhere around the 16th century, they were rebels, anti government peasant farmers getting squeezed off tiny plots of land. They did a lot of spying, reconnaissance, not necessarily assassinations. So that is part of the Robin Hood romanticism that goes along with them. They where the working class heroes of the day. Later the word came to mean mercenaries, hired soldiers, even monks.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Their history is on Wiki; they practiced irregular warfare, and were trained to be particularly secretive about their actions and existence. Hollywood seldom if ever tells an accurate account, they twist time lines, add fictitious characters, and events for drama. Following the unification of Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate in the 17th century, the ninja faded into obscurity.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hollywood is not a good source of information about anything. Sigh!
I stopped watching TV in 1982. Hardly ever watch a movie. Still have some of Hollywood’s nonsense in my noggin.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Admitting that a post isn’t the place for a book, aren’t the relationships between free will, responsibility and deoxynucleic acid a bit more complex than this?
LikeLiked by 1 person
LOL! Yes, the discussion is probably far more complex, but it’s not nearly as much fun as ninjas!
LikeLike
Reading this, I can’t help reminiscing about our production of “Faust” when I was at the university. We had a team of “scenery spirits,” girls draped in bluish, purplish grey fabric who floated around on stage for the many scene changes – in fact, they WERE the scenery. They would strike various poses to be doorways, walls, windows, etc. You’d kind of forget about them while watching the scene, then all of a sudden, when the scene was over, the bridge would come apart, float to another part of the stage, and form a gate. Lovingly nicknamed the “blueberries” by the cast, they were one of the most unique features of that production.
LikeLiked by 1 person
How charming! I do love to see some clever creativity going on, especially in theater. A few times I got to coach kids putting together skits and they often had some really wonderful ideas.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Amen, Gabrielle! When I directed the Halloween outreach, “Satan’s Worst Nightmare,” some of the best ideas came from the actors. For example, one year we portrayed Satan, instead of as a hideous, scary monster, as an attractive young man in a tuxedo. (Who’s tempted by someone hideous?) Another year he was portrayed as a rock star. 😉👍
LikeLiked by 1 person
IB
This reminded me of the Yuri Bezmenov interview on YouTube “Ideological Subversion”
The part where he says that when complete, you could present “The truth” to someone and they will not be able to or refuse to see it. I like to say I believe my own eyes. I am however cognisant of the power of confirmation bias. Discernment is key!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you, Jeff! I haven’t seen “Ideological subversion.” I’ll have to check it out. Discernment really is key and a big part of wisdom is having enough humility to recognize our own potential blind spots.
I sometimes joke about the sour milk analogy. I’m not sure why, but when someone thinks the milk has gone bad, they often want everyone else to taste it and smell it and come into agreement with them. “Does this smell bad to you?!” A bit comical, because if it’s sour it’s sour, and so why we feel the need to affirm this simple truth, check our perceptions, and get some validation is beyond me. Alas, when it comes to things that are far more important then sour milk, we often become absolutely convinced of our own certainty and everyone else is just plain wrong, if not downright evil about it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
This reminds me of that research that demonstrates that people don’t see the gorillas walking through the frame of the video, or notice that people have changed their clothes in the middle of a conversation, all that work on perceptual consistency, seeing what we’re looking for, or what we expect, or what we agree to see …
LikeLiked by 1 person
True, Hat. There’s also that old myth or legend about how Native Americans did not see ships coming because they had no frame of reference, nothing to connect it to within their brain, and so it didn’t process. True or not, I try to remember that is often true in a less material sense. Sadly, we can’t tell someone what a good, good Father is, if they have no frame of reference and can’t “see” it. You have to show them what it looks like. That’s our job as Christians, to make what is invisible to some, visible.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Indeed. One of the great ends of the church, “the exhibition of the kingdom of heaven to the world.” I wish we were better at that.
LikeLiked by 1 person