Fakes, Frauds and Wanna BeeeZZZZ

[VSanhodo]

I use too give my students and come to think of it still do the following example.

If the only person you ever trained with with the guy next door who only achieved the rank of Yellow belt under some yellow belt and you hadnever been exsposed to any other art you would be impressed.

Conversely, If the only person you ever trained with was Bruce Lee and you had never been exsposed to anything else you would not appreciate just how good he was.

Now if the student of the back yard wonder ended up meeting or going to Bruce's Class he would probably be amazed whereas if Bruces student went to the back yard wonders class he would instantly have a real appreciation of what he had been being taught.

There are way toooooo many overnight wonders which in my opinion have done nothing but bastardize the martial arts as a whole. I feel there is way tooo much govermental involvment and regulation in our lives alread. however, I do wish there was a way of weeding these BS artist out.

I myself, whenever I run into what I know is an overnight wonder be it on the street, in a grocery store or even in their school. I have no problem whatsoever speaking to them either in private or public and very nicely tell them I know they are a sham, but would be willing to help them in any way I possibly can to get on the right track. As I also believe most have good intentions just poor training.

Thats just my 3 cents worth

Thanks

San

 

[Don Roley]

Until then, I'd like to ask ... why not use the same name of the style and not claim association with the official organization?

If by name of a style, you are talking about something like "jujutsu" or "aikido", I have no problem with that. But if you are talking about something like Yoshinkan aikido, then that is like saing McDonalds hamburgers instead of just plain hamburgers.

And if you do not follow the directions of the official orginization, then you should not try to use their name or associate with them. If you trained with them, then they can never take that away. But if there is a chance that a person could walk into your studio and think they are under the control of someone else.... that is not a good thing. If you are not under the control of someone, either side might take the art in directions that the other does not like.

Your case is Hwarang-do. The creator (yeah, I believe he created it and did not learn it as he said) of the art has copyrighted the name. Kind of a scummy thing to do if he honestly thought it was a style that had a long history instead of something he created. But that is the law. Aikido was copyrighted in a South American country by someone with only a little training in the art, and my Japanese arts name is copyrighted in Canada by a person I do not hold in high regard. I think things like Yoshinkan should be copyrighted, but not aikido- unless it was the creator like Ueshiba.

From what I know of Hwarang-do, the guys that broke off are the honest ones.