Good point. But again those are also the people I am pitting. I can’t force anyone to do anything, but I can pit them.
Anyway, all martial arts are a LW conspiracy to gull people into thinking they can defend themselves without concealed-carry firearms!
Uh-huh? 
Either I’ve misunderstood some basic concepts for approximately 40 years, or the OP har misunderstood some basic concepts. I’ll leave it to the audience to make up their minds about who’s wrong here.
From my NSH POV: Kiddo, the most common “martial arts”, i.e. TKD, karate, judo etc. are sports. That they’re derived from self defense methods practiced some 100 years ago in a country far, far away is pretty irrelevant to the sport as it is today.
Taking math at MIT then?
Anonymous User, t]he problem that is ruining martial arts is called “civilization.” You can’t teach a person to successfully defend themselves in a true street fight without having them risk serious injury (at a minimum - death is also in the cards, although less likely). I don’t care how “hardcore” the dojo is, it can’t teach a person all the techniques he’ll need to know to successfully defend himself on the street. Even MMA fighters and Muay Thai practitioners aren’t actually trying to kill each other, but street fighters often are. Most students don’t want to risk permanent crippling injury, and for that reason the trend is for most dojos to water things down to make sparring practice less risky. Good luck reversing that trend.
Winning a contest on the street is as much about aggression and sheer toughness and bloodymindedness as it is about technique. Those attributes can’t be taught (although if a person already possesses them to some degree, they can be cultivated and enhanced). See Chimera’s story upthread. No martial art in the world could have prepared those two women to defend themselves, no matter how well it was taught, because they lacked the necessary guts.
And when did you ever see one win a bar fight?
As others have said, this is hardly a new topic. Mushashi* wrote about the commercialization of martial arts back in the 1600s.
*See "The Book of Five Rings."
Well, there was that one time in Albuquerque…
The average horse packs a kick that would put even the most rigorously trained martial artist to shame. They strike well with their forelimbs, too (especially the stallions). They’d clean up in a bar fight - well, if they’d just start drinking in bars, that is…
(True fact: many horses enjoy the taste of beer.)
They used to, but they got tired of the jokes…
Is it just ruining Tae Kwon Do, or is this affecting boxing, kung fu, Shorin Ryu karate, kali, escrima, penjak silat, judo, ju jitsu, kempo karate, shotokan (trick question–I know it’s not ruining shotokan), and a host of other martial arts?
For my money, I’d say you’re right, it’s probably ruining Tae Kwon Do, but it started out pretty badly bent in the first place, considering its genesis and raison d’etre.
Yes you are right. No Do Jang will be able to truly 100% teach self-defense, but at least the good ones try their best and dont ruin the art. The McDojos don’t/don’t want to even try. All they try to do is make money. It is about the mindset. A true Dojo will put the value of the art before profit while a McDojo will do exactly the opposite. That is why McDojos are usually so expensive. Martial arts maybe isn’t your best way to learn self-defense, but at least the real Do Jangs don’t ruin the art.
Also artemis thanks for correcting me in the gun debate. I clearly have no idea how they work and was talking shit.
It is affecting all the martial arts but the ones that are the most corrupted are TaeKwonDo and Karate. However, McDojos exist in every martial art; it is just not that bad in most other arts.
I’m a grown ass man and in my entire life I’ve never been in a fistfight. In fact, the only people I know that have ever gotten into fights are assholes. Or kids, I guess.
The idea that martial arts is there to teach “self defense” is stupid. The skills aren’t needed for daily life. The black belt mills you hate against provide a cardio workout to their customers. The motions reinforce balance, provide limberness, and strengthen muscles for daily motion. I argue that these skills are more useful than being able to kick someone’s ass, and are a pretty good workout.
I spent seven years taking a martial art that was free, held in the basement of a shitty old building, and never had more than five students. We didn’t spar, we spent 30 minutes a night learning long form katas, and there were only four belt colors. It was grueling and intense and the training is still with me ten years later. However, if confronted physically I’d run like hell before throwing a punch. There’s very limited place in this world for hand-to-hand combat, and I’m a little wary of people who argue otherwise.
What was its raison d’etre?
Why the long face?
Back in the 50’s or 60’s, a Korean General and a Colonel were tasked with developing a martial art that the military could teach its recruits in basic training, taking advantage of youth, flexibility and general good health. They were looking for a martial art that could be taught quickly and that might be useful if a fight ever got down to hand-to-hand.
So, they went to Japan and studied some Okinawan karate and picked up a few pieces from here and there and assembled them into Tae Kwon Do. They weren’t trying to create an Ultimate Martial Art, or something that could specifically counter any other art. They were just looking for a vigorous, fast-learning style they could teach to a corps of health, young, limber men in just a few weeks.
Anecdotal side note: In the Seoul Olympics, TKD was a demonstration sport. One of the competitions was Team Sparring. This event was won on the men’s side by the British team, which was cause for some excitement as they had basically just beaten the Koreans at their own national martial art. When interviewed, they admitted that they really hadn’t been studying TKD for long and, actually, they weren’t even martial artists: they were a soccer team, and they wanted to be in the Olympics but knew that they’d never make the soccer team, so they took a look at the other options for the upcoming Olympics, took a look at TKD and said “Yeah, we can do that.” They spent six months studying, tried out, made the team, and won.
The IOC took a dim view of this, being not particularly happy that somebody could start studying the martial art and be considered an Olympic champion six months later.
It’s really not.
The existence of McDonald’s doesn’t mean there are no longer any good steak houses for people who wish to search them out.
Yes, but it’s easy to tell the difference. Not so easy when shopping for a dojo. And, as noted above, picking the wrong one can actually be physically dangerous.
Oh, it’s you Smeghead. ;)
Yes you are right. Those who really want to train in a good school will look out for one. The problem is that McDojos are really misleading and 95% of the time, people can’t tell that they’re being cheating on, unless you go on the internet and really research things like this through (which I do).
The reason it is indeed a serious problem though, is because it’s like cheating. They’re cheating people out of their money only to teach those innocent people in a watered down manner. McDojos don’t really teach the real art, but a much poorer quality of it, and the reason is because they don’t really care about the art, but for the profit. And just to reiterate, it’s a serious problem because it’s basically like cheating, and it’s ruining the art.
Okay fine, TaeKwonDo is designed to be a quick process to become a black belt, but that’s in comparison with other arts. Many other arts require ten years of training to attain that rank, and TaeKwonDo only takes about 5-7. So comparatively, yes, TaeKwonDo is a quicker art to master, but TaeKwonDo McDojos are handing them out no later than three to four years, which is clearly not enough time unless one is truly talented and works their asses off. And typical McDojos will actually give out their black belt in 2-3 years. But even 3-4 is too soon for about 95+% of the people out their. Like I said, the typical time is 5-7 years.
So adding on to that, it’s taking out all the meaning and value of a black belt.
So if McDojos are cranking out black belts this early, only to offend (yes, in my opinion it’s offensive to the original art. Look at how TaeKwonDo is looked down upon these days due to all these McDojos handing out black belts so early) and ruin the art, make money and cheat on you and/or your kids, and also pose a danger for some people (some people think that if you have a black belt you can defend yourself on the street which is clearly not the case if you train in a McDojo), then yes I (and many others who have seeked this truth) have a problem with it, and it is a little serious - maybe not in the real world, but within martial arts, yes it is.