One further comment. Media accounts are replete with incidents in which
yudansha in various martial arts have been beaten or killed by street
fighters. In my community about 8 years ago, a Tae Kwan Do "champion"
was attacked by 3 men and beaten to death.
A year ago in San Francisco, Alex Gong, an international Muay Thai
expert was shot to death when he confronted a guy who had hit his car
and then left the scene of the accident.
I could go on, but you get the point.
If you become very skilled at Aikido, might you be able to defend
yourself on the street? You might, but it depends on a lot of things.
One thing of great concern is whether or not MENTALLY you can deal with
the situation. You might be a physically skilled martial artist who
becomes paralyzed with fear in a confrontation or who at least hesitates
far too long and fails in any attempt at defense.
No matter how earnest our dojo practice is, we simply do not and cannot
train to deal with the mental challenges in a violent street encounter.
No one in the dojo really wants to hurt us; on the street they either do
want to hurt us or don't care if we get hurt.
We need to be realistic--traditional martial arts of ANY sort practiced
in the dojo do not equip us to deal adequately with a truly violent
street encounter. Although we are better off than if we did not have
that background.
If you really want to see if your Aikido works, get rid of all of the
complicated techniques; acquire a lot more proficiency at atemi; make
your techniques executable very quickly and efficiently; don't worry
about form; and then let me know and I will give you some venues in
which you can try your new skills out.


-----Original Message-----
From: yoshinkan@yahoogroups.com [mailto:yoshinkan@yahoogroups.com] On
Behalf Of captain_black_belt
Sent: Thursday, March 23, 2006 4:59 PM
To: yoshinkan@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Yoshinkan] Re: Aikido as a "martial" art

I think that many of you make great points, especially Gordon's
distinction between Budo and martial art. I agree that Yoshinkan can
be used effectively in violent encounters, whether on 'the street' or
in the ring, but without testing it how does one know they can use it
for self defence or combat? Again, there is no venue to test out your
aikido unless you happen to do this on your own, and we typically
engage in cooperative practice during class. Would 5'1" female sandan
really be able to execute kata mochi nikkajo if a 6'5" 270 lb.
attacker hell-bent on slamming her into ground atempted to do so, if
she has only ever followed the strict Yoshinkan curricula of kihon
waza and jiyu waza? Without ever testing it on a resisting, fighting,
aggressive opponent, could she, or anyone for that matter, hope to
make it work? It's one thing, I think, to practice it in the dojo,
but, as was stated, it has to be adapted for 'the street'. But other
martial arts, like karate, have venues to make their art more
effective(sparring, competitions).

John, does your dojo generally lean more towards 'applied'
or 'realistic' techniques and attacks? And if so, why?

CBB








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