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Message: <blockquote data-quote="takyris" data-source="post: 852579" data-attributes="member: 5171">Welcome to the world of first impressions.  You came off as arrogant in the first post, and I read all subsequent posts with that same menality -- and responded as such.  Glad to see that you don't do that -- except that you still feel I'm baiting you, despite my almost complete lack of ninja jokes in later posts.Cool.  Glad we agree on that.  And yeah, if the kata is done to music and involves the practioner doing flips, I don't really see a ton of street smarts built into it. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Make fun of, no.  Disagree with, yes.  You're not phrasing it as knowledge learned on high that we youngins should thank you for.  You're actually saying that it's just your opinion -- and while I disagree with your opinion, I completely respect your right to have it. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />You make an interesting point in differentiating between beginning students and advanced students.  Perhaps my school is an exception to the rule, but we start sparring relatively early as one aspect of our training.  On the other hand, nobody coming to my school would think that sparring comprised the majority of my art.I have seen something that may be what you're talking about, where students start to think differently about sparring versus street defense -- after a few sparring classes, a beginner has started to show a little confidence when throwing kicks at his partner in a friendly sparring exercise, but he still can be incredibly uncomfortable when attacked with intent in a street defense exercise.  The "freeze up" is still there.Depends on the student, though, from my experience.  Some students get the street-stuff really early on but still freeze up in sparring.  I think that if you do sparring as one small part of a balanced regimen, it may help some students, and shouldn't harm any. So basically, I agree with you that sparring exclusively ain't the best way to teach students, but I disagree that it shouldn't be taught at all (or at later levels).  Two legitimate opinions.Side note: Good to make sure we're talking about the same thing -- what do you think of as sparring?  What I think of as sparring ranges from full-contact with pads and headgear to light contact for points to light contact without points to sticky-hands drills, and so forth.  My school rarely does point sparring except as a game at the end of class -- noting that it's a game.It was the fish thing, wasn't it?  Man, you ninjas are touchy about the fish stuff.Whoops, that was inflammatory again.Honestly, LGod, I will discuss things like an actual adult.  What I won't do is sit quietly and listen to you make remarks with the support of faulty logic.  I believe that those remarks do help my position -- because when I use a wacky analogy to show that your remark doesn't make logical sense, or that you have set up a straw man, the other readers will understand that your original argument was faulty.In fact, this even helps you, in the long run.  If your martial art is so superior, you should have no trouble poking holes in my attempt to poke holes in your argument.  At the higher belt ranks, teachers at my school start testing students on their knowledge, asking them why we step one way when we could step another way, asking whether it would still be safe to do a move with one aspect changed.  They test students on their ability to defend their art -- or to improve it.  So treat this as a learning exercise; prove me wrong. As for the rest of it -- I honestly feel that you're being playing the guilt card to shut me up.  I was heated in the first post, but I went mainly for humor in the later posts.  I have no intention of causing further conflict, but I write the way I write, just as you do.  If someone attacked your martial art, how would you respond?  Would you stay mellow, or would you defend your art and attack their insulting argument?  I did the latter.  Given that I'm making ninja jokes and you're crying foul, it sounds like your response would be to go for sympathy.For the record, I've read the better ninja books -- and I'm not calling them ninja books out of disrespect, but because it goes from ninjitsu to taijitsu to... well, you know better than I do.  I liked the ninja books.  I thought that Stephen Hayes (?) did a great job of showing how you could apply martial arts principles to the modern day.  I practiced some of the things he suggested.  It was fun to realize that I could jump a lot higher than I thought that I could jump.As for the actual techniques in the books, they looked decent, but I was concerned about how well they would work if something went wrong -- the book didn't demonstrate much in the way of checking or protective body positioning.  Of course, the book was aimed at beginners, and it's hard to show checks in a small black-and-white photo.  The basic movements were nice, however, not flashy and very practical -- pretty much like what my school teaches. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Wow.  Legitimate wow, not making-fun-of-you wow.  That's extremely cool.  Well, I am one of the people on these boards.  And I was not the only person who said that your first post was condescending.  I understand that you don't want to be seen as condescending.  I don't want to be seen as a smartass.  And yet, such is my life.  Most of the people on the boards would say that I am a smartass.  I believe I have no reputation at all as a troll, but I am quite happy to debate someone that I feel has a faulty argument -- and if they are doing so in a manner that puts down others, I will do so with a vengeance.  (It is very sad to be the smartass.  The smartass tends to die in the second act, and almost never gets the girl.  Ah, well.)But if you don't want to be seen as condescending, don't be.  I am happy to give you a clean slate.  I am interested in hearing your opinions and learning what you choose to share.  On the other hand, please understand that I have the intelligence and the martial arts ability to spot you when you switch from dialogue to dogma, and I will call you on it.I'm interested in hearing what a high-ranking hoshinjistu guy has to say about his martial art.-Tacky</blockquote>

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