"Take what is useful, discard the rest, MAKE A SYSTEM ON IT."
LOL. This reminds me of one of Ben Stein's books about how to guarantee to really screw your life up. He reasoned that since hundreds of self-help books have no solved peoples' problems by giving good advice--because no one listened or implemented the advice--he would instead write a book telliing them how to really mess themselves up, figuring that people would then ignore that advice and improve themselves by the failure to implement it.
So, maybe we need a tongue-in-cheek (finger-in-eye?) article on how to really lose in combat. Then, when people ignore it, maybe they'll get better.
I studied aikido for many years. As well as Japanese and Korean karate systems. When I was a police officer in Texas, I had occasions to use pieces from both, but you had to adapt, modify and tailor to your situation. There's no fancy kicking wearing a vest and thirty pounds of gear. Heck, it's even hard to move like that. You can move your arms and legs, but in no way are you nimble. Most times, taking people to the ground was more like football than martial arts. You got out of the car, you're were hot under that dark uniform and vest, you felt restricted, you're not stretched out...well, a lot of the dojo stuff isn't going to work very well. It requires an athlete, not a guy who's patrolling for eight hours.
Aikido did have some moves I found useful, however. One was the concept of putting the other person off balance merely by visualizing a straight line between the inside ankle bones of each foot on the opponent and pushing him (or her) at a 90-degree angle to that line. Another was basic arm bars. Had a gal I arrested who had no tongue, and I was booking her into jail and she couldn't talk. After securing my sidearm in the lock box outside, I had her inside and was going through the booking process. As soon as I took the cuffs off her, she hauled off and slapped me upside the head. This was not a punch and she was no serious threat. Still, I was a tad, miffed. So, on her next slap attempt, I used a classic aikido arm bar to put her face down on the booking table and pin her there, where I politely but firmly explained that if she wouldn't hit me, then I wouldn't hit her. It did the job and she quit fighting. I found out later the dispatchers were all laughing themselves to tears watching it on the booking room video monitors--they knew she'd hit me and that's why no one was in there to help. They just wanted to see what I'd do when I got slapped.
Sigh. Police types
do play gags on each other.
In that particular case, the aikido thing was USEFUL and I think appropriate. Years of practicing that move paid off as it was instinctive. If she had instead been a knife-weilding killer, it probably would not have been, unless you were too close to do anything but move into the opponent. I doubt a more serious throw or backfist to the face would have been appropriate for this citizen. The threat didn't justify a heavier use of force...yet if I had never practicing an armbar, my options would have been far more limited.
By the way, I don't personally believe some officers would practice even if they had the time and the money. That's a shaky presupposition. Many have an inflated idea of their own capabilities until someone hands them their head, and only then do they get serious. In that vein, a lot of officers are just like everyone else. But I think it's wrong to assume that more training will automatically improve officer capabilities. Will they practice it? Maybe, maybe not. It often requires an attitude adjustment. On the other hand, they see themselves as being pretty effective in dealing with threats already, so why work harder? See the problem?
Maybe it does take a certain amount of experience to determine what is useful. Getting hurt is often very instructive, if not the most efficient method of learning. Instructors can help as guides, they can do the research for the student, but the student still has to think, use his or her brain and decide. The instructor cannot do all of their homework for them. If they refuse to use their mind they will soon become a Darwin Award.
But the initial poster was asking about thoughts on aikido and its practicality. I think there are good things in aikido if you have the experience to separate the wheat from the chaff. The whole goal of training is to get the student through that as efficiently as possible. I think Bruce Lee also said that "anything that scores is effective." Disregarding the sports terminology,you really have to analyze that statement on situational context...but as a general rule, I think it's easy enough to use philosophically. Aikido has some good stuff and some not so good stuff. I think the first thing an aikidoka should understand is he is studying
art, not combat. If he understands that, he has a reference or starting point to evaluate aikido's effectiveness in a given context.
My 2 cents worth...okay, it was more like 4 cents, but who's counting?
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Topic: Aikido-is it practical and does it work? (Read 1560 times)