New member with an important question...

[Yoshimitsu]

First and foremost I'd like to say hi to everyone at the forums. As you can guys I'm new here but hopefully you'll see me around here more often than not.

 

Anyways let me get to my question. I've been practicing Konigun Ninjutsu for almost a year now. I had never really wanted to research much about my art as I had the training manual and that was fine. Today however with nothing to do I decided to do a little searching and I found several disheartening things.

 

The first thing thing I found was a post made by an anonymous poster at a forum saying that my art was something made-up, that the Shidoshi (director) is a con-man. This literally made my stomach lurch.

 

The second thing I found was that Konigun Ninjutsu isn't listed hardly anywhere, only a few places and it's official website. So I've made myself a little predicament.

 

As I understand it my art was created in Kyushu, some islands off the coast of Japan. According to some sources though there are quite a few ryu's of Ninjutsu sects that either died out or no one really knows about. I do not want to be a part of a made-up martial art, which is why I'm typing this. I need anyone with knowledge of Ninjutsu to help me out and clarify things for me, perhaps setting records straight.

 

So if anyone with Ninjutsu knowledge help me out here? Any kind of info would be good. If you know of Konigun Ninjutsu please post here, whether you think it a scam or a legit art I will still appreciate your opinions.

 

Thanks

[Tombstone]

I've always been interested in Ninjitsu. Finding information on it is hard however. If you're truely learning, having fun, etc. then don't stress over it. Who knows, you might be the one to popularize your style and get everyones attention.

[WolverineGuy]

Well, I've been doing a little reading for you, and most of what I've found points to a guy named Bryce Dallas. Most of the things I've read about him, sadly, are not very good. While I'm not sure about how "made up" your art is, and I refuse to discredit anything I haven't seen for myself, I'm somewhat concerned about the things I HAVE read. I see that the art has been located in Tennessee, Arkansas, and Philly. If the guy is truly a con man, I'm not sure that he could expand across three states like that, but who knows (AK and TN are easy, but PA...it could be done, who knows...) At any rate, where did you see this post? I dunno, I guess I'm not the kind of person that stresses about that sort of thing, as long as the art works...although, claiming to be a 1000+ year old traditional martial art is not really all that honorable. If the guy is a con man, cut your losses. If he's legit, and you like what you are doing, stay with it. If I were you, and you really wanted to look more into it, try to find some of Dallas's old students, and see what they think or know. Hope that helped.

[Yoshimitsu]

Well right now I'm training under one of his old students, and although they have a fallout from time to time he speaks highly of him. I personally have never met the man as he does not live anywhere around here. The only person other than my sensei that I know has met him is a former student who sparred him and as I understand it got worked over pretty well, but that's it and doesn't really matter much.

 

I did just now find an article mentioning the Saiga ryu, but that's also not very informative only confirming that it was a Buddhist-ryu.

 

Here are some other little things that might help: We don't use belts which apparently is weird, we use sashes instead. Also in the back of my manual that I own there is the Bushido code, a thing we are to learn. I'm not sure but isn't that a samurai thing?

 

BTW the forum I got that off of was a hyperboard forum and I was dumb enough NOT to bookmark it so it might take me awhile to find it again. Thanks for the help guys, you are the first forum to actually respond, lol. From what I understand Konigun Ninjutsu is something of a contraversey to say the least.

[karatekid1975]

I hear that Ninjutsu itself isn't bad. It's a really good art (then again, I'm just a Korean stylist reading about it). But I never heard of Konigun Ninjutsu.

 

Here's what I found on the word Ninjutsu:

 

http://www.geocities.com/yosemite/rapids/1028/info.htm This site has pretty good info.

 

http://www.ntcofcanada.com/ This one has a few videos.

 

Both sites have some links you can look at. I hope this helps.

[Yoshimitsu]

Thanks for the sites.

 

After talking with Wolverine for a bit and getting an opinion from another...neutral martial artist has made me rethink my stance on this. It is said that one little negative can undo a lot of positive. This is a little thing that can't really be proved either way, but it ate at me basically all day today. It's something like what happens at school. I'm sure there are a good majority of people at my school who have good things to say about me, but I am also sure there is another group who despise me.

 

So basically I'm staying with my art for 2 reasons: I like the art itself for one thing. The second reason is that you can't always believe what you hear and what you read.

 

PS: Special shout-out to WolverineGuy for his take on this. Thanks

[monkeygirl]

Yoshimitsu (by the way, nice name!)

 

You may want to tell us a little bit about your training. While the history of a martial art may be interesting, it's not everything. When it comes right down to the bottom line, the training is what matters, what decides whether or not your art is legitimate. So, if you tell us a bit about your training, some of our ninjutsu practitioners may be able to evaluate you.

 

While you're at it, take the time to formally introduce yourself at the Introductions forum!

[WolverineGuy]

Any time, my man! I enjoyed talkin to ya!

[SaiFightsMS]

As a historical note most traditonal ninjitsu was practiced within families. And were closed not only to outsiders of the non Japanese kind but also to those outside of the family.

[Kensai]

Because of the secretcy of Ninjutsu, it can easily become a mcdojo style. As people can make wild claims and no one can really prove them wrong. I heard of some guy that combined TKD and Judo and called it Ninjutsu.

 

Personally, for safetys sake find yourself a bujinkan ninjutsu club. This I believe is one of the few true ninja styles, as its the one with links of Iga ninja sect.

 

http://www.bujinkan.com/