Calling Somebody's Dojo A McDojo Is Offensive

[PhotonGuy]

Michael Phelps has like 24 gold medals.
Bruce Lee won 1 high school boxing tournament, and no other real proof of any physical skill.
Bruce Lee is famous as a movie star and a martial arts philosopher.

So do you think Phelps would make a good swimming coach? If you were a competitive swimmer would you want him as a coach?

 

[Wing Woo Gar]

To be fair he was indeed famous for martial arts.
But as has been noted for most people being good at martial arts doesn’t necessarily mean being able to fight.

His 1 inch punch was a martial arts thing and he was famous for it. I’d say he was definitely more famous as an actor and philosopher than as an actual martial artist though.

It’s not his 1 inch punch, it is ubiquitous in CMA. He is famous for his demonstration of it.

 

[Dirty Dog]

So do you think Phelps would make a good swimming coach? If you were a competitive swimmer would you want him as a coach?

There is no way to know since, so far as I know, he doesn't coach. He could be the Worst Coach Ever.

The number of world class athletes who go on to become successful coaches in their sport later in life is pretty tiny.
The best coaches are not necessarily (or even usually) the best athletes.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

Alright I will use a different example. Let's say there's this professor who is well known for being excellent at teaching the material from his given field. Let's say the professor teaches medicine for instance. He's taught at Harvard Medical School and other top universities and is famous for having many of his students becoming some of the best doctors in the field. Now let's say you're a student of his learning medicine. In this case you would be getting top quality instruction and you would not be going to a McDojo, or a McMedical School in this case, not when you're being taught by said professor.

Yes, if their a famous coach/teacher. Very different than a famous fighter though.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

When I talk about dojos that hand out blackbelts like candy what Im talking about is dojos that have really low skill requirements for the black belt, so that students can have really terrible skills and still get black belts. Its not a matter of how long it takes to get black belts, if you have high skill requirements and a student meets the skill requirements in 1-2 years than you can give said student a black belt in 1-2 years without being a McDojo.

This would of course not apply to dojos that don't have belt systems, other factors would be taken into play when determining if such dojos are McDojos.

Still the same response. Just because one school has a low skill requirement for black belt and another has a higher skill requirement, that's not an indication of which school offers better instruction. Just a difference in what black belt means to the instructors.

 

[Dirty Dog]

Alright I will use a different example. Let's say there's this professor who is well known for being excellent at teaching the material from his given field. Let's say the professor teaches medicine for instance. He's taught at Harvard Medical School and other top universities and is famous for having many of his students becoming some of the best doctors in the field. Now let's say you're a student of his learning medicine. In this case you would be getting top quality instruction and you would not be going to a McDojo, or a McMedical School in this case, not when you're being taught by said professor.

One of the fellows I've worked with for years is an incredibly gifts cardiothoracic surgeon. Absolutely brilliant. I'd let him cut on me in a heartbeat (see what I did there?).

Residents hate him. Worst teacher ever.

 

[PhotonGuy]

Still the same response. Just because one school has a low skill requirement for black belt and another has a higher skill requirement, that's not an indication of which school offers better instruction. Just a difference in what black belt means to the instructors.

Well in an earlier post you talked about the possibility of making students wait 10 years to get black belts and providing bad instruction at your dojo. So in that hypothetical dojo, exactly what are your standards for giving students black belts? Is it simply a time requirement? To get a black belt would all a student have to do is be a student for 10 years? Does a student have to be at your dojo for 10 years and immediately upon being there for 10 years they're granted promotion to the rank of black belt but not a moment before? If that's the case then I would agree, you are providing very poor instruction and you've got very poor standards.

 

[PhotonGuy]

Yes, if their a famous coach/teacher. Very different than a famous fighter though.

Alright, then just translate "coach/teacher" to "sensei."

 

[PhotonGuy]

Yes, if their a famous coach/teacher. Very different than a famous fighter though.

You've made your point so let me ask you this, would you want Michael Phelps's coach as your coach if you were a competitive swimmer?

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

Alright, then just translate "coach/teacher" to "sensei."

Yes, I am. All of those words are the same. coach/teacher is the same as sensei, and all should be able to teach. Famous fighter is different.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

You've made your point so let me ask you this, would you want Michael Phelps's coach as your coach if you were a competitive swimmer?

That depends, am I allowed anyone. If so, no. I'd want his coach.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

Well in an earlier post you talked about the possibility of making students wait 10 years to get black belts and providing bad instruction at your dojo. So in that hypothetical dojo, exactly what are your standards for giving students black belts? Is it simply a time requirement? To get a black belt would all a student have to do is be a student for 10 years? Does a student have to be at your dojo for 10 years and immediately upon being there for 10 years they're granted promotion to the rank of black belt but not a moment before? If that's the case then I would agree, you are providing very poor instruction and you've got very poor standards.

I didn't mean to indicate 10 years vs 2 years as set time requirements-I don't know anywhere where time is the only goal. My point is that one school may take a lot longer to develop the skill to become a black belt in that style/school then another one, and that's not an indication of the quality of either.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

Maybe? I can fight, does not equal I can teach.

There is no way to know since, so far as I know, he doesn't coach. He could be the Worst Coach Ever.

The number of world class athletes who go on to become successful coaches in their sport later in life is pretty tiny.
The best coaches are not necessarily (or even usually) the best athletes.

Yes, if their a famous coach/teacher. Very different than a famous fighter though.

One of the fellows I've worked with for years is an incredibly gifts cardiothoracic surgeon. Absolutely brilliant. I'd let him cut on me in a heartbeat (see what I did there?).

Residents hate him. Worst teacher ever.

Possibly my greatest asset as a coach is that I am naturally extremely untalented in the martial arts. Like, bottom 1% of the bell curve.

What that means is that just about every possible mistake or difficulty a student may have in learning a technique or concept - I've already been through it and have explored quite a lot of fixes that don't work before finding ones that do. This gives me a big head start in spotting what my students are having problems with and steering them in the right direction to fix it. Sometimes people who are naturally gifted just picked up important subtleties of movement instinctively and don't know how to articulate what a student who doesn't have that natural facility needs to hear.

There are also people who are both great practitioners and great coaches. It's always a treat to learn from those individuals.

 

[Steve]

So do you think Phelps would make a good swimming coach? If you were a competitive swimmer would you want him as a coach?

To be honest, probably not. I’d want the person who coached Phelps.

 

[Steve]

That depends, am I allowed anyone. If so, no. I'd want his coach.

Exactly. If I’d read a couple more posts I could have just agreed with you.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I've addressed that, see post #558.

Yep. That was several posts after the one you quoted - thanks for pointing me to it!

 

[PhotonGuy]

That depends, am I allowed anyone.

In this hypothetical situation, yes.

If so, no. I'd want his coach.

That's exactly what I said in post $569, if you go back and check you will see that I said, "would you want Michael Phelps's coach as your coach if you were a competitive swimmer?

 

[PhotonGuy]

I didn't mean to indicate 10 years vs 2 years as set time requirements-I don't know anywhere where time is the only goal. My point is that one school may take a lot longer to develop the skill to become a black belt in that style/school then another one, and that's not an indication of the quality of either.

Well when you talk about one school where it takes a lot longer than in another school to develop the skill to become a black belt its important to know why it takes much longer in one school to develop said level of skill than in another school. For instance, maybe the reason why it takes much longer to develop the skill to become a black belt in one school than it does in another is because in the school where it does take much longer, they've got much higher skill requirements for black belt then the other school, and so forth.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

In this hypothetical situation, yes.

That's exactly what I said in post $569, if you go back and check you will see that I said, "would you want Michael Phelps's coach as your coach if you were a competitive swimmer?

Wow, not sure how I misread that. Then yes, I would want his coach at my coach.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

Well when you talk about one school where it takes a lot longer than in another school to develop the skill to become a black belt its important to know why it takes much longer in one school to develop said level of skill than in another school. For instance, maybe the reason why it takes much longer to develop the skill to become a black belt in one school than it does in another is because in the school where it does take much longer, they've got much higher skill requirements for black belt then the other school, and so forth.

Yes. That's exactly what my point is. You said it's a sign of the quality of instruction. I was saying no, the bar for black belt may just be different.