Reason for belonging

[bushido_man96]

What is your reason for belonging to a martial art club or organization?

Because its something I enjoy doing and provides my people I can train with.

[MatsuShinshii]

Side note: why are organizations far more prevalent in Japanese and Korean arts, less so in Okinawan, and seemingly non-existent in Chinese?

The Japanese and Koreans focus is on building their organizations IMHO. The more students the better. Not all but the vast majority.

Besides a few, most Okinawan and Chinese schools that I have trained at are small in comparison to Japanese and Korean schools. They tend to like smaller number of students and more direct contact with their students. Again not in all cases but in most.

The organization (if you can call it that) that I belong to had less than 500 students in all of the states our instructors are in before it broke up. What is left is less than 400. My Shinshii never taught more than 10 students at a time. It's more personal. This is their way. I personally prefer the one on one experience of teaching or learning.

How much credibility do you give an Ashida Kim or Frank Dux certified instructor? Fred Villari?

My mother always said if you have nothing nice to say, say nothing at all. I have nothing good to say so...

With an organization, there’s a good chance the teacher is him/herself a student under the founder or higher-ups.

No one is a student of the founder of traditional arts. They are all long gone. As far as them being a student of the arts hierarchy - it's a possibility but not a certainty.

Organizations can work the other way by keeping me far away from certain places, as there are several well known McDojo chains out there. I’m not going to name names, but there’s quite a few “no experience necessary” organizations out there. When I was looking into re-starting coming on 3 years ago, I googled a local MA school I knew nothing about. I came across an “open your own dojo; no experience necessary” video put out by that organization on YouTube. No way I’m even visiting that school.

This is true. Finding an organization does not guaranty quality, knowledge or skill. In fact I'd rather learn from a true practitioner of the arts with no ties to an organization than most of the so called legitimate organizations out there.

Do a google search and you can find huge organizations that claim lineage to the founder but their instructors couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag. They claim huge number of students. This is great but does not guaranty that the instruction is good but there are a lot of students that fell pray to con artists. Just because you belong to an organization does not mean your getting taught anything of value.

There are benefits and draw backs to belonging to an organization. The benefits are legitimacy, access to things you can't get with an individual, etc, etc. The down falls are politics. IMHO the biggest issue are those that gain power and position and make changes not consistent with the founders ideals . There are 1000's of reasons to belong as well as there are just as many reasons not to belong. It really comes down to the individual and what their needs are.

I personally find no real reason for or against. I think its a balance of good with bad.

[Spartacus Maximus]

The one reason everyone has in common for belonging to any organization is human nature. With only a few extreme exceptional cases, people will naturally want to find others to interact with and share an interest, an idea or an activity. Those with similar interests usually tend to seek each other out. The more people there are, the more organized they will get. Like this forum, for example.

[MatsuShinshii]

The one reason everyone has in common for belonging to any organization is human nature. With only a few extreme exceptional cases, people will naturally want to find others to interact with and share an interest, an idea or an activity. Those with similar interests usually tend to seek each other out. The more people there are, the more organized they will get. Like this forum, for example.

Great point. I agree.