Mr. Anderson wrote:
So I had this huge argument with a mate at school about martial arts and whether they are useful "in reality" or not... Since I am doing Taekwondo I was (and still am) quite convince that they are useful (that is not to say that I started doing Taekwondo because I wanted to bash up people more efficiently).
However, my mate was absolutely certain that they are not at all useful and completely removed from reality.
Depends a bit on what you mean by 'useful'.
I'll just assume we can agree that it's not all about picking guy off the street and beating him up. And similarly, melee weapons aren't usually practical to carry around in your every-day-life.
This kinda makes styles like iaido (and iaijutsu) of rather limited use. ;)
Likewise, since it'sunlikely I'll ever face a guy in full armour on the streets, I'm probably not going to get much practical use of my (limited) Yagyu Shingan Ryu training. ;)
I'd say from my own experiences that the main applicability of MA-training in the world of today are internal.
You're a lot less likely to get into a fight, as you're more likely to be fit and projecting selfconfidence - traits that limit who will attack you.
Not projecting fear when facing someone who wanted to hit me has saved me from atleast a few fights.
Mind you, against a gun, don't even bother - atleast unless you're up so close that the gun is more of a hinderance to him than an advantage.
@lowcash:
1) Yes, true. so try to combine style and learn to generalize.
Also - some schools teach principles, not techniques.
2) Obviously true, but you already covered that point above I believe?
3) Like I said, against a gun, all bets are off unless the distance is very short - and probably even then. Not all of is live in barbarian countries where guns are easily available though. As for melee weapons. Quite a few styles do actually.
4) Down my own face? no. Well, yes, but not much. Seen my own blood leaking? Oh yes.
5) Here we move into the realm of tactics. My shotokan teachers actually dealt with this a bit, but usually the best advice is to try and limit the number of people attacking you at any given time - use of terrain is recommended. Remember that some schools actually deal with this problem.
6) So? pick more than a single style, or pick on that includes groundfighting.