A quick analogy:
Imagine a person setting out to climb a mountain that was 10,000 feet tall. They divide their journey into five stages. On the first day, they climb 2,000 feet, and camp for the night on a ridge. Each day they advance another 2,000 feet until they reach the top. Others have attempted to climb this mountain, but quit at the first plateau, or the 2nd, or 3rd.
Sitting at the top, he considers himself to be a 5th level mountain climber, because he completed all five levels and reached the top. As others join him, and claim the title of 5th level climbers, he says, "I've been here longer, so I am now a 6th level climber. As time passes, and others reach the top, he takes the title of 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th level climber.
If this is how one is "ranked" passed the 5th level climber, then it might be viewed as honorary, or of no particular meaning. 5th level is the true top level of advancement. However, what if the first person to the top, climbs down, and leads an expedition of new climbers to the top, then again, and again. He has climbed the North side of the mountain, the South side, the East, and the West. He as climbed in the Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. Upon reaching the top for the 10th time, he sits down next to someone who has just climbed the mountain once. The new comer says, "I am a 5th level climber, same as you, because we have both reached the top."
I don't believe so! To say that the 5th Dan rank in the Martial Art is the top, is to say that your learning has stopped there. There is more to gain from helping others to the top than just the one journey you took to get there yourself. You would be saying that nothing can be learned, evaluated by your seniors (for that matter, you wouldn't have any seniors) graded, or legitimately acknowledged as a rank of advancement past 5th Degree. Not in my experience.
Another perspective is to divide the mountain into 10 levels instead of five. Each day, you climb 1,000 feet instead of 2,000 feet. Either way, when you reach the top, you have climbed 10,000 feet. It is not the number of increments that indicate the accomplishment, it is where you are along the journey. If someone climbs the top in five stages, and calls himself a 5th level climber, and another person climbs in 10 stages, and calls himself a 10th level climber, then it is right that they should be viewed as being at the same level because they accomplished the same thing, but simply used different measuring sticks along the way.
However, the problem comes when someone climbs using a 10 level system, and reaches the 5th level (half way up the mountain) and suddenly says "hey, there used to be only 5 levels, and that is equal to a 10th level climber, so.... if I go back to a 5 level system, I'm equal to a 10th level climber!" Not unless you have done what a 10th level climber would have accomplished in all 10 levels - and reached the top. If someone completes all ten levels, then, while legitimately holding a 10th level status says, I'm reducing the levels to 5, and I am now at a 5th level, then that stands to reason.
Someone could say, I climbed the mountain as a single level of accomplishment, from ground to peak, so I am a 1st level climber which is equal to your 5th level, which is equal to your 10th level. So we have 1st Degree Black Belts who are equal to 10th Degree Black Belts because they measure their entire 50 years of training in one increment!
All this does (in my opinion) is add to the confusion for the public, and new students, and lends to more abuse by the frauds who don't need to prove any rank because they are a "master" of a rankless system. Mainstream Martial Arts (in America and elsewhere) have begun to conform to a multi-level system of grading knowledge, experience, and expertise. For those who understand this rank structure, it is never about the rank itself, but what it represents. Measuring in smaller increments is helpful to many, and does no harm. Attempting to go back to an earlier system of fewer levels only mixes up the standard that took so long to establish.
As others have said, people will be respected for their knowledge, and skill more than their rank, certificates, or belts they wear, but the honest individuals who display a legitimate rank equivalent to their accomplishments in their personal journey is not an automatic example of ego, or materialism. The problem people are those who never set one foot on the mountain, but claim to have reached the top, or those who go half way, and say they understand enough to restructure the whole journey for others to follow.
My suggestion is, go to the top, and back down a few hundred times. Take a few hundred people to the 10th (or 5th) level right behind you, and when you are 70 years old, tell me what your opinion of the rank structure is. :asian:
CM D.J. Eisenhart
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