They are padded, don't allow low kicks, no punches to the face etc. You won't be wawing your feet against each other in a real confrontation.
To be fair though, by comparison,
boxers have rules too: they aren't allowed to hit below the belt, aren't allowed to hold, push, or throw, and they wear gloves. I would still consider boxing to be a
full-contact martial art though.
MMA doesn't allow head-butts, groin attacks, downward elbow strikes, strikes to the spine, strikes to the back of the head, or strikes to the throat. I would still consider MMA to be
full-contact though.
Wrestling doesn't allow leg attacks, full nelsons, head scissors, back bows, headlocks, forceful trips, finger pulling, etc. I would still consider wrestling to be
full-contact though.
Heck even sport
shooting has rules. You can't just walk up the target and pull the trigger, the way you could in a real-world gunfight. And don't even get me started about
fencing!!!
My point is, just because a sport has
rules, that doesn't mean it's not a full contact sport. Heck, even
Fight Club has rules.
But also, just as importantly, I think we have to be careful about confusing the rules of
sport-competition with the kind of
training provided in that style. Like, just because a boxer can't hit below the belt in a ring, that doesn't mean he wouldn't do so in a street-fight. Likewise, just because you can't kick a knee in WTF sparring, that doesn't mean you wouldn't kick in a knee in a real fight.
Admittedly WTF sparring rules are designed to "give a good show" to the audience, but that's true for other sports like...basketball and football as well. Audiences like to see high spinning kicks: it makes WTF taekwondo more watchable for general audiences. But that's the same reason we have a shot-clock in basketball, to make the sport more watchable.
At the end of the day, WTF sparring isn't intended to mirror a real-world bar-fight any more than Greco-Roman wrestling is, but that doesn't mean that training in wrestling (or taekwondo) wouldn't be useful in a real-world fight. Admittedly, you could argue that some styles prepare you for a "real fight" more than other styles do, but even
that is just one factor among many. I think I could make a good case that size, speed, strength, and stamina are FAR more important in a real-world fight than
style is. Like...an out-of-shape boxer would probably get his butt kicked by a very fit kung fu guy every time, but that's not because of the kung fu. Personally, my opinion is, when it comes to most real-world fights, the major benefit of any martial art is really the
conditioning it provides, more than the technique it teaches (but I can see why some people would disagree with me on that). It seems to me that no matter what the style, if you train hard, you're going to be in better shape, and that's what's primarily going to provide you an advantage in a fight, I think. But I don't have a lot of experience in real-world fights, so...I could be wrong. Maybe some body who frequently fights in bars would have more insight.
