Self Defence question

Original post by goldenfish

I couldn't tell you what to reject because I don't have the expertise to. If you read Tao of Jeet Kune Do like I said earlier, some of Bruce Lee's ynotes go into details about what and why he's adopting certain things from specific sports / martial arts whether it be fencing or boxing or wing chun.

Not only I do, but many people far more knowledgeable then you or I do too. Dana white president of UFC called him the father of MMA, sugar ray leonard (i know he's not MMA) called him one of the greatest fighters ever and both Frank Shamrock and Randy Couture to name a few MMA fighters consider him father of MMA.

He promoted a training philosophy that was aimed at being the most relevant to Street fights / brawls and not necessarily being easy to learn, he understood that fighting in martial arts / boxing etc tournaments wouldn't necessarily prepare you for no bars fight since there are rules in tournaments e.g. No groin hits, no eye jabs etc.

It was developed to be effective, not easy. And considering how renowned he is as a fighter, I'd say it works.

Posted from TSR Mobile

Awesome

I mean seriously, I'm just blown away how two days ago you had all the knowledge in the world and your preaching your JKD gospel to everyone, and today you actually don't have any expertise at all and all it seems that you can do is quote other people and refer to pages in Bruce Lee books.

Reply 42

goldenfish

15

Original post by Clip

Awesome

I mean seriously, I'm just blown away how two days ago you had all the knowledge in the world and your preaching your JKD gospel to everyone, and today you actually don't have any expertise at all and all it seems that you can do is quote other people and refer to pages in Bruce Lee books.

Where did I say I have all the knowledge in the world? Please give me quotes. :rolleyes:

I would say I'm decent in multiple martial arts considering I've been practicing wing chun / boxing / aikido and Karate for 11 years. I've only started looking into JKD in the Last 2/3 years.
I can't give you advice about the jiu jitsu and judo since I don't practice them.

I'm just blown away by how arrogant you are, thinking you're more knowledgeable then a martial arts / fitness icon.

(edited 9 years ago)

Reply 43

Original post by goldenfish

Where did I say I have all the knowledge in the world? Please give me quotes. :rolleyes:

I would say I'm decent in multiple martial arts considering I've been practicing wing chun / boxing / aikido and Karate for 11 years. I've only started looking into JKD in the Last 2/3 years.
I can't give you advice about the jiu jitsu and judo since I don't practice them.

I'm just blown away by how arrogant you are, thinking you're more knowledgeable then a martial arts / fitness icon.

I knew this would be your next response - the old "You're arrogant" reply.

I presume you are referring to Bruce Lee again as the "martial arts icon". I'm not claiming to know more than he does - but I am saying that what he preached wasn't particularly novel, nor is it particularly practical. There is nothing wrong with saying this - it's a critique.

You came on here and told everyone that JKD is the best thing since sliced bread, and then went on to wax lyrical about how wonderful Bruce Lee was.

What I'm telling you is that for the vast majority of people, JKD is littered with problems. As you know - it's a martial arts philosophy. But at it's core for the majority of people it's suggesting something that is wholly impractical.

Can an average person go out there an learn any of the things that you have - Aikido, boxing, chunning, karate etc? Of course they can. If you box or spar regularly then it's impossible that in a few years you won't be able to fight.

But JKD says - "go out and put together your own amalgam of things that work for you". and by your own admission, this is going to take a very long time and is probably not workable for most people.

You reply that "it's the best and isn't easy". You also suggest that it would naturally take a very long time.

In what way then, is JKD superior to boxing, MT or karate? If you train boxing 3 hours a week plus an hour of sparring (or the same with MT or karate or BJJ or Judo) - in 3 years you will probably be able to have a bit of a fight.

What is 3 years of JKD? In all likelihood a Filipino-based training no different from anything else. What if you go your own way and do your own JKD? You'll most likely have a poorly understood mish-mash of striking and grappling. How long do you need before you have actually done better than the people who decided to actually learn something with some structure that's been put together by people who really knew what they were doing? (Like Kano, Uesheba or Funakoshi? Or indeed the Marquis of Queensbury?)

I put it to you that in most cases, JKD is implementing something that is not as good and takes much longer to learn.

I would ask you simply this - if you have 11 years of boxing behind you - you must be able to fight a bit. If you have 11 years of aikido, you have to be a shodan at least. Why on earth did you need a Bruce Lee poetry book to tell you that in some cases it's better to hit someone and in some cases it's better to put a hold on someone?

You've boxed. One of the greatest combat sports. What is there in boxing that you regard as "useless" that you would discard in your own personal JKD?

(edited 9 years ago)

Reply 44

Original post by Clip

The very fact that you consider Bruce Lee to be the father of MMA says it all. You do not have the slightest clue.

MMA has existed since antiquity. What we now see as MMA is far more closely related to Pankration than to JKD.

Pankration was one of the original Hellenic Olympic events, and was a combination of boxing and wrestling with rules extremely similar to the original Gracie UFC.

Was Bruce Lee around in the 7th Century BC? If not, how can he be the "father of MMA"? if they were doing it in Ancient Greece?

There have been Vale Tudo fights in Brazil for generations, with absolutely no reference to Bruce Lee or JKD. Similarly in Japan. The derivation of MMA is from VT in Brazil and Shootfighting in Japan - not from anything to do with Bruce Lee.

My contention is not that JKD philosophy is inherently untrue or fraudulent (like the vast majority of everything in martial arts); but rather that it is of very little value.

Firstly, there was no innovation. There was nothing clever in saying "Don't learn just one style - do what works for you" - because people had been doing that for hundreds of years.

Secondly, JKD has little practical modern application. BL was a martial arts teacher in America. He ran a kung fu school. He knew exactly what the pattern of learning was. Yet he promoted a training philosophy that is inaccessible to the overwhelming majority of students. This makes JKD in a sense no better than Northern Shaolin Five Animals Fist or whatever - where some old dude will tell you that you need to train for 20 years before you can win a fight. If you need to be able to box and wrestle and fence and do Muay Thai in order to have your own brand of JKD - well thank you very much, I could have done one of those and been able to fight five years ago.

You don't address anything that I've said except to shout "Bruce Lee is the best".

Tell me simply - if a core JKD principle is "absorb what is useful - reject that which is not"; let's say I'm starting out on my own personal JKD (as that's what it's all about) - what is there in Judo or Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu that I could possibly reject?

Just noticed this. i dunno whats been said in ur other quotes i might come back and read them later.

UFC and Vale Tudo are competitions. they may feature fighters from different martial arts to compete. Hellenic games featured wrestling in which everyone new pankration. pankration as a martial art became extinct but was basically made up but Jim Arvanitis around 1969. the man himself was a student of martial arts and had blended them. he wanted to revive pankration and proceeded to analyse images of pankration. obviously this information alone could not make up a martial art so he drew from his experiances of other martial arts to fill the gaps. so pankration was not intended to be a mixed martial art it was meant to be a patchwork revival of an old one.

while pankration was trying to rediscover a dead martial art. jet lee invented JKD which was not trying to be anything a cocktail of martial arts. prior to this most other stand alone martial arts were all about preserving tradition and were quite cult-like in nature. either that or they were a very linear mc-dojo style martial art that had graded belts for progress and were basically designed to make money more than teach sincerely practical fighting or defence.

jet lee was one of the first people to realise a lot of the cult style places wasted your time and that a lot of the "flowery" moves would take good chunks of a life time to master. in the process that it took for him to bring the cult like insular mysticism of kung fu to a blend of practicality that we see commonly with western style boxing he had become aware of other martial arts to incorporate.

he realised all martial arts are good but some had moves that were impractical in respect to the practitioner. for example helio gracie basically championed BJJ's groundwork because he was unable to beat his brothers when it came to throws. he did find however he could gain the upper hand on his stronger opponents via groundwork.

pencak silat focuses on using mystic dance style movements to trick and distract your opponent. some people lack the type of creativity, balance and cunning and the martial art would therefore not suit them. but thats not to say the whole martial art should be disregarded. there will be great techniques in there.

every martial artist who has learned multiple martial arts will have noticed that they use certain techniques while completely forgetting others that are seemingly of no use. they remember the ones that play to their own personal style.

the modern special forces learn mixed martial arts. they are encouraged to essentially make their own martial art that suits their natural and inherent style of fighting.

while there may have been other comparable attitudes towards martial arts and the blending of them historically. jet lee was the first to develop a system and encouragement of blending modern martial arts in a contemporary way. prior to that it was just individuals who would personally desire to learn a few martial arts. blending martial arts on an international scale is a fairly modern thing.

the idea behind jkd is not to just blend wingchun with western boxing. but to aquire and blend as many martial art techniques as you can. and cherry picking things from it that play to your own personal strengths as a fighter. so when you subscribe to JKD you're not just following a cocktail recipe of a chosen few martial arts like Kajukenbo, your encouraged to be constantly adapting and learning new things as you come across them.

so in that respect JKD is the first mixed martial art that is mixed on purpose.
while other martial arts may have been mixed they are not evolving. they repeatedly go back to the same vendors as inspiration and while they may sneak in a bit of other martial arts its not on their curriculum. for example kajukenbo has nothing from south east asian martial arts, its all japanese, chinese and western. nothing from korea, the philippines, indonesia, thailand or cambodia.

so to recap. JKD is meant to be a evolving mixed martial art tailored to the individual practitioner. much like MMA.

it is therefore quite different to dedicated recipe of combined martial arts.

also a mixed martial arts event where people of different martial arts can compete as apposed to a judo event where people can only use judo is quite clearly a different thing to mixing martial arts together as a fighter. one is an event the other is a fighting style.

Reply 45

Original post by RashaJ

Muay Thai. :yy:

Posted from TSR Mobile

try doing a round house kick in a night club. your gonna kick 3 other people before ur foot reaches its intended target, if it even makes it at all.

Reply 46

Original post by Mick.w

try doing a round house kick in a night club. your gonna kick 3 other people before ur foot reaches its intended target, if it even makes it at all.

Makes no difference. The essential component of anything effective is how used the person becomes to physicality, confrontation and fighting. MT has all kinds of live sparring and hitting one another.

That's why combat sports will always trump dead martial arts systems.

Reply 47

Original post by RashaJ

Muay Thai doesn't consist of one type of generic kick - you'll learn to use every point in your body + endurance

I mean it would be stupid to look for a type of martial arts then, using your logic, might as well just punch them in the face - you don't even need a martial arts for that, or just learn self defense and how to get out of certain locks?

OP asked for martial arts for common use, imo MMA, Muay thai - and just the basics should be fine.

actually the OP didnt ask that. the OP asked quite an open question about which of the 3 MA that he narrowed down would be best. he also mentioned which would be best for fighting in the street or in a bar.

in a street fight MT would be best. you can have room to move and avoid a clinch. plus if multiple attackers try to circle you kicks are much better at keeping multiple attackers at bay rather than punches.

and yes using my logic boxing would be the better choice.

boxing would be better than muay thai in a bar fight.

why?

1. your probably drinking
having drink in your system is going to slow your reactions down. so the more simple something is the more likely you can pull it off when drunk. and especially if your drunk and have been struck first. you will fall back to basic instincts. for muay thai this instinct will be to kick. for boxers it will be to punch. yes muay thai fighters elbow, knee and punch. but they don't focus on those things nearly as much as kicking. pradal serey focuses more on elbows and knees and lethwei even has head butts. but both of those are very similar muay thai. muay thai would be great for street fighting. theres more room in the street and kicks are much better at keeping multiple attackers at a distance.

2. Its close quarters.
kicks don't work well in close quarters and elbows and knees leave you vulnerable to being clinched. if a judo guy can get close enough to a muay thai guy then its over for the muay thai guy. punches are the best thing in a close quarters environment. wing chun is good and was essentially feudal chinas answer to krav maga. but finding classes is a challenge in its self yet alone finding a club with a good instructor that you can afford. in the uk most of the time the instructors are poor and if they are any good tend to charge out the ass. jkd has a similar problem although its a bit more common in the west as its been imported from america rather than the mysterious orient. on a plus side jkd is a reduction of wing chun and was invented by bruce lee basically to handle the street fights and bar room brawls that he himself got into.
but both jkd and wing chun all employ quick rapid strikes to the face when in close quarters. as you can see from Clips comments he believes even JKD has too much flowery bows and ribbons on and that it should be more to the point. boxing is the answer. no inductions of philosophy. people who go there have fighting experience and are not world of warcraft players who are doing this to not be afraid when they go to the shop. good instruction for cheap and clubs are commonly found across the uk. its hard for someone to grab you when your punching them rapidly and if they grab you sometimes it just allows you to get harder punches on them because their resistance to let go just allows you to build greater force against them. so for bar fights i would say punching strikes are the more favourable. then a grappling martial art would be great for if the guy starts to try and get you in a headlock which is very common. a ju jitsu based martial is great for this. something like judo or krav maga. krav maga would be the best seeing as its also defence from armed assault which would serve you will if your opponent is trying to glass you with a bottle. but of course when your drunk and in a stressful scenario your ability to do complex things like grabbing, locking and throwing is gonna be a lot harder than just plain old punching someone.

so im not knocking muay thai. its a great system for the street fighting side of the OP. but for the bar fighting side i'd say boxing.

boxing and muay thai can quite easily transfer. i think a plus of learning muay thai first is you toughen up your legs and fists. but ive noticed guys who come from boxing who go into muay thai tend to be much better fighters than guys who just stuck with muay thai from day one. also worth while remembering that most knockouts in mma competitions are done with punches not kicks.

Original post by Clip

Makes no difference. The essential component of anything effective is how used the person becomes to physicality, confrontation and fighting. MT has all kinds of live sparring and hitting one another.

That's why combat sports will always trump dead martial arts systems.

i don't disagree with this. but my point was in a nightclub brawl a boxer would be more successful.

Reply 48

Tomsta

OP

16

Original post by Mick.w

actually the OP didnt ask that. the OP asked quite an open question about which of the 3 MA that he narrowed down would be best. he also mentioned which would be best for fighting in the street or in a bar.

in a street fight MT would be best. you can have room to move and avoid a clinch. plus if multiple attackers try to circle you kicks are much better at keeping multiple attackers at bay rather than punches.

and yes using my logic boxing would be the better choice.

boxing would be better than muay thai in a bar fight.

why?

1. your probably drinking
having drink in your system is going to slow your reactions down. so the more simple something is the more likely you can pull it off when drunk. and especially if your drunk and have been struck first. you will fall back to basic instincts. for muay thai this instinct will be to kick. for boxers it will be to punch. yes muay thai fighters elbow, knee and punch. but they don't focus on those things nearly as much as kicking. pradal serey focuses more on elbows and knees and lethwei even has head butts. but both of those are very similar muay thai. muay thai would be great for street fighting. theres more room in the street and kicks are much better at keeping multiple attackers at a distance.

2. Its close quarters.
kicks don't work well in close quarters and elbows and knees leave you vulnerable to being clinched. if a judo guy can get close enough to a muay thai guy then its over for the muay thai guy. punches are the best thing in a close quarters environment. wing chun is good and was essentially feudal chinas answer to krav maga. but finding classes is a challenge in its self yet alone finding a club with a good instructor that you can afford. in the uk most of the time the instructors are poor and if they are any good tend to charge out the ass. jkd has a similar problem although its a bit more common in the west as its been imported from america rather than the mysterious orient. on a plus side jkd is a reduction of wing chun and was invented by bruce lee basically to handle the street fights and bar room brawls that he himself got into.
but both jkd and wing chun all employ quick rapid strikes to the face when in close quarters. as you can see from Clips comments he believes even JKD has too much flowery bows and ribbons on and that it should be more to the point. boxing is the answer. no inductions of philosophy. people who go there have fighting experience and are not world of warcraft players who are doing this to not be afraid when they go to the shop. good instruction for cheap and clubs are commonly found across the uk. its hard for someone to grab you when your punching them rapidly and if they grab you sometimes it just allows you to get harder punches on them because their resistance to let go just allows you to build greater force against them. so for bar fights i would say punching strikes are the more favourable. then a grappling martial art would be great for if the guy starts to try and get you in a headlock which is very common. a ju jitsu based martial is great for this. something like judo or krav maga. krav maga would be the best seeing as its also defence from armed assault which would serve you will if your opponent is trying to glass you with a bottle. but of course when your drunk and in a stressful scenario your ability to do complex things like grabbing, locking and throwing is gonna be a lot harder than just plain old punching someone.

so im not knocking muay thai. its a great system for the street fighting side of the OP. but for the bar fighting side i'd say boxing.

boxing and muay thai can quite easily transfer. i think a plus of learning muay thai first is you toughen up your legs and fists. but ive noticed guys who come from boxing who go into muay thai tend to be much better fighters than guys who just stuck with muay thai from day one. also worth while remembering that most knockouts in mma competitions are done with punches not kicks.

i don't disagree with this. but my point was in a nightclub brawl a boxer would be more successful.

So based on your information if i had to choose between wing chun and boxing for GENERAL self defence (not specialising in anything, not got the time or the money to learn multiple MAs) which would you personally recommend?

Reply 49

Original post by Tomsta

So based on your information if i had to choose between wing chun and boxing for GENERAL self defence (not specialising in anything, not got the time or the money to learn multiple MAs) which would you personally recommend?

You should always be learning a combat sport and not a "martial art". The key to being able to fight is always live training, and not the alleged deadliness of the moves.

So boxing, judo, MT, BJJ and to an extent even TKD will always be better than Chunning or whatever.

(edited 9 years ago)

Reply 50

Original post by Tomsta

So based on your information if i had to choose between wing chun and boxing for GENERAL self defence (not specialising in anything, not got the time or the money to learn multiple MAs) which would you personally recommend?

off the bat i would say boxing.
wing chun and kung fu in general is surrounded by a lot of induction and cult like stuff.

but. you should see who your instructor is. he might be some sort of champion or a 10 dan black belt in multiple martial arts but specialises in wing chun mainly.

personally i would say go to both.

you never know you may have found a wing chun club with an amazingly qualified instructor that doesnt charge out the ass and teaches real good hard fighting and defence.

but you probably won't. martial arts clubs are way more about the money usually.

but as i said you never kno. so i'd at least check out the wing chun clubs credentials who the instructors are. what the prices are. then turn up. see how they teach. if the guy on the website is actually the guy teaching you or if its just some ex students of theirs. also have a look at the guys who are there. do they look like they could win a fight?

if they look soft. they probably are soft. people will b.s. you around with all this stuff like "i dont want people to think im tough... id rather get the element of surprise" or "looking tough brings you unwanted attention and i wish to live a life of peace".

but you know what. the human body and its instincts are pretty amazing and fine tuned. your body and subconscious is reading loads of info from people. and chances are if they aren't intimidating to you its because your primal cave man danger reading skills have told you these guys are weak.

check the boxing gym out too.

but i'd go to wing chun first.

then boxing.

keep in mind. boxing is a lot of fitness. fitness that you will need in a real fight should you have one.

kung fu won't condition your body in the same way. unless its a good teacher who appreciates this.

so to recap.

my recommendation is boxing.

but i suggest visiting both.

as a sub note. judo is like a very reduced version of ju jitsu. your just throwing people over n over again. your clocking a good amount of hours building muscle memory on throwing people. boxing and judo is pretty much the perfect bar fighting combo. you punch someone. and if they grab you? judo throw. and its all stuff you've practiced over n over to the point that you don't have to think. you just do.

hope that helps.

any more questions feel free to ask.

Reply 51

Tomsta

OP

16

Original post by Mick.w

off the bat i would say boxing.
wing chun and kung fu in general is surrounded by a lot of induction and cult like stuff.

but. you should see who your instructor is. he might be some sort of champion or a 10 dan black belt in multiple martial arts but specialises in wing chun mainly.

personally i would say go to both.

you never know you may have found a wing chun club with an amazingly qualified instructor that doesnt charge out the ass and teaches real good hard fighting and defence.

but you probably won't. martial arts clubs are way more about the money usually.

but as i said you never kno. so i'd at least check out the wing chun clubs credentials who the instructors are. what the prices are. then turn up. see how they teach. if the guy on the website is actually the guy teaching you or if its just some ex students of theirs. also have a look at the guys who are there. do they look like they could win a fight?

if they look soft. they probably are soft. people will b.s. you around with all this stuff like "i dont want people to think im tough... id rather get the element of surprise" or "looking tough brings you unwanted attention and i wish to live a life of peace".

but you know what. the human body and its instincts are pretty amazing and fine tuned. your body and subconscious is reading loads of info from people. and chances are if they aren't intimidating to you its because your primal cave man danger reading skills have told you these guys are weak.

check the boxing gym out too.

but i'd go to wing chun first.

then boxing.

keep in mind. boxing is a lot of fitness. fitness that you will need in a real fight should you have one.

kung fu won't condition your body in the same way. unless its a good teacher who appreciates this.

so to recap.

my recommendation is boxing.

but i suggest visiting both.

as a sub note. judo is like a very reduced version of ju jitsu. your just throwing people over n over again. your clocking a good amount of hours building muscle memory on throwing people. boxing and judo is pretty much the perfect bar fighting combo. you punch someone. and if they grab you? judo throw. and its all stuff you've practiced over n over to the point that you don't have to think. you just do.

hope that helps.

any more questions feel free to ask.

I'm generally quite fit anyway, like i said in my OP i studied Aikido for 2 years which is grabbles, pressure points p[ins and throws

Reply 52