MaryKaye

For us this technique is a ki exercise, not a throw, and our teachers will say so over and over if necessary. But I know that's not true everywhere.

Where did this person train? Has he switched schools or traditions? It can be quite difficult to go from a more "hard" to a less "hard" style. You're being asked to change engrained habits, and to change them in ways that your previous teachers may have characterized as weak or ineffectual. You'll have to go through a period of feeling less competent than you used to, which is painful.

Our dojo rule is that you can try to force this technique with seniors, and they are free to reverse you (one of the first kyus is exceptionally good at this). But you don't frustrate juniors by giving more resistance than they can handle. This gets reinforced over and over; it's part of our "teaching to teach" emphasis. If you can't hear that kind of message, eventually advancement gets really hard. This works for us, but a dojo with a different teaching style would need a different approach.

The stereotype in our dojo is that it's young men who behave this way, not older ones; but I don't see any evidence that either stereotype is true. Some people are just more combative than others, and it's not really a matter of age. Or gender, either---I'm not quite as much of a problem as our most difficult student (I hope) but I've gotten called on kokyu ho quite a few times myself.

Mary Kaye