Does Martial Arts really help?

tallgeese · Black Belt

I can't speak for everyone's experience, but being in LE as well, I'd say most fights that I've been involved in have revolved more around an attempted tackle or some form of ugly wrestling attempt by the bad guy. These kinds of scuffles are much more prevalent.

Now, the ones that have involved striking that I've been party to have pretty much started with either a) the bad guy grabbing with the left and swinging with the right, or b) a wild haymaker kind of thing.

I've only seen one kick thrown by a mope, and that was one of them kneeing me in the groin during a scuffle with a domestic suspect, after he had tried to tackle me. It was kind of an after thought.

I think that statistically, things probably break down around those lines, but I'd have to do the research. Having had the chance to be part of this line of work, I'd agree with Kuma, my training in ma has been very useful, on a routine basis in real conflict.

To the original post, I think both strike work and grappling training is important. You might not pull the guy to the ground, but you can sure end up there. Or, maybe it does make more sense to get a bad guy down. Situations are oddly fluid that way. BJJ has been, by my experience, shown to be effective in real situations as well as competition. It's not a magic bullet, but it works well.

The method of training has more to do with how well what you're doing will work on the street than what. Are you training against resistance? Drilling with movement? Addressing defending and attacking spontaneously to spontaneous attack? Do you occasionally look at what you're doing with a critical eye towards realism?

Looking at those will impact the usefulness of any ma system greatly. remembering that even done properly with great mindset, things can still happen.

So yes, it's very useful if trained properly.

Kuma · Black Belt

NightOwl · Black Belt

1st thought on high kicks: The average person I've seen doesn't protect the head when fighting. Since people don't keep their guards up and don't expect it, a well executed high kick will likely yield at the very least a TKO.

2nd thought: If you miss and get off balance, go too slow, etc you are screwed. Personally I don't have flexibly or speed so I like nice, safe, and low roundhouses.

3rd thought: If you can get an opportunity- it's a risk/reward situation. If you are an expert kicker I don't see why not. But unless you are an expert I wouldn't recommend it. An expert like...HWANG JANG-LEE http://www.kungfucinema.com/hwang-jang-lee-1362 . If you try and take on a knife fighter armed with nothing but your fists and your nikes your personal mileage may vary.

Final thought: I'm not as vehemently opposed to high kicks as some are. But I would agree that they in general are not nearly as useful as low or mid ranged kicks. Certainly they are overemphasized many times in martial arts. TKD is especially known for its high kicking, but under WTF rules you don't have to worry about grabs or punches and you are rewarded for kicking high. But that is a situation where what you use in one situation might not be what you use outside the gym.

However I think that once you reach a pro level in mma with thousands of dollars on the line, you are careful about how you use your high kicks just as like you would be guarded about using them in a street fight. Is it the EXACT same? No, but it's still a big risk and if you are willing to risk it on a professional fighter with a quarter year's income in the balance, then kicking some drunk attacking you for looking at him wrong in the head might not be that big of a deal.

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On if martial arts can be useful in real life? I know a hapkido practitioner who has taken out multiple people at a time in street fights using his martial arts training...many times. But do I think that hapkido as many practice it will make everyone into Jakie Chan? No. You fight how you train and this guy was/is a true master who trains like a machine. In fact my personal opinion is that unless you have aliveness in training (as a good portion of MAs don't) the likelihood that what you train in will translate to actual fighting is slim.

Thus most martial arts are not useful beyond providing exercise/general enjoyment in my opinion. Note I didn't say styles- if you have one guy training muay thai statically and one guy training eagle claw kung fu with aliveness on a regular basis; my money is on the eagle guy as the better fighter in real life. In other words training is generally more important than substance. Thus an 'unskilled' brawler who has 'trained' by getting in fights constantly will have an edge over a cardio kickboxer who knows techniques but can't apply them in a live situation.
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Of course this raises the question of why martial arts are so popular in the first place. If they are generally not useful wouldn't they have gone away? My thought is not necessarily.

Historically speaking, martial arts are a a somewhat niche activity. Back in the day if a martial artist couldn't fight in real life, they either died or got publicly humiliated by loosing in a fight. In other words, what worked and who could use it were weeded out from those who couldn't simply by survival of the fittest. Starting a new martial arts style? Great. Now Chen down the street is angry about you taking away his students and is challenging you to a lei tai match (good luck!). As such who wants to get hurt and risk injury by fighting? It's much easier to take up another sport or game and avoid that barbaric 'martial arts' business all together. Thus when people are in a time where martial arts training is rough and constantly tested, you don't nearly have as many people signing up to get black eyes to bring to work the next day.

Now however martial arts are more widespread and popular than ever. What was once mostly practiced by the military, the athletic, and a small segment of society now has its own separate book in the yellow pages. Go to any strip mall and it is likely that you'll find at least one martial arts joint. But look closer and you'll see that most of the customers are middle class suburbanites. These people have jobs, families, school, and many other activities that they are involved in and require attention outside of martial arts. Also they will very likely never face violence on a regular basis, and as such if what they are training works or not is highly irrelevant. In the meanwhile they can get the feeling of safety and power by doing martial arts without needing to go through the often painful and difficult process of refining it through rough training. Thus since Martial arts schools can make you feel like a deadly weapon without needing to prove it nowadays, for many that is good enough to take it up. Thus martial arts schools no matter how poor can stay in business.
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Don't hit at all if it is honorably possible to avoid hitting; but never hit soft.

~Theodore Roosevelt

bushido_man96 · KF Sensei

sensei8 · KF Sensei

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