Training With Women...

[SteyrAUG]

Another topic and a recent experience got me thinking about this.

I've spent most of my life involved with the martial arts. I can remember when there were almost no women (or children) involved then it seemed for a time, due to the popularity of cardio kickboxing programs, that women made up almost half a given class or more. And finally it seems there are more than a few women involved in "fighting arts" like MMA or Krav Maga (or at least what is being passed off as Krav Maga).

Now I don't mind training with or sharing a class with women. In fact I think it's great when they are training. I don't mind practicing techniques with them, showing them things they might not know or even learning from qualified female instructors (although in my experience that is actually very rare).

What I hate is doing contact drills, sparring, or even worse, fighting with them. Much like being the head of a school and having a visiting challenger it is a "no win" situation. In that example if you refuse many will assume you are afraid to face the challenger and it may cost you students. If you fight an lose, you risk having many of your students no longer view you as a "qualified expert" (it won't matter of the challenger is in his 20s and you are in your late 40s). And if you fight an win, you actually gain nothing, after all you are a head of the school and a "whatever degree" black belt. And even in the last example many will question why you felt the need to fight and prove yourself to some unknown and will wonder if you have an ego problem.

Well the only thing worse than being a senior instructor and having an outside challenger is fighting women.

If you control yourself and take it easy, well you just got beat up by a girl. To make matters worse in nearly every case the female will assume she actually bested you.

If you take it easy but don't give it away you still can't win. After all she fought you pretty hard and you fought back hard and she did "about as well" as you. Given the usual disparity in size and strength most people, including the female, will feel she was the victor.

If you beat her decisively then you are an asshole who just beat up a girl and people will wonder what your ****ing problem is and if you are so damn insecure you felt the need to beat down a female to make yourself feel better.

The lone exception being those few women who actually ARE talented and actually CAN fight. But I haven't run into that too many times.

To make matters worse, almost without exception, the female in question will tell you to "treat her like anyone else." About 20 years I was told that by a female black belt at an instructors training program. Now I had always been taught "If you put on a black belt in a dojo, you better be prepared to fight like a black belt because all the other black belts will fight you at that level."

I had been demonstrating good control on techniques all day and that is probably why I was paired with the female black belt in question. The only problem is the matches were being scored and graded and outcome could affect future promotion. So when I gave a few people the "WTF?!?" look she looked at me and said "fight me like anyone else."

So things get started and she throws a front hand backfist at my head and I lean out and and catch her with a simple spin back kick to the solar plexus as she tries to follow with a rear leg roundhouse. I hit her as hard as any male opponent who I was trying to take out of the game and she folded up pretty good and couldn't train for the rest of the night.

Had it been a male black belt opponent I would have been recognized for effective and efficient technique and indeed it was one of the shortest and most decisive matches of the evening. But instead of having my practical demonstration of skill rewarded I was criticized almost unanimously by everyone. Keep in mind that other black belts were knocking their opponents down to the ground in a similar manner, but they weren't fighting females.

I might as well have just pulled my pants down and took a shit on the carpet given the attitude towards my actions. To make matters worse, they'd have never stuck me with a male black belt of similar stature and actual skill level because they'd know what would happen to him. And if they did, nobody would have said a word because he "was wearing a black belt."

About the only good thing regarding that evening is the female in question seemed to understand it was her fault, although there was no apology and she made no attempt to stop anyone from criticizing me. I suspect she had gotten away with sloppy, vulnerable technique for a long time because nobody ever "fought her like a black belt."

Well recently I and some of my friends were visiting an "Olympic" Tae Kwon Do school (meaning they use Olympic rules, not that any of their members will necessarily ever compete at the Olympics) and I was struck by the number of extremely aggressive female students with impossibly poor technique who were really taking it to some of the male students. The particular rules of Olympic TKD make it generally a safe playground for those who lack genuine fighting skills to participate. Nobody is going to punch you in the face, sweep your support leg or hit your reset button (solar plexus) with a massive hit like a spin back kick.

So now there seems to be a current crop of females with very few practical fighting skills and lots and lots of fighting spirit. And we received no shortage of offers to "fight" from some of the female black belts who viewed our "non flashy" technique as less than advanced. Thankfully I am now at an age where I can decline such offers by citing concerns about injuring myself from doing too much.

I only hope these women who "truly believe they can fight" don't go get into a real fight when they have other options.

[Pork Chop]

Interesting.

I'd like to hear your feelings about the seemingly large number of child black belts these days. My son is 12 & has 2 friends his age which have already reached this high status. Problem is, they haven't the remotest ability to back it up due to their size & strength.

Thoughts?

[Kain]

Having done one form of martial arts or another for nearly twenty years I can attest to the fact all the same. Add to the fact I have girl I know who is wishing to learn combatives I know just how you are feeling. Her only formal training, and I really hesitate to call it that, has been ground fighting techniques that her fellow cadets have regurgitated. Considering she is all of five foot two and maybe a 120 pounds soaking wet I have been having a rough time trying to explain to her that there are techniques that would be better suited to her opposed to trying to going to the ground as the first option. It could be that I have always been trained to stay on my feet bleeding through but I don't think she would fair well in a real fight, hell even play fighting trying to use brute force against me really doesn't work. On the upside unlike a lot of girls I have worked with in martial arts she is not afraid to hit someone, so that is at least one battle(One of the biggest I have usually seen) I don't have to fight. Going to drag her to a friend of mine's dojo come this holiday season and let him teach her some things since he is both an LE and Mil combatives instructor as well as running his own dojo and runs a regular women's combatives class so he is used to dealing with women her size and showing them what works and doesn't.

As far as children in the dojo... I started practicing when I was five. that said, since I really don't want to get on a rant about a lot of schools out there. I was allowed to train because the sensei thought I was mature enough to learn even though his usual minimum was was seven for his kids class which was up to age 15 or 16. While there are children who at five or six or seven are old enough to learn most are not. There are some 27 year olds who are not mature enough to learn something that is an art form that is beautiful in its violence and that if employed properly can kill. My schools have all been very traditional also with the art coming first, above competition, above the color of the belt and the senseis were not there for there for the money but to teach something they were passionate about. Also the kids classes rarely were there to spar and if they did it was in full pads where the adult classes actually wouldn't use pads with the understanding that for most sparring you controlled the techniques to where you did not damage the other more then just bruises since you never really could go full contact unless you really did wish to serious hurt someone. That said, I have a friend of the family who's son just started karate, at age 4, yes 4, FOUR!!! Been there for less then two months and has had his first test to go up in rank to yellow belt and they already have him breaking boards from the pictures I have been shown. Barring him being a prodigy I can't help but call that school as one that is there solely for profit and is short changing most of its students.

[SteyrAUG]

Interesting.

I'd like to hear your feelings about the seemingly large number of child black belts these days. My son is 12 & has 2 friends his age which have already reached this high status. Problem is, they haven't the remotest ability to back it up due to their size & strength.

Thoughts?

It is why I stopped wearing my black belt in all but required settings. While I spent 7 years "earning" mine, at around the same time I was training they were already being handed out for "time served" in some schools (often in 4 years or less) and not long after that there will children wearing them.

As a symbol it is all but meaningless today and the difference between a real martial artist wearing a yudansha grade and somebody who "has a black belt" is similar to the difference between an actual green beret and somebody who bought an official green beret from a catalog.

The real fun of course is when that guy wears his green beret among actual members of special forces or when somebody who "thinks" they earned a black belt finds themselves among those who actually did. The vast majority of my personal students met me having already "earned a black belt" someplace else and then finding out they were simply "given a black belt."

When I was a student some of the worst beatings I ever took was as a 2nd Brown Belt who "believed" I was almost the same as a Black Belt. It seemed in my school the purpose of every first degree black belt was the show every 2nd Brown Belt the vast difference between the two ranks and to make sure nobody gets in easy.

And really the belt is not important. It is a 20th century convention when early martial arts schools in 1920s Japan adopted colored belt ranking systems from Judo in order to be accepted by the governing bodies such as the Zen Nippon Budo Renmei.

None of the Okinawan masters who developed "te" systems over the centuries had belts to indicate their skill level, in many cases there wasn't even certification, you knew who was who because they had demonstrated skill and ability.

In orthodox traditional Chinese boxing there are no indicators of rank at all. Titles like Si Hung (older brother) refer to a senior student who has been studying longer but this doesn't automatically mean they have a greater level of skill. Teachers are known as Si Fu but they typically don't wear anything to indicate that status.

So if a standard is held and abided by, a belt can have meaning the same way as a beret. Otherwise it is just a belt or a beret and they only require about $5 to own one.

[Zane1844]

The subject you brought up struck me because it happened, and was very awkward.

When it was sparring day at my gym, my coach brought us to the "boxing side" as we call it- we do MMA. So this female boxer was sparring before and while watching her we all thought she was a man!

I do not like bringing this up because it was weird. I found out she was a woman when I stepped in the ring, too late to back out. So we touched gloves, and we starting boxing, my coach kept yelling for we to stop backing up and being nice. He found out why I was after...

Personally, I think I did enough to "win," I was basically defending myself. Afterwards, she shook my hand and with a smile said "that was good."

So I had to live with that, my coach told me he would not have me spar her if he knew.

This was after another awkward situation that people joked to me about...

[Cincinnatus]

I might as well have just pulled my pants down and took a shit on the carpet given the attitude towards my actions. .

This made me spew my drink all over the room.
Of course, this whole idea that women can generally compete one on one with men in MA or infantry training is--generally speaking--absurd, but the same political correctness that applies to your story applies there, too.
As a martial artist, I too have noticed this problem in sparring with or fighting women.
It makes it 1,000 times worse if she's been steeped in watching crap like GI Jane, and Kill Bill, La Femme Nikita, Chuck, et al. that plant the impression in people's heads that a 120 pund woman can knock out a 300 pound man or twelve as easy as you please.

[SPQR476]

I always tried my best to be non-discriminatory in instruction and with other instructors of the fairer sex. However, I never showed them any quarter if they were "equals" as I'd rather be known as an ass than foster an over-inflated sense of capability. For that reason, few ever wanted to spar, so it worked out.

I think there's a place in martial arts for youth, but a 10 year old black belt is nonsense.

[SteyrAUG]

I think there's a place in martial arts for youth, but a 10 year old black belt is nonsense.

Absolutely martial arts are beneficial for children. There are many, many things they can learn and will have a better foundation than most adults if they are trained properly.

But there are many things that are almost pointless to teach children. As for belts, I can accept a junior black belt grade for a student with several years of training, and absolute understanding and demonstration of basic fundamentals and the ability to demonstrate (if not apply) all the techniques of a given system. I don't think any 10 year old can do this with a legitimate system.

But at this point they might as well hand out Junior Hanshi belts. If ever I abandon my scruples I'm going to start a kids only dojo with ranks like camo belt, ninja belt, dragon belt and smurf belt.

[p7fl]

S/A:
You are over thinking the whole thing.
You push a woman as hard as you can. Same as with any guy any age you are standing across from. Ease back when it is appropriate.
As for “Olympic” TKD, it was just a way for the home team in Korea to win some Gold Medals. It will fade away.
Karate in the US was, not is. The 60’s 70’s and 80’s are gone.
Just be glad you got to be part of it.
jon

[SteyrAUG]

S/A:
You are over thinking the whole thing.
You push a woman as hard as you can. Same as with any guy any age you are standing across from. Ease back when it is appropriate.

jon

I did that once, about 20 years ago. It didn't go over so well.

And I don't think real martial arts are dead, I just think they have been driven back underground where they truly belong.