Mr. Tea,
Thanks for taking the time out of your busy day to rebuttal, useless rebuttals that don’t address the major issues in my argument, yet rebuttals nonetheless. Although I am new to this website, whether you like it or not, I am more experienced in both traditional martial arts and realistic martial arts than 99% of the folks who post on this forum. Thanks again for stating irrelevant issues to my argument and clearly staying away from the fact that KARATE IS NOT EFFECTIVE. I can write a book on concrete examples and attach, oh, hundreds of videos where Japanese, Okinawan, and Chinese traditional black belts get beat down by bjj blue belts…but that’s for another thread [FONT=Wingdings]J
So to continue the flow of this conversation, I have provided rebuttals to your counter arguments:
“Tell that to Lyoto Machida”
Why does everyone refer to Machida as the hero who brought karate back in the playing field? First off, he trained in Brazil which largely influenced his style of karate fighting. Fuck, he practically uses no karate anyway and trains with kick boxers and boxers. He is also a bjj black belt for god sake. When’s the last time you’ve seen a Shotokan guy jab, uppercut, or hit beautiful judo throws…um never…they keep their hands low, have no head movement, and get clipped hard in the jaw and go night night J
“Wow, where to begin with this. First, Trias did not introduce Karate into the US. Second, not all of the “big shots in USKA” have transitioned to BJJ or MMA. Third, MMA is not a distinct martial art, it is “Mixed Martial Arts.” Fourth, very few people here are “karate-ka stuck in the past,” so you are in effect creating a strawman argument. Thank you very much for reinforcing the stereotype that all Americans fail at logic.”
Trias opened the first dojo in the U.S. in 1948…It’s documented, were you around in 48? Once again, who cares if he was first or second or third? Doesn’t address the fact that karate is useless in a fight. The USKA was a huge organization in the 70’s and 80’s, and karate tournaments will never be the same. I would estimate that roughly 70% of the top competitors no longer are affiliated with traditional martial arts. I can list a good 40 competitors who transitioned to Kyokushin karate or Bjj by the mid 90’s (personal friends of mine). Take the famous karate player Ron Van Clief who is quoted saying, “Today’s fighters are just so well trained now, and (there are) many different facets of MMA, the striking, the takedowns, locks, ground-and-pound, it’s become a global sport. It’s quite wonderful how point tournaments and tae kwon do are dead. They’re boring to watch and they’re not exciting. They do not represent fighting, or sparring, really. Maybe the sport, but not fighting.” This guy agrees with me, but you don’t. You’re probably also the guy who’s never been in a fight except ofcourse for the game of tag you play in your dojo.
Once again, you are getting mad over stupid sh-t. I know more about Asia then you will ever know, mainly for the fact that I consulted all over East Asia for 4 years. As far as natural instincts of Japanese and Chinese people is concerned, I gathered this knowledge from Fumio Demura as well as various Savate masters from France. When I lived in Tokyo, I had the opportunity to visit the famous Honbu dojo and had a conversation with some of the instructors about new age MMA and various hybrid forms. They again agreed with those claims.
In any case, whether in Asia or the States, I along with most of the martial arts community agree that traditional Japanese and Okinawan karate styles are not effective in a real street altercation because:
- Ineffective defense
- No head movement, easy target
- No combinations, they are taught to execute to that “one” big strike but buddy, it takes a lot more to drop someone in a real fight. When the adrenaline is going, people can take a lot of pain.
- 80% of traditional karate does not involve sparring (e.g. kata, bunkai, etc)
- Point fighting has incorrectly taught karate practitioners how to not “continuously” fight. It has also taught them how to not utilize 80% of the true karate techniques. A good head hunter, say a boxer, wipes the floor with a karate guy nearly all the time.
- Karate practitioners only spar against other karate kas, so when someone in the street throws powerful haymakers at a karate guy, he basically folds. Karate practitioners are very vulnerable to boxers and wrestlers, which has been proven over and over again (you can find tons of intel on youtube).
I respect karate as an art and a way of life but not as a fighting style. And at this point, I respect Marx’s system more than any Okinawan or Japanese traditional martial art. At least it kind of works…In MMA, we have our own rivalry among wrestling, judo, bjj, sambo, boxing, etc. Karate is never mentioned, funny how things evolved.
P.S. Do you train in any form of martial arts? May I ask in what style and what experience you have? At the end of the day, you can talk behind a computer all you want but it’s your background that gives credibility to your argument. I’m guessing you’ve never stepped into an MMA gym or wrestled in high school. Why don’t you go to any local MMA training facility and get your head knocked around a bit, then come back on here and argue how effective your back fists and reverse punches were against a seasoned striker looking to knock your head off.
Cheers
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I respect Kyokushin karate, which is why I indicated it as a legitimate style in my previous post. Finally, I don’t hate traditional karate but like I said respect it as an art and way of life. As a former practitioner of Trias’ Okinawan Shuri Ryu and a USKA national champion, I experienced its major gaps when I transitioned to boxing…they don’t call it the sweet science for nothing