The VITAL Tour -- Martial Arts
Ok, so here is a major hot button topic to say the least.
We really don’t mean any disrespect to the martial arts
industry, but sometimes a little tough love is necessary.
Please take the following educated opinion as constructive
criticism rather than ignorant bashing.
We love martial arts for so many reasons. It’s a great
hobby, an excellent method of physical fitness, wonderful
for discipline and determination, and it really benefits
kids tremendously. There are many amazing and talented
people who both teach and practice martial arts. No one is
denying that practicing martial arts can be a lifelong love
that gives more than it takes.
Now that is said as a qualifier and speaking in general
here, martial arts as typically taught today, are a partial
and poor violence response strategy. In fact, in many
cases, someone that has studied martial arts may be more at
risk from violence due to an instilled false sense of
security.
An untrained person may abide by their primal instincts to
avoid / stay-away from a dangerous situation altogether.
Whereas a seasoned martial artist may be more inclined /
pre-disposed to involve themselves in the violent situation
because they feel they can handle themselves. This is only
one of many dangerous fallacies that disguise martial arts
into being seemingly good for self-defense.
Although the general consensus is that the terms martial
arts and self-defense are synonymous, this is a critically
flawed connotation. Then again, as you will see later on,
even some systems that label themselves as self-defense
(rather than martial arts) have similar errors in their
premise.
Martial arts is absolutely not self-defense; the same as
lethal ammunition (live bullets) are absolutely not the
same as non-lethal ammunition (blanks). Yes, they both look
similar from the outside / from a distance, but there is a
deadly distinction if you intermix them indiscriminately.
So specifically why are martial arts styles not good for
personal protection against violence? We will try to name
only the top 10 reasons. At one point in time we had a list
of 36; but we will try and boil it down for you here.
Again, these points are made in general. There will always
be exceptions here and there, but as a whole these tend to
hold true in most cases.