Not taken seriously

[SageGhost83]

Perhaps the main allure of MMA is that it allows its practitioners to create their own martial style and train it the way that they think is best - full contact with full resistance. A lot of people either don't have the patience to put up with what we do in TMA, or they just plain don't like it. No problem, some things are not for everybody. I think that MMA gives people a chance to truly explore and find their own "thing" without restricting them to a particular tradition or culture. MMA is really big in the US. In the US, we don't like being restricted. We love the freedom of personal creativity, so naturally something like MMA is going to be more appealing to us. Another thing that I have noticed is that a lot of non-asians hate walking into an art and being marginalized because they are not from the culture. It is not a widespread problem, but it is a problem nonetheless. I have been to TKD schools that were run by Korean instructors and I noticed that the Korean students were treated much differently (favoritism) than the American students. Something like MMA, which is more open and inclusive, would also be more appealing to anybody who has experienced this unfortunate practice within the arts. There are a lot of people who don't like having to bow down to the far east, or any other culture, for that matter. MMA gives them a martial platform without forcing a particular tradition or culture upon them. I personally love the traditional stuff, but I understand that it is not for everybody. So it is a case of different strokes for different folks. Of course, both sides claim superiority, but that is just plain silly. It all comes down to individual proficiency.

 

[SageGhost83]

I so hope that the Iceman doesn't retire. He is one of the guys that really made me a fan of the UFC. A traditionalist who likes the UFC, go figure .

 

[azmyth]

I enjoy MMA as well. I'm about as traditional as they come.

What I don't enjoy.. is being from the south and seeing all the redneck, bully, brawlers who have never had any interest in martial arts.. til they found out they could now beat the crap out of someone else.

they come into my school to talk to the instructor about MMA (old school) and they look at us like we are inferior to them. I don't understand why, we are all on the same "side".

I love MMA because its the closest thing to televised Martial arts tournaments we can get.

Does anyone else remember when ESPN had Isshinryu tourneys?

 

[searcher]

What I don't enjoy.. is being from the south and seeing all the redneck, bully, brawlers who have never had any interest in martial arts.. til they found out they could now beat the crap out of someone else.

they come into my school to talk to the instructor about MMA (old school) and they look at us like we are inferior to them. I don't understand why, we are all on the same "side".

Yeah, I am with you on that. I had a guy I used to work with tell me that all the karate guys were a bunch of wusses and we could not fight. He would always say that "wrastlin" was far better and how he had beat one of those karate guys up. I know the guy he beat on. The kid was about 130 lbs and the redneck is about 300 lbs. Not much of a match-up.

 

[Andrew Green]

Three words, azmyth: Olympic martial sport. That's the long and short of it, I think.

No, that's got nothing to do with it. Boxing, Judo & Wrestling are also Olympic sports and are very well respected in the circles that attack TKD and Aikido.

What gets TKD the negative rep is the high quantity of really young students, often with high ranks. The large number of schools teaching under the name TKD that are more like day care centres then gyms. TKD might have a large range of quality in schools under that name, but there are a lot of really bad schools in terms of fighting skill on the bottom end. Partially its just numbers, there are a lot of TKD schools. And partially it is marketing, TKD as a whole has positioned itself as a very kid orientated and commercial system. Not all schools fit that mould, but the ones that do are the ones that stand out.

I wouldn't worry too much though, the people that criticise the most are usually the ones that watch TUF & WWE, but never actually train anyways.

 

[azmyth]

No, that's got nothing to do with it. Boxing, Judo & Wrestling are also Olympic sports and are very well respected in the circles that attack TKD and Aikido.

What gets TKD the negative rep is the high quantity of really young students, often with high ranks. The large number of schools teaching under the name TKD that are more like day care centres then gyms. TKD might have a large range of quality in schools under that name, but there are a lot of really bad schools in terms of fighting skill on the bottom end. Partially its just numbers, there are a lot of TKD schools. And partially it is marketing, TKD as a whole has positioned itself as a very kid orientated and commercial system. Not all schools fit that mould, but the ones that do are the ones that stand out.

I wouldn't worry too much though, the people that criticise the most are usually the ones that watch TUF & WWE, but never actually train anyways.

Yep. ATA is one of the biggest factors. It is probably the most well known TKD org other than the ITF and WTF. Its more of a summer camp than a martial arts program, from what I have seen. There was an ATA school that came and did a demo at a local festival here. There were 7 year old 2nd degrees, camo belts, and neon nunchucks, and plastic bo staffs. Even for demonstration standards it wasn't very good. Don't get me wrong, I have seen plenty of GOOD ATA students, but those just happen to be the ones who still focus on training through all the fluff. I asked about an ATA school nearby here when i was looking for a new school just to check all my options. They wanted 120 dollars a month, plus a contract, plus they had all these little extra programs that cost more. Oh, and if I wanted to bring my whole family.. they had a plan for me. I don't see anything wrong with this, as long as they don't try to market themselves as being for self defense. They do teach alot of good technique from what I have seen.. its just that they don't reinforce it, and since everything is on a time limit to get your 7 year old to black belt in 1 year.. alot of stuff slides by.

I guess it really all comes down to being popular. The more popular something is, the more crap it gets. The sad thing is.. if TKD was the art that was dominating UFC.. it would be the art all the bully brawlers would be flocking to.

I like TKD, in all its forms. I like Karate, kungfu, Muay Thai, Judo.. etc.
Its all about finding your niche and finding a good school to fulfill it. I like to kick, and I like to stretch my body to its limits and do things that are out of comprehension for most people. So, with that TKD is just he right art for me. I enjoy point sparring, and doing forms, and learning about the arts history. I also enjoy seeing the occasional display of flying kicks associated with TKD. I think I would enjoy Hap kido and Tang Soo Do as well, but trouble is finding a school around here. Its either.. bad MMA school, TKD (where I am at now), or BAD ATA TKD.

 

[exile]

No, that's got nothing to do with it. Boxing, Judo & Wrestling are also Olympic sports and are very well respected in the circles that attack TKD and Aikido.

But there's a big difference between those three activities in particular and TKD, Andrew—namely, fighting range. The reason why the people on the Site We Don't Like and similar places have a few good things to say about those particular activities is that their range corresponds to the extremely close range that corresponds to a real streetfight. While these sports are Olympic sports, they're widely seen by people who profess to take a hard-***, realistic view of MA in relation to streetfighting as realistic in their training and applicability to what happens to you in a bar fight or parking lot assault. Boxers are typically toe-to-toe, the ground grappling arts are still closer range, and that trumps the fact that these sports are also based on artificial rules and scoring systems.

The problem with TKD's Olympic avatar is that it rewards techniques which make sense in terms of the kind of spectacle that plays well with ringside judges, but which are widely seen as hopelessly out of touch with real street violence. It's the fact that TKD has become so widely popular in its Olympic sparring guise, rather than its brutal old-school CQ versions—that provokes the kind of response that Azmyth is talking about. The phenomenon you're talking about—the 'Little Tigers' babysitting side of it—is part and parcel of the reduction of the martial content of the art in its most widely known form, but I don't think that's the thing that really yanks these guys' chains. It's the 8–10 ft. fighting distiances that the sport imposes via its Olympic scoring system.

 

[YoungMan]

But if Tae Kwon Do focused on strictly close quarters hard core street realism, there wouldn't be much room for anything else. The art would never advance. Think of it like this: if you constantly had to psychologically prepare yourself for assault, you'd never get anything meaningful done because your whole life would be directed toward fending off an attack.
I agree with Andrew's assessment: Tae Kwon Do gets so much disrespect from other stylists because it basically sold its soul for Olympic glory. At one time, that was admirable. Korea was a Third World Country, and nobody thought the Olympics was feasable.
However, to raise its awareness and get bodies in the door, the Kukkiwon essentially gave rank to all who wanted it. Which led to a legion of "Instructors" who were (or claimed to be) Kukkiwon certified, teaching inferior technique to gullible students.
The end result is that much of what passes for TKD technique these days is, quite frankly, shoddy. Certainly nothing like what the old school black belts strove for. I used to get my butt whupped by guys who had extremely powerful technique, and couldn't care less about medals. Not that they were constantly in danger of assault, but their motivations were certainly more noble. And these were Kukkiwon black belts.

 

[exile]

I agree with Andrew's assessment: Tae Kwon Do gets so much disrespect from other stylists because it basically sold its soul for Olympic glory. At one time, that was admirable. Korea was a Third World Country, and nobody thought the Olympics was feasable.

Hey wait... that's what I was saying, YM! Andrew was disagreeing with me. I mean, I don't think I'm imagining that...

However, to raise its awareness and get bodies in the door, the Kukkiwon essentially gave rank to all who wanted it. Which led to a legion of "Instructors" who were (or claimed to be) Kukkiwon certified, teaching inferior technique to gullible students.
The end result is that much of what passes for TKD technique these days is, quite frankly, shoddy. Certainly nothing like what the old school black belts strove for. I used to get my butt whupped by guys who had extremely powerful technique, and couldn't care less about medals. Not that they were constantly in danger of assault, but their motivations were certainly more noble. And these were Kukkiwon black belts.

Right, there's been a general diminution in quality as the martial content of the art gets diluted for sport purposes. But Andrew was arguing that the real problem was the focus on young children and lowered standards. The two go hand in hand, in a way, but a lot of the people who knock TKD, maybe most of them, have never been in a dojang, I suspect. For them, the 'public' vision of TKD is (in the by-now clichéd phrase) sparring foot tag on the `combat' side and something dangerously like Korean wushu on the forms competition side (that Chloe Bruce video from a few weeks back was very unnerving, and not in a good way). It's what they perceive as combat-irrelevance that pushes their buttons.

A lot of other good points have been made above about the nature of the criticism that being channeled toward TKD from You Know Where and similar places, and what drives that. The thing is, the reason why TKD is such a big target for these yobs is that the disparity between its claims to combat effectiveness and the extreme artificiality of its Olympic sport manifestation work together to paint a big 'Kick Me Here' sign on its butt, at least in certain quarters... those that azmyth is thinking of, for example...

 

[AceHBK]

Questions really should be:

Do you really care what others think about it and how they perceive it?

 

[Cirdan]

Go to any TKD demonstration and you`ll be more than likely to find a bunch of high ranked very young black belts throwing a movie-fu show. The ones doing traditional TKD (Shotokan), a system well able to do the job, are hard to spot.

 

[azmyth]

I honestly don't mind the movie-fu demo's if the skill is there in the other areas too, but they normally aren't. Most orgs focus only on that, and this is not TKD.

I know this is a lame example.. but if you have ever seen the movie "Best of the Best" they kind of paint a picture of how TKD should be viewed in my eyes. Respected as a deadly and useful art if trained properly.

Heck the "IF" factor is all I am asking for. But, the "you know who" folks are so jaded.. that its basically like "If one of the other people with a chip on his shoulder thinks TKD sucks... so should I" Some of them don't know a darn thing about the art.. they are just following the crowd.

They'll deny that they'd ever get kicked or hit.. because their art is so much more superior.. its almost like they have this superman complex. I don't doubt that if I got thrown to the ground.. without some sort of ground training I'm screwed.. but that doesn't mean I can't still do some damage.

In my eyes, TKD is an art of multiple purpose....

Self Defense, Sport, Exercise, mental fitness, showmanship, speed, agility, and heart.

The old saying "it doesn't need to look pretty if it works" is true.. but isn't it cool, than it could be both in TKD? Thats how I look at it anyway.

I'll save my flashy kicks for demo's, and keep my front kicks and sweeps for the street.

 

[kaizasosei]

about taekwon do, there are many things that i like and some that i think could be better.
i never really thought about it before but i think it is true that in taekwondo, there is a tendancy to want to show that taekwondo is a brutally powerful fighting art. in the process, there is too much focus on power and less on skill.
which is strange considering that in my opinion, for taekwondo one needs a high level of body controll, skill as well as flexibility. the focus on kicking alone opens entire worlds of kicking and kicking combinations. also i find taekwondo is one of the most beautiful aesthetic martial arts.
i myself, value kicking just as i do striking with hands, and am capable of fighting without hands if need be. i have had contact with taekwondo since i was a teenager and it further helped me further build on my kicks, that i had been practicing from bujinkan, karate and kungfu.
if someone knows how to make the kicks connect, doesnt matter what style it is kyokushin or taekwondo or whatever, then it is a very powerful style.

 

[azmyth]

exactly.

problem is, people have painted a picture containing 720 spin kicks and 8 year old black belts.

 

[KEritano]

exactly.

problem is, people have painted a picture containing 720 spin kicks and 8 year old black belts.

Unfortunately, it is the TKDists who have painted this picture, not ordinary people. Flash and youth make for great demos and shows. Real self-defense doesn't do well on the big screen.

 

[azmyth]

the real TKDists out there understand that a 720 kick is not effective on the street, and flinging around a plastic bo staff is pointless..

but, the people "watching" on the outside that know nothing about TKD only see this picture. So I guess your right, but its only a certain group of TKDists who are painting this picture.

would be nice if they would show the other side of the paper too.

 

[dancingalone]

I don't think the fancy kicks are the main culprit. Most people are rational enough to realize they are just the 'show' part of TKD. Where TKD falls down is the advent of no-contact sparring and 5 year old black belts. There's also a new emphasis of character development over self-defense training which I find very troubling.

 

[exile]

I don't think the fancy kicks are the main culprit. Most people are rational enough to realize they are just the 'show' part of TKD. Where TKD falls down is the advent of no-contact sparring and 5 year old black belts. There's also a new emphasis of character development over self-defense training which I find very troubling.

Do you get the sense that this has become almost a mantra for TKD schools and publications, much more so than any other MA, including Japanese karate (where, apparently, it was Funakoshi in his postwar writing who really got the ball rolling on the 'character perfection' line)?

 

[Andrew Green]

720 spin kicks and other fancy stuff takes a lot of skill, athleticism and training to be able to do, I have a lot of respect for any school that can get young kids motivated to train to that level. It might not be "real fighting", but who cares, they are in better shape with far better motor skills then 99% of other kids there age (and adults).

 

[Andrew Green]

But there's a big difference between those three activities in particular and TKD, Andrew—namely, fighting range.

That too, but that's not because it is a Olympic sport, but because of the rules that where used. Open tournament style point fighting is no better, probably worse in my mind, and Olympics had nothing to do with that

I think a lot of what went wrong with TKD was in the importance certain groups placed on making it "unique". People have been fighting for thousands of years, trying to come up with a "unique" format is going to disconnect it from other formats. Of course had they not gone for the "unique" approach, it would have just been kickboxing