Why do so many mock aikido?

Discussion in 'Aikido' started by Theidiot, Oct 18, 2016.

  1. Theidiot

    Theidiot New Member

    I don't mean on here. I mean in general. The interweb is full of claims and 'proof' that aikido is a waste of time.

    I've only been training in it for a few months. I come from a background of karate and similar so I'm not by any means qualified to pretend to know what I'm on about. But the very limited amount of training I have had has convinced me that if practiced properly, and if one explorers the principles rather than limiting ones self to the text book techniques, I can see how it can be extremely efficient as a defensive combat system.

    So I don't get why there are so many folks out there that would ridicule it.

    The aikido club I attend sells itself as freestyle, and the chief instructor is an ex soldier so I'm wondering if my confusion arises from the possibility that the aikido I've seen is not the same as pure traditional aikido.
     
  2. Aegis

    Aegis River Guardian Admin Supporter

    It's one of those arts studied for a number of reasons, and some of those reasons don't appeal to people who train for the sole purpose of learning to defeat someone else in a full-contact sparring match. Let's face it, aikido is not the fastest route to that particular goal.

    Some schools don't do themselves any favours, as they might train with no intensity ever, or spend far too much time focusing on parlour tricks like throwing someone with no contact at all or too little to actually make any difference.
     
  3. aikiMac

    aikiMac aikido + boxing = very good Moderator Supporter

  4. Pretty In Pink

    Pretty In Pink Moved on MAP 2017 Gold Award

    Just because someone is a soldier, does not mean they have any ability to fight hand to hand whatsoever.
     
  5. SWC Sifu Ben

    SWC Sifu Ben I am the law

    I would caveat that saying that it doesn't mean they have any significant skill with hand to hand. Fitness plus aggression is a potent mix. Your average marine would wipe the floor with most martial arts practitioners.
     
  6. Dunc

    Dunc Well-Known Member Moderator Supporter

    Akido was my 1st martial art and I'll say that it (maybe with rugby) got me through my "school scrapping years" very effectively

    Ultimately it wasn't for me - when I went to uni there was a huge choice of styles and after trying most of them I settled on a different art

    If you enjoy it that's fine and probably if you train with a focus on what you want to achieve then you'll make progress in that direction. But I'd also suggest that you heed the advice that experienced folk on MAP give as there may be other, more efficient ways to achieve your goals
     
  7. Pretty In Pink

    Pretty In Pink Moved on MAP 2017 Gold Award

    Not me.
     
  8. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    Its mocked for the same reason wing chun is mocked, a number who train it claim its very good for self defence, yet there isnt a single clip from those saying this of it working in unscripted full contact fighting, think theres a thread here for example of aikido in a real fight which goes for 78 pages without a clip of anything like a real fight.

    Interestingly I dont think people who train for the sole perpose of winning a full contact fight mock it because people train it for other reasons than fighting such as health or improvement , i mean no one really mocks those training tai chi for health, they tend to mock it because claims are made by those studing it that have never been backed up
     
  9. Thomas

    Thomas Combat Hapkido/Taekwondo

    I think that's a very gross generalization. Having served and trained with all branches of the military, you really get a mixed bag. Yes, fitness plus aggression does help, but it's not the end-all be-all.

    That said, I do hate the whole "war" and "warrior" analogies used in the martial arts. Being a martial artist, competitive or not, is not the same as being a warrior or fighting in combat. Well... not unless you fight "as real as it gets" and call in an airstrike on your opponent after getting intel from your LRS teams on his/her activities for the past few days. But, I digress on my pet peeve.... :)
     
  10. Thomas

    Thomas Combat Hapkido/Taekwondo

    I like Aikido. In my opinion, the falling and the footwork is truly exceptional and lays the foundation for a very powerful system. I've cross trained/sampled Aikido for quite a few years and have found it very complementary to Taekwondo and Combat Hapkido.

    The largest 'downside' is that, in my opinion, it takes so long to get good at it. It really takes a long term commitment to reach any sort of practical level. To tie into that, sometimes I have found some Aikido students to get so used to doing things the 'Aikido Way', that new situations or changed formats seem to throw some students off more than I've seen in some styles.
     
  11. greg1075

    greg1075 Valued Member

    No one mocks Aikido. Some people mock a training method.
     
  12. Ero-Sennin

    Ero-Sennin Well-Known Member Supporter

    True dat. Also doesn't mean they've even seen combat, even during a time of war.

    I would agree if you're including the mcdojos people generally train at. I would disagree with you however if we're talking about somebody who has three months of decent sparring under their belt. The public image of the Marines is not the reality of the Marines.

    I remember when I first got to the fleet after all my infantry training that I got into a lot of trouble because I knew how to fight, would challenge stupidity, and wasn't easily intimidated (there's a thing against new joins in the Marines where you're just supposed to shut up and do what you're told). There was a field op where we did a bull in the ring style BJJ session, and I made a fool out of some of the senior guys very quickly. We were allowed to slap and I remember I wrapped one guy up with no intent of submitting him and just started slapping him. This lasted for a good 2-3 minutes. Needless to say I found myself on a lot of late watches :rolleyes: These were guys who had been in the infantry a couple years and had been on a combat deployment, and they were absolute garbage in hand to hand skills.

    Anywho, I'm not great at BJJ, didn't train enough. I would place myself as a novice in a bunch of different martial arts fields, but smart enough and mean enough to use it more effectively than a lot of people. At that level I was far superior than the great majority of people I came into contact with in the military. Very few people are actually really fit/aggressive, even in the Marine Corps infantry (as individuals, the group mindset is entirely different). Hell, not even every Marine is a rifleman. I've been to the shooting range watching a kid try to put the rifle bolt in backwards!

    I agree with you. However I'm going to warn you that military people are seldom alone when they are out on the town. So if you pick a fight with one, you're probably going to get blindsided and possibly curb stomped. I remember when I was boxing one of the instructors who did a few different things asked if I was a Marine one day, then got really mad about it because he picked a fight with one out on the town and then all his buddies showed up and beat the snot out of him and broke his foot : P. He ended up in the ER. (Like I had anything to do with it though. I did laugh at him though xD)

    I hate when people try to use the military as some sort of proving point with martial arts. Unless they were one of the select few individuals who were schooled and trained in hand to hand combat, were infantry, military police, or some other specialized unit (all a major minority) it's just not relevant.








    On topic, I've never really seen anybody who knows anything about Aikido blast Aikido? I've always took it as a style with a philosophy of training that should augment other training, not so much as a stand alone art.
     
  13. greg1075

    greg1075 Valued Member

    FWIW - A guy I used to train jjj with enlisted (army I think) a few years back. He came in to train after being in Afghanistan for a couple of years. He didn't have anything particularly positive to say about the hand to hand combat he'd received and didn't have anything useful to show us for that matter. I've rolled with an ex-marine. We both tested for blue together. He's fit and aggressive alright, but that's not like a higher rank than him can't deal with it.
     
  14. Pretty In Pink

    Pretty In Pink Moved on MAP 2017 Gold Award

    Oh I know it. Fighting as a unit doesn't just mean on the battlefield. They do that in pubs all across the UK too
     
  15. TwirlinMerlin

    TwirlinMerlin Valued Member

    I attended aikido classes for 6 months a while back. The school I was attending for karate invited me to give it a try. I felt there were some useful aspects. Coming from karate I was all about linear in and out, meeting force head on, driving through your opponent. Aikido opened my eyes to circular movement and redirecting your opponents energy and balance. So all that was great but I wasn't getting any real training beyond principle and theory. The training went like, I put my hands on my opponent, barely start a technique and he literally throws himself to the mat. It was like some kind of breakfall jamboree in there. There was a lot of delusion about what was effective and how real fighting actually goes. I have to admit though that it was still kind of fun. I can see why some people like it. I know my experience was only one school for a short stint but it seems like this is the norm for aikido?
     
  16. Giovanni

    Giovanni Well-Known Member Supporter

    if you like what you're doing, keep having at it. don't worry about it. everyone is going to tell you this or that about whatever you study.

    it's not to say that there are quicker and more effective ways to learn to fight in an empty-hand manner.

    what association is your dojo affiliated with?
     
  17. Giovanni

    Giovanni Well-Known Member Supporter

    at the very least, you'll get a killer front and back roll.
     
  18. Theidiot

    Theidiot New Member

    Thanks for all the insights. You've all helped satisfy my curiosity.

    In an effort to sum up what I think everyone is collectively saying, perhaps aikido is mocked by people with a very narrow set of criteria about what they think makes a worthy art.

    If you're at your peak fitness age, around between 20 and 30 years old, are physically fit, have no significant injuries or medical issues, and want to win fights quickly and you're not even thinking about reaching a point in your life where you physically can't keep kicking for 3 minutes or more and you just can't physically match a younger opponent, then aikido is a very bad choice.

    If on the other hand, you have a few persistent niggles, you can't go hell for leather for 3 minutes in one go, and in any case you have no interest in bashing another human being, but you like to explore the mechanics of the human body, and like to practice often overlooked things like falling safely, moving in without smashing your way in etc, and you don't care how long it takes because you're not training for an event, but are instead training because you like it, then aikido is cool.

    Does that sound about right?
     
  19. aikiMac

    aikiMac aikido + boxing = very good Moderator Supporter

    That's a fair assessment, although I did start aikido in my 20's, but I was interesting in learning how to safely fall down. And l liked the circles. :p
     
  20. huoxingyang

    huoxingyang Valued Member

    A friend of mine trains Aikido because of the pants. He's all about getting to wear the black flappy pants. :p
     

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