Yoda

Years ago there was a kind of "in joke" amongst us who trained with Huk Planas. Huk is a fountain of kenpo knowledge and truly is a person one could look to for insights on the system. As such, he was often referred to as Yoda. So the cry was "Yoda! We seek Yoda!" at the camps at seminars. A few of the guys even went so far as to have a coffee cup made with artwork by Ed Parker Jr that showed Gil Hibben as Obi Wan Kenobi and Huk as Yoda. Not hard to see Gil in the cloak, and Huk with the Yoda ears was a scream.
So I had to laugh when a former student of mine got a little PR piece in the paper that said, referring to Huk "He's like Master Yoda and I, like a jedi". I mean, I get it, but now I have to wonder what the general public would think when they read that. My impression is someone might think he's serious and have to laugh as well. A Karate instructor comparing himself to a Jedi knight, a fictional character in a fantasy movie? The PR blurb was presumably designed to promote his school. Does this sort of thing do that? The rest of the blip was fine, but I think some of his credibility suffered with the last line.
One thing we all know and have to remember is that the media people often screw things up, or just change them to suit. I'm sure they thought the line was cute. He wrote it, it was in the original press release he sent to the paper. But I don't think it helped his cause, being the last line in the blurb. That sort of thing tends to make people remember the last line and not the meat of the article, which itself was good. And the last line was kind of dumb.
Sending your PR releases to the press is a good thing, but the content has to be scrutinized for length, content, timeliness, quality, etc. As in kenpo, take a bystanders perspective. Think about how they might see (read) the article and what would make them want to go to you. Would you want to go to a karate teacher who publicly compares himself to a Jedi?