ITF/WTF Merger???

[DWx]

The merger is between the ITF headed by Ung Chang. My guess is its the North Korean branch?

I suppose that would make sense as Prof. Chang Ung is on the IOC. It says on his ITF website:

"With my back ground as the Member of the International Olympic Committee (I.O.C.)... I will fulfill my duties, that of the unification of ITF & WTF.."

Wonder what will happen to ITF-C and ITF-V if Chang Ung and WTF merge.

[Ottman]

Who cares?

Let's do away with all these orgs and just have Tae Kwon Do. How does that sound?

As said in a previous post: it's just politics.

No need for politics in MA

( Although I wouldn't mind seeing a little MA in politics. Can you imagine if senators had to spar to defend their positions? I would be glued to C-Span 24/7.)

[DWx]

Who cares?

Let's do away with all these orgs and just have Tae Kwon Do. How does that sound?

That would be great but unfortunately we live in a capitalist world where everything is governed by political bodies and orgs whose hidden agenda is nearly always money. The sad thing is that all these organisations really define what Tae Kwon Do is. Even just looking at WTF vs. ITF style a beginner can see that there is a major difference. Which one is really TKD? or even what is TKD? You can say it is a predominately striking art but you could say that about hundreds of martial arts. You could name some of the forms or techniques but many different other styles also share them.

It'd be great to go back to the days where a master would take on a few students for nothing and teach them. Yet if that happened unique martial arts would disappear and we would end up with everything becoming morphed and diluted from the originals with additions and variations. If people didn't care about what style they were learning I say go ahead and return to the concept of no-style. The best martial artists were always the ones who adapted things to suit their body type and didn't care for rules. However people in this day and age like to learn different systems, look at yourself for example, you list five different arts under what styles you have learnt. If you want to do away with all the orgs, do away with naming the system altogether and just tell people you learn "martial arts".

(This is in no way a go at you Ottoman... I just hate it when MA are taken over completely by politics)

EDIT: I can't spell

[Ottman]

Who cares?

Let's do away with all these orgs and just have Tae Kwon Do. How does that sound?

That would be great but unfortunately we live in a capitalist world where everything is governed by political bodies and orgs whose hidden agenda is nearly always money.

Exactly the problem. I can understand individual schools and instructors needing to make ends meet, but I see no need whatsoever for these orgs, especially when it costs over $300 for things like dan certifications that really don't mean anything to anyone except the coffers of the ITF, or WTF, or etc..

The sad thing is that all these organisations really define what Tae Kwon Do is.

Wrong, the instructors and practitioners of TKD really define what TKD is. These orgs can try to hold people to certain standards, but in your experience, has this been the case at all? (It hasn't in mine)

Even just looking at WTF vs. ITF style a beginner can see that there is a major difference. Which one is really TKD? or even what is TKD? You can say it is a predominately striking art but you could say that about hundreds of martial arts. You could name some of the forms or techniques but many different other styles also share them.

Again, (and like every other martial art IMHO) I think the major difference here is between individual practitioners and instructors, you can say that nomenclature, and forms are clearly different between WTF and ITF, but these differ between schools of the same org as well. For instance, although my school is officially WTF, but we teach forms from both styles, and use terminology and teach techniques from many different styles of martial arts. Nearly all of our students have no idea which org we belong to (or even that these different orgs exist at all) and also don't know that our self defense cirricculum is really primarily Hapkido and Ju Jitsu techniques, and the style of sparring we teach is more like something you'd find at an Isshin Ryu or Shotokan school. They really are just training martial arts, and couldn't care less that are orginizations trying to . . . 'organize' everything. So when you look to the individual student, why try to make things complicated with different parameters for different 'styles' of the same art? Sounds senseless to me.

It'd be great to go back to the days where a master would take on a few students for nothing and teach them.

Wish I knew of a time and place (and an instructor) where this happened.

Yet if that happened unique martial arts would disappear and we would end up with everything becoming morphed and diluted from the originals with additions and variations.

Hasn't this already happened throughout the history of martial arts? Not that I think it's a bad thing, these additions and variations don't dilute the arts, but are the exact reason there are so many different styles. I believe this is exactly the thing that makes different styles, and different martial arts practitioners unique to begin with.

If people didn't care about what style they were learning I say go ahead and return to the concept of no-style. The best martial artists were always the ones who adapted things to suit their body type and didn't care for rules. However people in this day and age like to learn different systems, look at yourself for example, you list five different arts under what styles you have learnt. If you want to do away with all the orgs, do away with naming the system altogether and just tell people you learn "martial arts".

I wouldn't say 'no-style' but rather 'your-style' isn't this the whole point behind martial arts training to begin with? I wouldn't say that the best martial artists don't care for rules either, they just tend to make up their own. When a body of people are respecting a certain set of rules, (at a tournament for instance) the best martial artists are the ones who can adapt to whatever those rules are, and still be successful. Therefore, while they respect all rules at the proper times, they are not bound indefinitely by them. The reason I study so many different styles is due to my attempt at refining my own style. I take from each of them what I need/want and leave the rest. I can understand the need to know the basic gist behind what is taught in each art (if you're looking for grappling training, it's good to know that BJJ is a grappling art, while TKD is not) but such strict definitions of what is included (and more importantly what is not included) in different styles of the same art, as the WTF and ITF and other like orgs have, is rediculous (again, IMHO).

(This is in no way a go at you Ottoman... I just hate it when MA are taken over completely by politics)

Never thought it was. I also hate when MA are taken over by politics. Good convo though!

[DWx]

The sad thing is that all these organisations really define what Tae Kwon Do is.

Wrong, the instructors and practitioners of TKD really define what TKD is. These orgs can try to hold people to certain standards, but in your experience, has this been the case at all? (It hasn't in mine)

But what is TKD though if it isn't a certain way of doing things according to what is commomly accepted as TKD. The instructors and students make TKD (or any other MA) live. The actual movments and way of doing those movements make a martial art individual and different.

I'm finding it really hard to explain myself lol...

What I mean is, what if I was only ever taught WuShu but thought I was doing TKD, would that make it TKD because all the other students and instructors believed it was?

...forms are clearly different between WTF and ITF, but these differ between schools of the same org as well. For instance, although my school is officially WTF, but we teach forms from both styles, and use terminology and teach techniques from many different styles of martial arts. Nearly all of our students have no idea which org we belong to (or even that these different orgs exist at all) and also don't know that our self defense cirricculum is really primarily Hapkido and Ju Jitsu techniques, and the style of sparring we teach is more like something you'd find at an Isshin Ryu or Shotokan school...

How can you be sure you're really doing Tae Kwon Do. Tae Kwon Do was named in 1955 so surely the only true TKD is exactly the same as the style that was named in April of that year? Any improvements or modifications should really be scrapped if we want to call an art pure Tae Kwon Do. But then again there is always room for improvement in any fighting system. Should martial arts be able to evolve so much that they are unrecognisable as their original forms and still retain their original names? Scientists have come up with new names at each major deviation of natural evolution so should martial arts be renamed if they aren't recognisable as their original format?

They really are just training martial arts, and couldn't care less that are orginizations trying to . . . 'organize' everything. So when you look to the individual student, why try to make things complicated with different parameters for different 'styles' of the same art? Sounds senseless to me.

Well then call it martial arts and not TKD. And are different 'styles' of of the same art really part of the same art if they are so different they have varying parameters?

Yet if that happened unique martial arts would disappear and we would end up with everything becoming morphed and diluted from the originals with additions and variations.

Hasn't this already happened throughout the history of martial arts?

Yes, it happened before the concept of "martial arts" when we were still cavemen and it will happen for as long as humans feel it necessary to learn to fight. However, people cling to structure and organisation and I think martial arts wouldn't be as popular if people couldn't recognise a set system or style?

I think my wording's off again...

If martial arts returned to just the "student and teacher" concept, the competitiveness would be lost, the desire to master something that others are trying to master or the ability to compare yourself to another...

The beauty of martial arts now is that most have spread global and someone from the country of origin for a particular martial art can see the resemblance to someone across the other side of the world?!? What I'm trying to say (and failing miserably) is that just like common sports such as tennis and basketball, martial arts work better if the "family" that study them is worldwide and encompasses people from all backgrounds, (this is starting to sound really mushy )

aww, heck, forget this bit until I can think how to word it...

I wouldn't say 'no-style' but rather 'your-style' isn't this the whole point behind martial arts training to begin with? I wouldn't say that the best martial artists don't care for rules either, they just tend to make up their own.

So why name martial arts, lets just call them all by the same name! What do you think constitutes a martial art by the way? A common answer I get is that martial arts often have a philosophy or ideal behind them. By mixing bits of different styles do you lose that ideal and therefore lose the "art" respect behind them?

The reason I study so many different styles is due to my attempt at refining my own style. I take from each of them what I need/want and leave the rest. I can understand the need to know the basic gist behind what is taught in each art (if you're looking for grappling training, it's good to know that BJJ is a grappling art, while TKD is not) but such strict definitions of what is included (and more importantly what is not included) in different styles of the same art, as the WTF and ITF and other like orgs have, is ridiculous (again, IMHO).

That all depends on what you are taking away from each style. Some techniques are designed to work well after another and indeed some work only in certain situations. When explaining the pros and cons of mma to other students, I tend to use the analogy of an alphabet. You can take letters / symbols away from different systems of writing but what you are left with is incoherent and doesn’t work unless you are able to adapt it properly and create a new language that utilises each component effectively. A better example is language. Have you ever tried having a conversation in English, French and Cantonese? The grammatical structures are different. One language may have a word for something that you will never encounter or a word that only works in certain contexts. By trying too hard to mix languages but not really defining a totally new system, all that results is confusion. Would you really try a TKD technique in a silat stance? The mechanics of the motions are often incompatable.

Good convo though!

Yeah, I think we hijacked Bushidoman's original topic though.

[bushido_man96]

Yeah, I think we hijacked Bushidoman's original topic though.

Hey, its all good! The reason that we have the ITF and the WTF to begin with all goes back to politics. General Choi originally pushed to try to get TKD into the Olympic games. He had spoken to the head of the IOC a few times, but to no avail, it appears.

I know that the ITF and WTF had different rule sets when it came to sparring. I am not sure why they went with the WTF over the ITF, but it may have something to do with the Kukkiwon being a certification body for the WTF around the world.

Can anyone shed some light on this matter for me?

[Ottman]

What I mean is, what if I was only ever taught WuShu but thought I was doing TKD, would that make it TKD because all the other students and instructors believed it was?

Yes. (I can't decide if this is a good or a bad thing, but the answer is yes.)

How can you be sure you're really doing Tae Kwon Do. Tae Kwon Do was named in 1955 so surely the only true TKD is exactly the same as the style that was named in April of that year? Any improvements or modifications should really be scrapped if we want to call an art pure Tae Kwon Do. But then again there is always room for improvement in any fighting system. Should martial arts be able to evolve so much that they are unrecognisable as their original forms and still retain their original names? Scientists have come up with new names at each major deviation of natural evolution so should martial arts be renamed if they aren't recognisable as their original format?

Tae Kwon Do is a perfect example of this exact type of evolution and renaming. What you refer to as 'true TKD' is actually a melding and subsequent evolution of a bunch of other older arts that was organized and then named TKD by General Choi. He and his original practitioners decided that this style would be called TKD, but it really uses principals and techniques from different arts, and every student and instructor has their own interpretation of these techniques. So how can we be sure that what we refer to as true TKD, isn't really just Hwarang-do and Karate mixed together and evolved accordingly?

Well then call it martial arts and not TKD. And are different 'styles' of of the same art really part of the same art if they are so different they have varying parameters?

Good question. We should ask the Shotokan, Goju Ryu, Isshin Ryu, Shorin Ryu, Wei Chi Ryu, Kempo, Kenpo, Wushu, Wing Chun, Long Fist, Shaolin, BJJ, JJJ, Judo, Aikido, Hapkido, Silat, Muay Tai, etc. guys about this.

Personally I'm not sure how significantly varied you can get with two arms and two legs, but there are certainly differences in strategy, and philosophy between these different styles, and certainly different nuances in how to perform things like kicks and other strikes and take downs and other techniques between different arts. These types of differences are not apparent to me when we are talking about WTF and ITF, which, to me, are more administrative bodies trying to tie together things like certifications and set cirriculum etc. Again, I see no real need for these types of orgs to exist, and especially no need for the fees they charge.

However, people cling to structure and organisation and I think martial arts wouldn't be as popular if people couldn't recognise a set system or style?

This is true, but I don't see how it applies to WTF/ITF. Again, most of the students at my school, and many from other schools that I have talked to are not even aware of this division in TKD. Thus, you can certainly recognize TKD as a seperate style from other martial arts without needing the WTF and ITF to tell you so.

I think my wording's off again...

If martial arts returned to just the "student and teacher" concept, the competitiveness would be lost, the desire to master something that others are trying to master or the ability to compare yourself to another...

The beauty of martial arts now is that most have spread global and someone from the country of origin for a particular martial art can see the resemblance to someone across the other side of the world?!? What I'm trying to say (and failing miserably) is that just like common sports such as tennis and basketball, martial arts work better if the "family" that study them is worldwide and encompasses people from all backgrounds, (this is starting to sound really mushy )

aww, heck, forget this bit until I can think how to word it...

I can understand what you mean here, but I think you are forgetting that most martial artists, regardless of style, will be able to relate to one another, and consider themselves part of a whole simply because they are martial artists. This forum itself is a prime example of that. This is what I see as the beauty of MA. It doesn't matter what style you are rooted in, martial artists tend to respect each other just because they are martial artists. And I cannot imagine that competitiveness would be lost if we stop dividing MA's into different styles. Look at the popularity and competitiveness in MMA. Also, I've always been of the opinion that MA is about mastering yourself, and maybe it's just me, but I've never really compared myself to what others are doing. I just do it the best I can.

What do you think constitutes a martial art by the way? A common answer I get is that martial arts often have a philosophy or ideal behind them. By mixing bits of different styles do you lose that ideal and therefore lose the "art" respect behind them?

I consider martial arts as a method of learning about your own self; your limitations, strengths, weaknesses, etc. and expressing them physically in the way that best represents who you are. Each martial art has it's own philosophies and ideals, but I think we can agree that martial arts in general share very similar ideals and philosophies, so no, I don't think you lose those ideals from mixing styles, but on the contrary you reinforce them by mixing styles.

That all depends on what you are taking away from each style. Some techniques are designed to work well after another and indeed some work only in certain situations. When explaining the pros and cons of mma to other students, I tend to use the analogy of an alphabet. You can take letters / symbols away from different systems of writing but what you are left with is incoherent and doesn’t work unless you are able to adapt it properly and create a new language that utilises each component effectively. A better example is language. Have you ever tried having a conversation in English, French and Cantonese? The grammatical structures are different. One language may have a word for something that you will never encounter or a word that only works in certain contexts. By trying too hard to mix languages but not really defining a totally new system, all that results is confusion. Would you really try a TKD technique in a silat stance? The mechanics of the motions are often incompatable.

Well, even though I only speak English fluently, I can speak a decent amount of Spanish and also know some German, some Japanese, and of course, a little Korean. Just because I can't speak these languages fluently, doesn't mean that I can't use them to communicate better with people who do. I went to Mexico and was able to communicate very well using a mix of Spanish and English (far better than if I just knew english and didn't know any Spanish.) I'm sure I would have created confusion had I thrown some German or Japanese into there as well, but that's part of Martial Arts as well: knowing when to use which technique. If I didn't have any Spanish speaking ability, I wouldn't have been able to pull it out and use it when needed. So if you indiscriminately use random techniques not neccessarily applicable to the situation, of course you will create confusion. But not having those other skills also creates the potential for you to come up short when you need them, so as with most things, there are two sides to this issue, and it really depends on the situation to determine which course of action is best.

I couldn't imagine not having BJJ skills at this point, when just 5 years ago I never would have seen the point of training in BJJ. I do mix and match techniques from different styles, but I also have to keep in mind which is relevant at which time to avoid the confusion you've alluded to.

Good convo though!

Yeah, I think we hijacked Bushidoman's original topic though.

We've gone a little off topic (expanded if you will) but I think that bushidoman is listening intently and will chime in when he's ready.

[Ottman]

Hey, its all good! The reason that we have the ITF and the WTF to begin with all goes back to politics. General Choi originally pushed to try to get TKD into the Olympic games. He had spoken to the head of the IOC a few times, but to no avail, it appears.

I know that the ITF and WTF had different rule sets when it came to sparring. I am not sure why they went with the WTF over the ITF, but it may have something to do with the Kukkiwon being a certification body for the WTF around the world.

Can anyone shed some light on this matter for me?

I never thought about this, but I know that WTF style sparring has been referred to as Olympic Style since I've been involved in TKD, even before TKD became an Olympic sport. I guess the Kukkiwon just had a better lobby?

Currently, ITF style sparring is only light contact (at least in every tournament I've ever been to) which I'd like to see changed, but I honestly don't know how WTF style rules made the Olympic games while ITF didn't. Again: politics.

[bushido_man96]

Hey, its all good! The reason that we have the ITF and the WTF to begin with all goes back to politics. General Choi originally pushed to try to get TKD into the Olympic games. He had spoken to the head of the IOC a few times, but to no avail, it appears.

I know that the ITF and WTF had different rule sets when it came to sparring. I am not sure why they went with the WTF over the ITF, but it may have something to do with the Kukkiwon being a certification body for the WTF around the world.

Can anyone shed some light on this matter for me?

I never thought about this, but I know that WTF style sparring has been referred to as Olympic Style since I've been involved in TKD, even before TKD became an Olympic sport. I guess the Kukkiwon just had a better lobby?

Currently, ITF style sparring is only light contact (at least in every tournament I've ever been to) which I'd like to see changed, but I honestly don't know how WTF style rules made the Olympic games while ITF didn't. Again: politics.

Politics, maybe. Perhaps they just gave a better pitch?

[DWx]

Do you have to pay a yearly "subscription" type fee to the WTF? I've looked on their website but it only mentions about national assosciation orgs fees and referee registration...

The olympics is supposed to be for amateurs rather than proffessionals and is supposed to be open to anyone good enough regardless of background. Perhaps the IOC went for WTF for the money reasons as the individual members don't have to pay?

I'm really not sure on that though, its just a guess.