Fencing: A sociopath sport?

Im considering taking up fencing, based on the following from the Wikipedia article:

At the most basic level, fencing revolves around the opening and closing of various lines of attack and defense. In order for one fencer to hit, the other must make a mistake and leave an "opening." Fencing tactics rely on a mixture of "open-eyes" opportunism and deliberate "set-ups", where the opponent is systematically fed false information about one's own intentions.

Famous sociopaths: Julie D'Aubigny

Via this Badass of the Week, I present the historical figure Julie D'Aubigny.  Some selections, but the entire article is pretty entertaining:


Julie D'Aubigny was a 17th-century bisexual French opera singer and fencing master who killed or wounded at least ten men in life-or-death duels, performed nightly shows on the biggest and most highly-respected opera stage in the world, and once took the Holy Orders just so that she could sneak into a convent and bang a nun. If nothing in that sentence at least marginally interests you, I have no idea why you're visiting this website.


One of the most badass human beings ever produced by France was born in 1670 into a life of wealth, privilege, and one-percenter opulence that meant she could have just spent her entire life chilling out Real Housewives style without ever so much as having to shank a single human being in the eye in a hellacious fit of rage, but, as we shall soon see, that sort of malaise really wasn't this chick's bag. 
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Julie D'Aubigny moved to Marseille and started hooking up with a badass fencing master who just so happened to be on the run for murder after he stabbed some dude to death in an alley outside Paris. The homicidal fugitive swordsman trained D'Aubigny in the finer arts of fencing for a while, but as soon as she realized the student was now the master she ditched his broke ass and started giving sword exhibitions across Marseille to hone her skills and make a little extra dough. Basically it worked like this – she'd pull out her sword, sing a song or two, and challenge anyone in the audience to battle her in a duel. If someone stepped up, she'd sing a humiliating song about them, then make them look like assholes who couldn't tell the difference between a sword and a limp piece of linguine. Her skills were so lights-out gonzo that one time some jerkwad in the crowd called out that she wasn't really a woman, but was some badass cross-dressing cavalier musketeer motherfucker who was ripping everyone off. She responded by ripping open her blouse and telling the audience to "judge for themselves".


Oddly enough, kicking peoples' asses for money eventually led to a completely unrelated job prospect – a career as the star attraction of the Paris Opera. Apparently, while this chick was singing songs to humiliate her enemies in the dueling circle, some powerful record execs were in the audience, and they were so impressed by her melodious contralto voice that they decided she should be doing better shit than stabbing people in the balls for spare change. In the span of a few months, the woman known in Marseilles only as "La Maupin" (meaning "The Mapuin") went from a completely untrained street performer to the lead actress in the world's most respected Opera, playing roles of badass Classical chicks like Pallas Athena, Medea, and Dido. In addition to her flair for the dramatic and innate musical talent, it also helped that La Maupin had a near-photographic memory and rarely needed to read her lines more than once before committing them to memory.


Of course, her fiery temperament in love and combat meant that she slept with or swordfought with most of the men and women in the opera at various points during her career. Like, one time some jackass doucheface pretty-boy actor was being overly-aggressive while talking to one of Julie's actress friends, so La Maupin told that asshole to take a chill pill and show the lady some respect. He told her to fuck off and mind her own bitch business. Later that night, as he was walking home, he found La Maupin standing in the street, weapon drawn, challenging him to a duel for honor. When the guy refused to pull his sword, she fucking beat his ass with a wooden cane, stole his pocketwatch, and left his dumb ass in an alley. The next day, the dude came to work with a couple black eyes, and when people were like, "WTF is up with your face," he told them he got jumped by three big black dudes armed with hammers and baseball bats. As soon as he said this, La Maupin pulled out the dude's pocketwatch and called him out a lying liar from Douchebagville. Then, to make matters more humiliating, she then forced the dude to kneel and beg forgiveness in front of all his co-workers before he could get his shit back.

La Maupin was also kind of a hardcore bisexual, and some of her tales of badass awesomeness dueling over female lovers and seducing chambermaids read like they were perpetrated by musketeers or pirates or some other ultra-daring swashbuckling male heroes of eighteenth-century literature. Of course, being a woman, Julie D'Aubigny could pull off some feats of romantic badassitude that most men could only dream of. The most notable example of this was the time that she became a nun just so she could hook up with one of the sisters in the convent. The story goes like this: One time the Mademoiselle D'Aubigny got some super-hot lusty blonde to fall in love with her. When the blonde's parents found out their daughter was a lesbo, they had their "ravished" daughter put into a convent, totally unaware that this wasn't going to be nearly enough to deter La Maupin – D'Aubigny took the holy orders, entered the convent as an initiate, created a diversion by setting the fucking convent on fire, and then kidnapped the blonde nun, snuck her out of there, and shacked up with her for like a month. Are you kidding me with this?

I don't know, maybe she had borderline personality disorder?  If the contemporary portraits are any indication of what she looked like, her many conquests might have something more to do with her skill at seduction and confidence than her beauty.

Not for the feint of heart

Recently I've been itching for a fight. I've been so focused on a project for work, really overcommitted, and just generally not scheduling in enough M.E. time for "special interests". As if on cue, a long term work entanglement seemed to be coming to a head.

I had not been seeing eye to eye with this person (CW) for a while (CW is neither directly over or under me, not even directly affiliated with my employer, but we worked on a project together). CW had been a consistent source of both fun and frustration over the period that we were working together. I ended up terminating the working arrangement, though, due to some irreconcilable differences and my desire to finally move the project forward. By now CW most certainly hates my guts and thinks I am evil. She is actually very perceptive about a lot of things about me that most people are blind to, but interpreted the signals in a paranoid/unrealistic way (conspiracy theories) instead of the normal/banal truth (two-faced and manipulative). Despite being let go from the project, this person still had some materials that I needed to finish up.

Back to now, this person had finally agreed to schedule a meeting with me to discuss the impasse. I did my homework before the meeting. I talked to someone else who was on the project and got her on my side (basically by making her afraid of this person, suggesting that this person is erratic, owned a gun, delusional, etc.).

CW came for our schedule meeting and sat down. We exchanged greetings and I waited for her to begin. When she didn't, I said something with slightly condescending overtones that I knew would set her off (she hates that I think I am better than she is). I wanted her to attack me, and she did. Put on the spot like she was, she started spouting out reasons why I was a terrible person and she would never give me the project materials. I started taking notes, which further infuriated her. CW's accusations boiled down to me being completely unethical, would abuse the project materials for my own nefarious (not really) ends, under-compensated her, and was attempting to pass off her work as my own. She left in a huff, saying something about expecting to have a formal complaint filed.

I couldn't have been happier! Armed as I was with these accusations, I shot off an email to my superior, something to the extent of, "I didn't want to have to bother you with this, but I have just received some very serious accusations of which I thought you should be aware." I gave her a quick, straight rundown of the facts leading up to that day. I then painted the accusations in the worst light I could. Finally, I took umbrage--the righteous anger of the innocent and put upon: "I have put up with her atrocious behavior before due to her exigent personal circumstances, but I refuse to be responsible for somehow trying to excuse this completely unwarranted and personally offensive affront on my character." So now of course I am the victim of these outrageous accusations. In fencing, we call that a "feint," one of the most effective moves when timed correctly, and I couldn't have timed it better. I slow played the hell out of that issue, giving in here, fighting back there, until finally the time was exactly right, she lunged in for what she thought would hurt me most, leaving herself completely unguarded.

For various reasons (including potential legal liability for the organization if I was found to have misbehaved), my superior will support me. The accusations are so ridiculous and unfounded that no one would take them seriously. Furthermore, in insisting that these accusations be resolved, I will accomplish my real goal which is to get those project materials back. Almost a year of having to deal with this person and finally my patience will pay off, with the added consequence of seeing her professional life effectively destroyed as she continues to try to sling mud at me and ends up being the only one tarnished.

In my defense (and in case any of the interested parties read this now or later), I am actually innocent of wrongdoing in this situation, but I also know that true guilt and innocence don't matter as much as playing your cards well.