Ya, it does look like that, doesn’t it. Let's see if I can live up to the hype.
How about you just answer the question and qualify your credentials?
Not sure what your point is...there are bad and good instructors in every field you can think of, including tai chi.
Most Tai Chi instructors are bad instructors.
Again, not quite following you... Are you saying that Pilates teaches self defense? Because you already said that tai chi can be used for self defense.
No, I'm saying Pilates and most examples of Tai Chi have the same merits as a self defense system.
About "resisting opponents in a more-or-less controlled sparring environment", that is just one of many stages in the training process and no more emphasis should be place on that then any other stage. Without good basics the training with a resisting opponent will just lead to sloppy technique and/or injury. To learn how to fight you actually have to fight in a real fight anything else is just a step up on that learning curve.
The problem with Tai Chi is that very few people who practice it ever even come close to doing more than push hands, which isn't even really sparring. Most training consists of forms practice, which while effective for teaching proper mechanics, (not making a statement about the effectiveness of Tai Chi's movements here, for the record), should never be the bulk of one's training any more than sitting in a garage turning the steering wheel and playing with the shifter should be the focus of a training program for a NASCAR driver.
If you're not sparring in every class, and the bulk of your training consists of minimal resistance training with compliant partners, your training is garbage.
Just an aside: a lot of the close in sport style grappling maneuvers can be negated by grabbing and twisting the fingers (Wally Jay proved this years ago). This is more so in the more static ground styles. Tai chi has small joint manipulation as part of it syllabus (chin na) one involves grabbing the index and middle finger with one hand and the ring and little finger with the other and pulling until the palm is split opened and separated.
This is a new twist (pun intended) on the "eye pokes, broken glass, and lava" argument. Sorry, it just doesn't fly. Small joint manipulation was perfectly legal in UFC 1, UFC 2, UFC 3, UFC 4, and I believe UFC 5 as well along with 30+ years of Vale Tudo fights in Brazil. Your anecdotes about Wally Jay mean nothing. We deal with facts here.
One thing about martial arts that most people don't understand is that they all contain both grappling and striking. Lets look at tae kwon do for instance. No other martial arts gets picked on more than poor TKD. Did you know that even TKD has grappling in it? Before it was TKD it was Shotokan and before that it was Okinawan karate the style of Funakoshi and Mabuni Kenwa, students of Yasutsune "Anko" Itosu the first person to introduce 'TO-DE' into the Okinawa Dai Ichi. Yasutsune taught what has become the style of punch, block, kick that we see in many karate/tkd systems. Since he was teaching children he didn't teach the real fighting application of the kata, (he did not remove the grappling from the kata, just stopped showing it). It's still there if you know what to look for. This was the same style that GI's learned and brought back to the US which became the McDojo styles that many kids take today. Unfortunately for adults who want to learn how to fight, the key to unlocking the "kata key" is lost to most instructors.
Taekwondo's grappling is garbage, and I'm well aware of it's 60ish year history as a Shotokan derivative. I'm also aware of BS nationalistic propaganda that's attempted to portray TKD as a 2000+ year old art, myths about high kicks being used to unseat mounted calvary, yadda yadda.
There is no "Kata Key", that's just spin used to justify crappling (unrealistic grappling) in order to market ____ art as having the same techniques as the popular (and effective) grappling styles.
Your kata is meaningless if you're not actually out there training in an "alive" manner, against fully resisting opponents intent on imposing their will and techniques upon you.
Now, who are you again, and what credentials do you have? Mine are in my signature file. I am an amatuer Mixed Martial Arts fighter, and own/operate the largest Martial Arts forum on the Internet, which just happens to be devoted to rooting out myths and BS in the arts like what is included in much of your post.
There's no sense in being coy here, unless you're trying to pretend you're someone you're not.
Oh and:
T'ai Chi
This message is hidden because T'ai Chi is on your ignore list.
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Sorry, I won't respond to someone who's a known troll. There's no point in discussing anything with you because you've established that you're immune to logic, reason, and common sense.
