Re: Too deadly for competition…the Last Samurai?
Originally posted by blankslate
One key difference between bujutsu and more modern martial arts is that students of bujutsu generally do not compete.
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This is not true at all. Duels in fuedal Japan were common among practitioners. Perhaps not the competition they are thinking about, but competition none-the-less. If you don’t compete you aren’t training well enough. I’d like to see these people use their sword skills against a good kendo practitioner or fencing artist who spars hard with Shinai, foils, pads, and in competition. They’d get their rear ends handed to them.
Originally posted by blankslate
“It’s a combination of traditional and practical warrior arts as opposed to sport. Instead of being about winning, it’s about surviving,” says Robin Scoville, 35, a second-degree black belt at the dojo. “They’ve passed down the art of survival. It wouldn’t be here if they didn’t survive.”
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Another common misconception from people who practice traditional systems but don’t spar with them at full speed. They ridicule “sport” systems as inferior when in fact sport practitioners develop the attributes of good fighters in a much more realistic way.
Originally posted by blankslate
When he started training 28 years ago, Brown felt as if modern martial arts had softened through the emphasis on sporting.
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Go to a Judo, Boxing, Muay Thai or BJJ school and see how soft they are.
Originally posted by blankslate
“They’ve lost the point of why people train,” Brown says. “The black belt has lost its meaning.”
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No. They regained it once again from people who ruined the techniques by not using them at full speed. These people are the ones who allowed potentially effective systems to whither and become weak.
Originally posted by blankslate
Bujutsu can be scary, Brown says, because it is a martial-arts system Westerners are not used to seeing.
But the skills are taught slowly in a systematic manner, he says.
Bujutsu and the samurai code of honor are featured in the film “The Last Samurai,” starring Tom Cruise. [/B]
There are real people doing weapons training that do it for sport reasons and do it realistically. Check out the Dog Brothers, Kendo schools, or any system that uses full-speed fast sparring with real hits. That is how you learn to use weapons. It’s not doing kata in the air all day that does it.