Originally Posted by Sabin

I have a small problem with the whole idea of making asskicking look beautiful, both in a self-defense sense and a moral sense. The infliction of violence on another human being is generally a vulgar and ugly thing, and should be treated as such.

I do understand how an honorable match between two skilled fighters who respect eachother (and who aren't looking to kill or maim their opponent) can be considered beautiful in a martial arts sense. But I dislike the idea of certain arts (TKD is guilty of this at times I believe) trying to make the use of violence in a self-defense situation seem like a beautiful act. Seems like it would be better for students to learn to understand violence as the ugly thing it is. This would, firstly, make them less eager to employ violence, and secondly, make them more capable of using violence effectively if forced to.

As to the video...I have to say I was highly impressed by the instructor's hand speed. But I would have liked to have seen what his sparring sessions were like, to see if there was any "aliveness" in his training. In my view, choreographed routines and point sparring just cannot build a fighter the same way "alive" training can.

Obviously, you can't do full-contact training every day, and when you do, you can't include things like biting or eye-gouging, but I don't think that's a good excuse to remove it from training entirely.

Let me know what you think.