Tempest

I am gonna just shamelessly, although incompletely steal Brian's line here, because it most assuredly applies to this question. I do have some doubts about most of us being well adjusted. I think that martial arts tend to help us BECOME well adjusted eventually if it is done correctly, but keep in mind that we do engage in gratuitous violence for fun. There is something a little out of step with most people in that as a basic principle.

Considering that most of them are tactical and strategic advice, I would be VERY wary of treating them as a foundation of good moral philosophy. That being said I guess you could if you wanted to, but implying that there is something INHERENT in them that should be a foundation for moral thought and philosophy is a stretch. That would be like me taking my moral philosophy from Von Clauswitz. I COULD, but I don't think I SHOULD for the purposes of living a moral life outside of some VERY specific circumstances.

No. At least 6 of them don't even apply if you don't practice Karate. Now, I do think that something similar to them are a good IDEA, but being bound to them is silly for anyone not practicing Shotokan Karate. I have re-printed the 20 precepts here for reference during this discussion. 1. Karate-do begins with courtesy and ends with rei. 2. There is no first strike in karate. 3. Karate is an aid to justice. 4. First know yourself before attempting to know others. 5. Spirit first, technique second. 6. Always be ready to release your mind. 7. Accidents arise from negligence. 8. Do not think that karate training is only in the dojo. 9. It will take your entire life to learn karate, there is no limit. 10. Put your everyday living into karate and you will find "Myo" (subtle secrets). 11. Karate is like boiling water, if you do not heat it constantly, it will cool. 12. Do not think that you have to win, think rather that you do not have to lose. 13. Victory depends on your ability to distinguish vulnerable points from invulnerable ones. 14. The out come of the battle depends on how you handle weakness and strength. 15. Think of your opponents hands and feet as swords. 16. When you leave home, think that you have numerous opponents waiting for you. 17. Beginners must master low stance and posture, natural body positions are for the advanced. 18. Practicing a kata exactly is one thing, engaging in a real fight is another. 19. Do not forget to correctly apply: strength and weakness of power, stretching and contraction of the body, and slowness and speed of techniques. 20. Always think and devise ways to live the precepts of karate-do every day. As an example, trying to apply number 15 to some of what I do is a good way to get injured and not accomplish much.

We are each of us ultimately accountable to our own conscience in whatever form that might take. Whatever we do, or don't do, or whatever we permit done in our presence or under our name, we have to live with the consequences of. Even, and most ESPECIALLY those consequences that you do not intend. Beyond that, accountability is a choice. Criminals are criminals precisely because they will not VOLUNTARILY submit to accountability to the legal codes established in a given society. Someone who will not be accountable to an organization to which they belong will quickly find themselves on the outside of that organization. Someone who will not be accountable to friends for minor slights and oversights will likely have no friends... so on and so forth. But at every stage it is a choice. Only the law has the actual authority to take that choice away from you, and then only in specific circumstances that are clearly defined and actually quite limited.

No. Not even a little bit. We CHOOSE to teach morality/philosophy along with fighting skill for a variety of reasons, but there is nothing in the laws or traditions of our greater society that states or even implies that a martial artist will be, or even should be, the moral authority on anything. The truth is, we teach moral philosophies because we and/or our students believe that they are a necessary part of either our skill, or the responsible use of that skill. Even if that is true though, there are certainly other ways to climb that mountain than the ones laid out in a dojo. If you want morality, I advise you to visit a church, because the morality you will get from me 'on the floor' as you like to put it is that of the great philosopher Kipling.

Sure. Or, to be more precise, for adults society DOES teach morality. There are laws, rules, taboos, codes of behavior, religions, philosophy and various scientific theories of human behavior that all combine to establish the so called "Moral standards" that any society will rise or sink to. Why is now acceptable, as an example, in the United States, to be homo-sexual, to be black, to be Mexican, to be.. whatever. Being, and proudly being, a member of the minority group of your choice and or birth, is socially acceptable due to our wider society embracing changes in scientific thought, laws, and psychology, rather than religious traditions that do not serve the needs of these members of society.

I am not really a Karate guy, but this is what I was able to find for a Goju grading syllabus. It seems legit based on the about a year of Goju I did a LONG time ago. I have never seen anything on a Karate syllabus to include Kani-Basami, but I HAVE seen my Goju instructor do what he called a scissor kick, which would look similar to kani but would score by kicking uke in the chest instead of by taking him to the ground. Kyu Ranking Required Techniques * 10th Kyu White belt plus stripes Jodan, Chudan, Gedan Zuki Jodan, Chudan, Gedan Uke Mae-Geri, Mawashi-Geri 9 th Kyu Yellow Requirements for 10th Kyu plus: Gekisai Dai Ichi kata (sequence) simple moving basics Uraken-Uchi, Hiji-ate, 8 th Kyu Orange Requirements for 9th Kyu plus: Gekisai Dai Ichi (good kata) Bunkai. Gekisai Dai Ni kata (sequence) Hiki-Uke, Yoko-geri, Ushiro-Geri, San dan gi 7 th Kyu Green Requirements for 8th Kyu plus: All basic techniques** Gekasai dai ni kata simple combination moving basics, Kumite, yaksoku kumite 6 th Kyu Blue Requirements for 7th Kyu plus: Saifa kata & Gekasai dai ni bunkai Renzoku bunzai gekasai dai ichi 5 th Kyu Purple Requirements for 6th Kyu plus: Saifa kata and bunkai, sanchin 4 th Kyu Purple and white stripe Requirements for 5th Kyu plus: Seiyunchin kata 3 rd Kyu Brown Requirements for 4th Kyu plus: Seiyunchin kata and bunkai 2 nd Kyu Brown 1 black stripe Requirements for 3rd Kyu plus: Shisochin kata, 1 st Kyu Brown 2 black stripes Requirements for 2nd Kyu plus: Shisochin kata and bunkai

Absolutely not. The idea that it ever could be is laughable. That being said, in our modern society one cannot ASSUME that responsibility for someone else's child just because of contact with them on a regular basis. Communication is key here. Parents often time have very skewed views of how their children behave, but at the end of the day our society trusts parents with raising their children. I for one would not like the alternative. Please see works such as "The Giver" for some idea of how that might work out. Never forget that parents and children are people, and as such they have a tendency to make mistakes, but they have the right to make those mistakes with their children, as painful as that is to watch sometimes.

Ok, I am going to take these one at a time because the answers to each question will be lengthy. Sometimes. Not really within the CONTENT per se.. Consider that a punch to the face is a punch to the face regardless of who issues it, but the CONTEXT, oh absolutely. Consider not only the precepts of Sensei Funakoshi, but the codes of Chivalry and Bushido as expressed at different times and places. Also consider the maxims and aims of Judo. Additional supporting evidence can be found in the medieval treatises of western martial arts. Consider this opening line from the lichtenauer Zettel: Young knight, learn  to love god and revere women; 2 thus your honor will grow.  Practice knighthood and learn 3 the Art that dignifies you,  and brings you honor in wars. There are similar exhortations on honor and proper behavior from treatises and soldierly manuals throughout the medieval and renaissance period. Teaching someone the use of arms, or even good skill at unarmed combat, is providing them with more personal power than they otherwise would have. From the historical context, the idea that providing someone with this power without a commensurate understanding of their character would ever be socially acceptable is a modern phenomenon. With that said, there is plenty of evidence that supports the idea that people always HAVE provided such training separate from morality. There just have always also been those that are more responsible with the training.

In Judo there is a concept called Tokui Waza, essentially your favorite or most reliable technique. Strategy for the fight tends to begin when you leave behind the idea of defeating your opponent and embrace the idea of doing a particular technique. Develop a hammer, something you can reliably score with first. It will likely be something you can do quickly under stress. Try drilling after an exhausting conditioning workout to start to ingrain this. Simultaneously, work on defending the attacks that land against you the most. Spend extra time working on the defenses to those attacks. Defenses should also serve the purpose of putting you in the position to launch your next attack and if possible disrupt your opponents balance and structure some as well. Once you have 1. A defense against the attacks that land on you the most often and 2. An attack that you can reliably score with, then you have the beginnings of a strategy. This is where the real work begins, because each fight is unique and the variations on even a basic strategy are nearly infinite, and that is before you start adding in combinations of techniques. DO LOTS OF SPARRING AT THIS POINT. Helps to have a partner that is interested in your development. Adapting your strategy to different opponents is largely a function of how much you know ABOUT your opponents. Is he taller than me? Is he shorter than me? Does he like to go left or right? Did I watch his last fight? What does he like to do? This is just an intro, but should be enough to get you started on developing sparring strategy.

Yeah, I hadn't even got to that part yet in my suggestions. But this is another issue with simulating human tissue to strike. People move and, not only that, but they are weirdly shaped and oddly supported so you can never be sure of what you are striking.

The only fair answer to this is "It depends". Brown belt IS an instructor rank in GJJ, but a junior one to a 4th degree. Junior instructors can have great energy and sometimes can actually push you to succeed faster than an older instructor who understands that it is a marathon, not a sprint. That being said, you should be prepared to take a greater degree of control over your own development at this point, and I would not rule out the possibility of doing some weekend sessions with your current instructor as time allows.

With regards to BREAKING a bone, I would suggest trying this: Get a poplar or ash dowel rod of approximately the thickness of the bone you are trying to simulate, then get about a %15-20 ballistics gel to form the flesh surface, form it to about the thickness you want of flesh of the dowel rod and try hitting it. I warn you that at first this will not be pleasant, as striking %20 ballistics gel with your bare hands is not fun, but it wont HURT you per say, just mess up your form.

Very true, and for several reasons: 1. Human bone is not just one substance, it is a layered substance. 2. Living bone is VERY different from dead bone. 3. Outside of certain very specific professions having experience cutting living human bone is... frowned upon. 4. Everyone's bones have a slightly different structure. My bones and your bones do not necessarily have the same density. This is BEFORE we account for bone diseases and bone conditioning training. With this in mind, finding a good simulator for human bone is problematic at best. What most of us with swords do instead is use pell work for power, and use test cutting for form, so we look for a medium that is somewhat sorta close, such as soaked rolled tatami, that will give good feedback from the cut.

Awesome.... Congratulations Safroot!

Happy birthday sir

I use HSU for mine. They are not the BEST uniform you can buy, but you get good value for the money out of them. I really LIKE the Adidas gi, but it is pricey. There is a certain element of you get what you pay for in Judo uniforms.

Thank you for the explanation. I find value in this and will actually be trying this out in training to see if this works. I appreciate this information. I know that this month has been... hectic for you to say the least, but I would be interested in hearing what your results with the pell were if you get a chance.If you've read any of my last few posts, you will hopefully not take what I say next as an insult or disrespect for the knowledge you have shared with me. I actually have not had the opportunity to delve into this with my students as of yet. I have however made a, weapons Makiwara, if you will but have not gotten around to actually employing it in actual practice. I will being testing this with my students to see if it has favorable results as you have stated. No matter how it turns out I will definitely let you know. I appreciate your knowledge on this subject and hope you understand why I have not yet tried it. No disrespect was intended I can assure you. None taken, I assure you. I actually asked partly as a way of getting you to talk about something a little less intense. I respect that you are willing to give it a try, and look forward to hearing about your experiences with it.Please do not think I intend to badger you, I just thought that talking about hitting things would be more fun than what you have been dealing with recently.

Thank you for the explanation. I find value in this and will actually be trying this out in training to see if this works. I appreciate this information. I know that this month has been... hectic for you to say the least, but I would be interested in hearing what your results with the pell were if you get a chance.

Congrats Dani!

I own a Rapier. I have even been known to fence with it occasionally. It is not my favorite tool, and I am with George Silver in declaring it a bit of a social menace, but it has its uses.

I tend to be a bit of a Lichtenaur junkie. My preferred source is Ringeck, but I have done enough Fiori to have some respect for it.

Longsword for it's sheer versatility. Can be used one or two handed, although better 2. Can cut, thrust, or crush as needed. Every part of it is a weapon. Not particularly practical to carry, but if this was about practical, then the correct answer is a firearm.

Fair enough, but you wouldn't take someone deep sea diving who only knew how to tread water, and you wouldn't try to claim that someone who could only relax and tread water was an expert in swimming. There are many people doing many things in the world, some of them getting paid for it, that they are not very good at. To go back to your example, attackers use the element of surprise, but because of that anyone who has spent time truly becoming aware of their surroundings, actually aware, not just paranoid and jumpy, almost immediately defeats most attacks before they ever begin. Thus to attack such a person, you must become better at the element of surprise. This becomes a cycle that eventually becomes various martial traditions and fighting systems throughout the world.

That's such a vague and subjective statement to make in the sense that it supports everything and nothing at the same time. We're talking about why the technique doesn't fit the situation and why its very unlikely to succeed compared to other options available. You seem to argue that because something "might" work its therefore a good idea despite having extremely limited success. To be fair, if something is REALLY self-defense, and not fighting, then you really are usually behind the curve to begin with. In that situation, low percentage, high payoff moves tend to look more appealing. In my humble opinion, if something HAS worked for you, then you should not discount it, but if you wish to be a skilled martial artist, it is necessary to explore WHY it worked, and WHEN and WHERE it might work in the future.