View Single Post
Old 03-03-2009, 11:55 AM   #7
graham
 
graham's Avatar
Dojo: Northampton Ki Aikido Club
Location: Northampton
Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 134
United Kingdom
Offline
Re: Aikido IS a practical contemporary martial art

Quote:
Matthew Gano wrote: View Post
Of course what you seem to love about Aikido is it's effectiveness in these areas, so I'm not sure how this thread will avoid the "does it really work" discussion...if for no other reason than someone will want to inject a caveat and then probably want to discuss it. I think the examples you gave are good ones for how Aikido can be helpful, but I also think there are valid counterpoints that have to be included in a discussion about the virtues of these things too.
Yes, I think you might be right. In that case, I would be the first to put my hands up and apologise, because I'd guess that I'm not the only one to be thoroughly bored by that discussion.

Reading it again, my post was really badly written. What I was trying to do was a) compile a list of the kinds of things I personally would look for in a contemporary martial art and b) compile a list of the things I love about aikido. I was then gonna be all smug and clever and show how the two lists were - from my perspective, at least - virtually identical.

Quote:
Maybe another way to look at it is this: in the grand scheme of practical self-defense there is a lot of ground to cover. Some of us need to focus more on the list of skills you provided while some of us need to focus on something more like "ground and pound" (a gross simplification of MMA).
Well said. Thanks.
  Reply With Quote