Great thread. Everyone is making valid points. I'd like to weigh in on the topic if I may.
My instructor, Sifu Barry Cuda, recently had a conversation with someone in the know regarding the whole lawsuit thing. It's actually Shannon Lee, Bruce's daughter, who is spearheading all of this. She had Bruce Lee's name and likeness trademarked as well as the name Jeet Kune Do and the symbol (the yin yang with the arrows and the Chinese characters). Her lawyers issued a cease and desist order to Dan Inosanto barring him from using the name JKD and the symbol on any of his products (academy t-shirts and such) and his website. She's going after the first-generation students first, then she'll move on to the 2nd gen, like Vunak and Richardson. Even MA magazines like Inside Kung Fu won't publish articles on JKD because she hasn't given express written permission to anyone to do so. If you notice, anytime Bruce Lee or JKD are mentioned in an interview they put the little "TM" symbol after. So where does that leave the rest of us who have been training in the art and want to propogate it?
Well, when we heard about the whole mess we (Barry and I) were stuck at a crossroads. We had just launched our own website and were in the process of filming our instructional DVD series. We were also preparing to advertise in Inside Kung Fu. Barry has been studying JKD and FMA for nearly 20 years under Dan Inosanto and Paul Vunak (the lion's share of his training coming from the latter). So here we are ready to do this thing and we find out that we can't say JKD anymore. We could just say Kali, but what we do is not purely Kali, is it? There's Wing Chun in there, Silat, Jiu Jitsu, greco-roman, shootfighting, JKD, etc. Not only that, but we don't teach the way most JKDC teachers teach. We don't have a Jun Fan class on Monday, a Kali class on Wed, a Silat class on Fri, a Muay Thai class on Sat, etc. We teach the ranges and what works in each range. If it's trapping day, it's trapping day, Wing Chun, Kali, JKD, whatever works in that range.
So we decided to call our system "Filipino Kali Mixed Martial Arts" and run with that. After all, Barry and Vunak parted ways years ago and Barry wasn't about to ask for an apprenticeship from Dan after 20 years.
If Shannon Lee wants to control the use of her father's name and art, fine. It's her legacy, she has that right. She's not gonna stop me from teaching the effective street combat strategies and techniques that I know work. She's not gonna stop me from making a living. Her father just won't get the credit. And that is truly sad, because he deserves it.
Vic
www.combatartsusa.com
