# Kung Fu's David Carradine Dies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 4, 2009, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691 "2009-06-04T13:59:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2009, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/61 "2009-06-04T23:41:19Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > Is it me or does hanging seem a very odd way to kill yourself when there are guns, drugs, and any number of other means that are a lot less painful and iffy available? Yes, that’s why it appears not to be suicide, but autoerotic asphyxiation. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2009, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/62 "2009-06-04T23:57:04Z")
Bruce Lee, who was furious over losing the role of Kwai Chang Cane in _Kung Fu_ to a white dude, may well be waiting in the Bardo to kick Carradine’s ass. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/63 "2009-06-05T00:11:17Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > Frankly, I’d wish it was suicide rather than AEE, but then again the guy had three young children and I have nothing but ill will towards someone who would do that to their kids. Really? You’d prefer he spent his last moments in such a deep and hopeless sense of despair that the only release he could find was utter self-obliviation? As opposed to him indulging in a moderately weird sexual fetish gone terribly wrong? No offense, but that’s kinda whacked. ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/64 "2009-06-05T00:15:08Z")
I think there’s very little chance this was suicide. His career was doing very well, he was supposedly in the middle of a project in Bangkok, and he’s been pretty active in the Hollywood scene as of late. Financially he seems to have been in good shape and at the age of 72 it’s unlikely that depression or other mental illness had set in. It’s very likely that it was probably auto-erotic asphyxiation, or maybe even more likely that it wasn’t quite so “auto”. It’s sad but I compare it to dying while skydiving. The fact that he was a happy and active 72 year old makes it easier to come to terms with. He seems to have lived a happy full life. ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/65 "2009-06-05T00:16:25Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Really? You’d prefer he spent his last moments in such a deep and hopeless sense of despair that the only release he could find was utter self-obliviation? As opposed to him indulging in a moderately weird sexual fetish gone terribly wrong? No offense, but that’s kinda whacked. Leave her be. She feels better about herself passing moral judgment on the dead. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/66 "2009-06-05T00:24:57Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > He appeared in commercials for [yellowbook.com](http://yellowbook.com). Did anyone else see those? Yeah. He seemed to be enjoying himself. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/67 "2009-06-05T00:44:09Z")
yellowbook.dot.coooooooommmmmm. I have to agree…rather an embarrassing way to go. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/68 "2009-06-05T00:59:25Z")
ending his career with a performance in _Love’s Labour’s Lost_ ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/69 "2009-06-05T01:52:08Z")
> [@Omniscient](#): > > Leave her be. She feels better about herself passing moral judgment on the dead. Oh stop it. I know people with suicidal depression so at least I can understand it, to a point. Excuse me for thinking that, with all the kink in the world, if your best wank idea will possibly end up with you dead with a cord wrapped around your neck and your johnson (and you’re in Thailand, for Christ’s sake, the land of kink), that’s pretty lame. Mileage does vary. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/70 "2009-06-05T02:05:53Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > Oh stop it. Yes. Let’s get back to the gallows humour. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/71 "2009-06-05T02:18:01Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > I did not know this…[Martha Plimpton](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000588/) is his niece. The Carradines are strung out in all sorts of family trees. They also all seem to have a reputation for high intelligence and extreme eccentricity. (Martha’s father is Keith, who still looked amazingly good nekkid for a man nearing 60 as the sister’s love interest on _Dexter_ a couple of years ago.) My sister’s husband used to own a dress shop. While I doubt she’s glad David Carradine is dead, she did used to curse whenever she saw him on TV because while he was filming a movie close to their shop (she lives in a beach community) he had one of his reps call my brother-in-law on a Sunday to ask him to open the store as a personal favor so that Carradine could bring his wife (or girlfriend- not really sure) to buy some clothes for some event or other. Per my sister and her husband she tried on every dress in the store that was anywhere near her size before saying “nah, can’t really find anything”, to which he said “Sorry, thanks for opening” to my brother-in-law and they left without spending a penny. Pissed them off big time. I remember looking through his memoir in a bookstore once. He has one of the strangest forewards I’ve ever seen, one that dedicates the book to Buddha and Alan Watts and Descartes and pretty much everyone else you’ve ever heard of in the field of philosophy or spirituality. > [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > Yes. Let’s get back to the gallows humour. I’m trying to remember what movie had the line “At least he got off before he got offed?” about a man who had ejaculated shortly before dying. Anyone? Bueller? ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/72 "2009-06-05T02:21:49Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > I’m trying to remember what movie had the line “At least he got off before he got offed?” about a man who had ejaculated shortly before dying. Anyone? Bueller? [Basic Instinct](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103772/quotes) ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/73 "2009-06-05T02:25:06Z")
There’s also _Nekromantik_. But no snappy dialogue to go with it. ---
**Author:** ![Hoopy\_Frood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hoopy_frood/32/8452_2.png) [@Hoopy\_Frood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoopy_Frood)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/74 "2009-06-05T02:27:07Z")
With the AEE thing, maybe they need to rename it to the “Five Point Hairy Palm Exploding Heart Technique”. ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/75 "2009-06-05T03:32:45Z")
Dang. David Carridine and Bruce Lee did more to popularize martial arts in the US than anyone else. Ya, ya, David wasn’t exactly a real martial artist, and Kung Fu was full of an awful lot of hoaky “oriental stuff.” That said, look at my location and you can see some of the influence that David Carridine/Kung Fu had… Since he’salready in the neighborhood, maybe his incarnation will be at the Shaolin Monastary. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/76 "2009-06-05T04:36:19Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > Sucks all around, I guess. > [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > If there were, he wouldn’t have had to try what he did. I could have provided the poor man with the locations of no less than five BJ bars in Bangkok, none of them far from his hotel. ---
**Author:** ![Sealemon2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@Sealemon2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sealemon2.0)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/77 "2009-06-05T04:52:18Z")
Awww, man…I’m glad he had a full life, and even though the end of it seems…bizzare at best, I still respect the guy. RIP, Bill. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/78 "2009-06-05T05:00:47Z")
So bummed about this. It was good to see him in movies again. > [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > I could have provided the poor man with the locations of no less than five BJ bars in Bangkok, none of them far from his hotel. Hrmm. Maybe his problem wasn’t the girls, but the “increased bloodflow”. Didn’t he know about Levitra? R.I.P. Mr. Carradine. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/79 "2009-06-05T05:22:10Z")
> [@cmyk](#): > > Didn’t he know about Levitra? Is she in Bangkok now? Last I heard she was still dancing in Reno. ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691/80 "2009-06-05T05:52:40Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > Oh stop it. > > I know people with suicidal depression so at least I can understand it, to a point. Excuse me for thinking that, with all the kink in the world, if your best wank idea will possibly end up with you dead with a cord wrapped around your neck and your johnson (and you’re in Thailand, for Christ’s sake, the land of kink), that’s pretty lame. Mileage does vary. It might be embarrassing, but I find something particularly insidious about your implication that he’d be better off suicidally depressed and miserable than horny and bent. I feel like I’m watching Fox News. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kung-fus-david-carradine-dies/498691.md?page=5)