Skimming through these threads I couldn't help but shake my head. Perhaps I rattled something important loose doing so, but, isn't everyone missing a key word in the phrase Martial Art, that word being ART. Everyone pursues traditional styles for different reasons, fitness, culture, self awareness, camaraderie, stress reduction etc. Some traditional styles are marketed more towards these attributes than for developing fighting prowess or self defense. Martial ability becomes a secondary or even tertiary holdover of the overall tradition, while the primary focus of the style defines it's purpose. Its undeniable that traditional systems over the years have been infused with philosophical and religious ideology, medical knowledge and have been shaped by cultural and societal views. All lending themselves to the use of the word ART to describe what was once a PRACTICAL SKILL.
The very term MARTIAL ART has become a colloquial catch-all to describe fighting methods, when in actuality, the word ART suggests something much more benign and scholarly.
Let's take Taijiquan as an example, while extremely rare nowadays, Taijiquan used to be a formidable fighting method. But, since the health benefits of performing Taijiquan have been discovered, this has become its MAIN focus. The fighting aspect has only hung around due to tradition.
The decline in the fighting efficacy of traditional systems can largely be attributed to fitness trends, sporting competitions and popular culture, Tae Bo, Dr. Ho's Tai Chi and XMA anyone? Let's face it, most martial arts instructors running full time schools wouldn't be able to afford rent, let alone feed themselves, if the only thing they had to offer the public was fighting ability, so most cash in on promoting physical fitness, camaraderie, discipline, self esteem building etc. The problem isn't in learning a traditional style, the problem is the suppressed remnants of the tradition that are neglected but continue to be viewed by the public at large as the primary function, this being FIGHT DEVELOPMENT. Little Johnny coming home with a black eye and bloody nose is more apt to draw a lawsuit than a new student referral. Another issue are those individuals who, because of the popularity of MMA, promote their traditional system as a fighting art when the extent of their experience is based on forms competition, light contact point sparring and having learned a few applications but have never been in an actual fight, all as a means of keeping their doors open.
Traditional systems are not the issue here, it's how they are learned and developed, what the PRIMARY focus is and usage. It all comes down to teacher and student and if the methodology of the style is emphasized as PRACTICAL SKILL or ART.
Anyways, that just my two cents on this whole discussion.
