Marginal said:
I could see a case being made against 100% sport oriented TKD. Restricted use of the hands, developing the habit of fighting with your arms at your sides, high kicking, pinning/jumping techniques etc aren't especially smart in a self-defense situation.
(Note: This says nothing about any particular style or organization, just schools that focus on sport to the exclusiuon of all else.)
My point exactly, Marginal. I'm not against TKD, I mean I take it. Its just that a bunch of TKD schools out there have given a bad name to TKD in general. I mean, it's the most widely known MA, and I know plenty of schools that just use it as a MA sport, rather than teaching Self-Defense. I mean, there are a lot of instructors out there that have set up schools and then gone bankrupt and run with people's money. And also, since TKD is a widely known "sport", there have been plenty of things that have made it only a sport.
I'm just saying that a large majority of the schools that are not affiliated with an Organization, Assocation, or Federation. I'm not discriminating against schools that are not affiliated, its just a large majority of the ones I've been around or heard of from friends. Those schools only teach TKD and OK self-defense, but you can't just have one form of martial art taught to you and not know grappling or advanced Self-defense. Otherwise, it's just a sport. You can't just master an art of standing without knowing how to fight when on the ground. A large majority of fights end up on the ground.
TKD itself originated from art of Hwarang do. Then the Japanese messed it up. But, the Hwarang army did happened to do alot more than just Kicking. (I'm not saying that Hwarang do is messed up at all, I'm just saying that TKD was messed up during the World Wars.)
I just don't think that TKD by itself is a good MA. I was kind of suspicious about ATA when I first started because I had been to TKD schools since I was like 4 yrs old and most of them were crap. They couldn't really teach much self-defense and they just stank. Everything was so ununiform. All messed up. If ATA was just TKD and that was all, no joint locks, no grappling, Tai chi chuan, or any of the other stuff we teach, I'd be taking MA from the Kung Fu school a few towns over. Yes, it's american TKD, but the guy who founded ATA was born in Manchuria and was a Korean(died on Oct. 5, 2000). He and his cousins/brothers/sons/other relatives were trained in the traditional TKD and he made up his own style, incorporating the techniques that TKD lacks. WTF, ATA, and the other federations are great, I just don't like being under a private school. Not unless it's a good one that has a good rep.