The Evolution of Martial Arts Politics

The Evolution of Martial Arts Politics:

By Gary Gabelhouse

It is a corrosive factor that can destroy the integrity of even the most hardened steel. It has been described as a cancer that’s spread can quickly become out-of-control. Barry Diller, the Chairman of the Board of the Fox TV Network once told me in a meeting, “When you find it in your company, you must hunt it down and kill it quickly--kill it totally, and kill, by firing, those who spread it.” It drove a wedge between my teacher and his teacher--and caused a rift beyond span, regardless of the love and years of training together on the floor. What is this terrible thing? Politics. Politics has done more to arrest the growth, evolution and development of the martial arts than any other thing--including world war. Politics.

Source: Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary 10th Edition . . .

politics \ n pl but sing or pl in constr [Gk politika, fr. neut. pl. of politikos political] 3 a: competition between competing interest groups or individuals for power and leadership b: activities characterized by artful and often dishonest practices

The purpose of this paper is to analyze politics in the martial arts and identify its foundations in the hope that such understanding will enable us, as martial artists, to create and execute strategies that minimize politics in the martial arts.

In the John Wayne movie, True Grit, Wayne’s character was in need of crossing a river, in order to either catch or get away from bad guys, I can’t remember which. In talking with the Ferry man, the river pilot said, “Listen. I’ve been everywhere...I’ve seen everythin...I’ve DONE everything...that’s hows I knows peoples so miserable.” As one could analyze from the comments of the Ferry man, politics, as human misery, has a number of facets and is resultant of a number of different human conditions.

In my development of this paper, I tried to focus on the mechanism of the disease of politics, and tried to avoid analyzing the symptoms. From my analysis and research, and in my opinion, the recipe for politics in the martial arts includes the following key ingredients:

The establishment of a kyu and dan system or its equivalent, in each of the martial arts;

The desperate living conditions of all Orientals after World War II;

The availability of money from U.S. servicemen and the U.S. Military’s exporting to the Orient the concept of payment for martial arts teaching;

The evolution of desperate need to greed and financial ambition on the

part of some Oriental martial arts teachers;

The narrowness of self concept of early practitioners, with its resultant, extreme

reliance on martial arts and the resultant ego demands;

The transition of primarily ego-based motives of Western martial

artists to motives based on financial ambition.

These six factors weigh heavily in the development and spread of politics in the martial arts. While martial arts politics certainly existed to some degree prior to World War II, it was more isolated and revolved around the honest dislike between two practitioners, rather than the dishonest machinations of a number of Ryu Ha leaders.

The establishment of a kyu and dan system or its equivalent, in each of the martial arts...

Many of the martial arts find their beginning in India. Here, during the time of Gautama Buddha, the Kaestrya or warrior class engaged in vajramukti or thunderbolt striking and encased their art in the Nata and pratima (equivalent to kata, chuen, quan, h’sing or forms). It is thought by many, that what are now the martial arts, were transported to China from India by Bodhidarma around 525 A.D.. When the Muslims began their invasion of India, purging the land of Buddhism and its devotees and priests, these arts, along with their religious underpinnings, were scattered--taken not only to China, but also to Southeast Asia and perhaps even the Ryukyu Islands (Okinawa) and Japan. As early as the 1300’s China began to trade and, in fact, have expatriate Chinese living in the Ryukyu’s. Karate--the martial art born from the Naha, Shuri and Tomari area of Okinawa--had no ranking system until recent time.

As a case in point, Okinawan Goju Ryu Karate-do, as founded and taught by Chojun Miyagi, had no ranking system. There were no kyu or dan ranks recognized--only students and Instructors. For example, and according to a 1983 interview with the late Seikichi Toguchi, under this system, Higa, Sensei received an Instructor’s Certification from Miyagi, but no black belt or rank--not even a 10th Kyu! Toguchi clearly stated that Miyagi, Sensei gave no rank ever to any of his students. From the 1983 interview, Toguchi says, “If anyone says they received a black belt or any rank from Miyagi, Sensei, they are lying.” This tradition of no rank was felt by some to be holding the development of Karate back. While the Dai Nihon Butokukai, Japan’s preeminent Budo organization did recognize Okinawan Goju Ryu as an official style, the lack of ranking as in Judo and Kendo, were considered by some to be problematic.

According to Toguchi, in 1952, and in the absence of their teacher, Miyagi’s senior students got together and formed the basis for an organization that would award ranking. After his return to Okinawa, the students presented the plan to Miyagi. “Who would award the black belt degrees?” asked Miyagi. Replied his students, “Since you would be President of the organization, you would, Sensei.” Miyagi stated he could not award a black belt degree and that only a member of the Royal Family could do so, and that such was the business of the Dai Nihon Butokukai. Miyagi scrapped the plans of his students and returned to his traditional teaching and training.

Upon the death of Miyagi in 1953, most of his senior students began to teach and some began to award rank. Up until the mid to late 1950’s some, such as Toguchi, issued Instructor’s Certificates rather than dan ranking as we know it today. By the early 1960’s these Instructor’s Certificates, however, were transitioned to the rank of Yondan.

While Judo and Kendo had ranking systems in place for decades, ranking in some martial arts such as Okinawan Karate did not have any such ranking systems in place until the 1960’s. In the karate of Chojun Miyagi, you were a student or an Instructor. If you were a student, you knew where in seniority you fell as a function of your time in training.

The reason why this factor of dan ranking is so important in considering politics in the martial arts, is reasonably obvious. In a system where you are either a teacher or a student, there is hardly anything that offers leverage to money and ego. Such a simple system of teachers and students does not offer as much opportunity for exploitation as does the dan ranking system. More on this to follow.

The desperate living conditions of all Orientals after World War II

Okinawa, Japan, China and Korea were ravaged during World War II. One must consider that not only was the military of Japan defeated, its economy was decimated. Simply, the citizens of Okinawa and Japan were often homeless and without adequate food and safe water. Likewise, the living conditions of the Chinese and Koreans who suffered under Japanese domination, was just as bad, if not worse. The postwar Orient was a time of significant human hardship.

Martial arts, with the exception of Sumo, were outlawed by the U.S. occupation force. Martial artists and the grand old masters of karate were no different than anyone else--they required food, water and shelter--things that were lacking in the late 1940’s throughout the Orient.

Times were so desperate that, in many cases, even the old Masters of martial arts did not resume teaching until some years after the war. Chojun Miyagi, for example, did not begin to again have regular classes with his senior students in his Garden dojo until 1952--a seven year hiatus. Even in the early 1950’s the people of the Orient were in extreme need. This situation set up the unhappy need-based and economic relationship between Oriental martial arts teachers and Western students. This leads one to evaluate the next factor in the creation of martial arts politics . . .

The availability of money from U.S. servicemen and the U.S. Military’s exporting to the Orient the concept of payment for martial arts teaching;

Imagine the surprise of the Oriental teachers, as they found they could be paid much-needed money in return for their teaching. Prior to the occupation of Japan by the American military, the concept of payment for teaching was not developed. Certainly, many of the old masters did recognize the importance of extending service to your sensei, and some, such as Chojun Miyagi, actually supported their teachers. Yet the concept of paying for teaching was, as yet, not founded in the Orient. One did service or kept one’s teacher out of giri or duty and honor--not as a form of reciprocity for the teachers’ lessons. Chojun Miyagi’s students would make gifts to their teacher at Obun or other holidays. Yet, systematic payment for instruction was, for the most part, a concept exported to the Orient by Americans.

Some Oriental martial arts teachers seized this financial opportunity as a means to ensure the survival of their families. Such actions are difficult to find fault with. However, this alien concept played an important role in the development of politics in the martial arts.

Wanting their servicemen to become proficient in all things martial, it was natural that the Military Officers urged and incented G.I.’s to learn martial arts from the Oriental teachers. As an example of this, the U.S. military instituted a punch card system on the island of Okinawa. The Oriental Sensei were instructed to punch a serviceman’s card for every lesson or training session they completed. The Oriental Sensei would then receive a fee for each card they completed. The military officers also intimated they wished their servicemen to have accelerated training and promotions. Some of the Oriental teachers saw this as a conflict and did not participate in the system. Others, however, saw this as an opportunity to get money that was in scarce supply in the postwar Orient.

The evolution of desperate need to greed and financial ambition on the

part of some Oriental martial arts teachers;

While many Oriental martial arts teachers did not participate in the military-backed pay-for-teaching, and others participated in an earnest manner in order to get much needed money to support their family, some Oriental Sensei abused and began to take advantage of the system as they relented to human greed and/or financial ambition.

Some Sensei would take a G.I.’s card and punch it a number of times, even though only one class session was taught. Sometimes the Sensei would punch the card numerous times, as the G.I. stopped by the dojo and didn’t even train. Basically, some of the Oriental teachers saw such fraud and quick promotion as means to make a comfortable living. This activity began taking place in the mid to late 1950’s--the time of many alleged and acknowledged fast promotions of Western martial artists.

The narrowness of self concept of early practitioners, with its resultant, extreme

reliance on martial arts and the resultant ego demands;

This factor, in my opinion, accounts for more of the “why” of politics in the martial arts than anything else. However, this factor touches on the sensitive and very personal issue of what we really see when we look into the mirror of our heart.

I came to the martial arts very late in my life--starting to train Goju Ryu when I was over 40 years old. Before that time, I had successfully raised a child to adulthood, remained married to the same woman for nearly 20 years, was a successful educator and curriculum developer, had successfully started and run my own business, had authored books, been a professional musician and achieved a fair degree of success with regard to expeditionary climbing. Not touting myself as a renaissance man, I was well rounded and had a large body of life experience. I could and can define myself by many things and in many ways.

Many acquaintances who are heavily involved in the martial arts, in my opinion, are not well rounded. In fact, they tend to be very narrow in defining their self concept. They tend to define themselves as martial artists, and little else. Their obsession with the arts has limited their self concept. Instead of seeing the martial arts as a lens that all else in life is reflected through, they look at the arts as an end. They tend to define the martial arts as a noun rather than an adjective or adverb. And so, their self concept is narrowly defined as not much more than martial artist.

Such narrowness of self concept results in an unusual amount of reliance on the martial arts. Martial arts alone must shoulder the burden of defining a life. This reliance begets unhealthy need, as opposed to choice. The karateka or judoka needs to be a great martial artist rather than choose to be a great martial artist. This need sets the martial artist up for a lifetime of searching to be whole, trying to fill the many different gaps of human frailty with only one thing--the martial arts.

Therein lies that which gives form to and nurtures politics in the martial arts. The martial artist NEEDS to identify themselves and hence, be identified as a great martial artist. With such a consuming need, this individual will go far beyond normal human idiosyncracy in order to be affirmed. No wonder that rank, as one very obvious indicator of achievement, is so important to this individual. Rank can become so important, the needy martial artist will breach their honor in order to get rank and buy it at extravagant cost if it’s offered for sale. Others jump to and or dishonestly claim lineages that would identify them with true masters of the arts. We all know the stories of the Shodan or Nidan who climbs on a plane, trains for a couple of weeks and comes back with a Godan or Rokudan--some $1,000 poorer--claiming as a lifelong teacher an individual with which they spent ten or twelve hours. It is most pitiful and a waste that such an individual has narrowly defined themselves and painted themselves into a corner of mandatory ego-building based on a need to affirm their life.

So, some of the early Western practitioners were obsessed with their art. They were narrowly defined individuals who needed to achieve higher and higher rank and be associated with masters of their art. They found willing, financially ambitious teachers who sold them rank and set up a pyramid scheme otherwise referred to as being the USA representative for a Ryu Ha. They became Yondans in less than a year. They had an insatiable need for higher rank and higher visibility. They lied, cheated and bought the trappings of power, without realizing the real power of the martial arts themselves. Some of these early Western practitioners offered a fertile garden for martial arts politics.

The transition of primarily ego-based motives of Western martial

artists to motives based on financial ambition.

Oriental martial arts teachers evolved from having an honest and clear need to make money in order to support themselves and their families, to a different position of having financial ambition driven by greed and avarice. Their motives for selling their art to willing Westerners changed from need to greed--honesty to abuse and dishonesty.

And so, the motives of the early Western practitioners began to change, as well. Western martial artists had created such a presence in the 1970’s and 1980’s, some felt they no longer needed their Oriental teachers. They did this sometimes, not as a healthy growth of confidence in their own arts, but for the reason to cut the Orientals out of the value chain of martial arts economics. The martial arts landscape in America in particular, and, in fact, world wide, saw the proliferation of organizations--with some Oriental Kancho and Sensei tenaciously trying to maintain control, and Westerners who sometimes stood on the shoulders of true masters in order to pick the fruit of economic success in America.

Some Western Sensei, born of dishonest promotion by dishonest Oriental teachers, carried on the tradition of their art in the same manner amassing significant wealth, in the name of Budo. Politics played to restrain those who would take power or money from these Kuchi Bushi became commonplace. Politics played in order to claim false lineage in order to cash in on true masters, became all too prevalent. Pocket Ryu or the way to your pocket became a popular Ryu Ha. Politics, more than anything else, has robbed martial artists of realizing their true potential through Budo, and has, in fact, distorted what Budo is to the martial artists of the next millennium.

SUMMARY

In summary, the postwar, Oriental martial arts teachers, in desperate need of money to live , found they could sell their art to Westerners who, lo-and-behold had the money and appeared willing and able to part with it. Some Oriental teachers, with financial ambition, recognized that the ego needs of their Western students were easily met by rank, and that these Westerners would pay good money for that rank. Rank, created by Orientals for completely different reasons, was a most convenient means to generate cash from Westerners. Then, these narrowly defined Westerners, with only their art and their rank to show for their life, desperately had to keep their balloon-like egos inflated with further promotions, and false lineage. In some, this ego-based human condition evolved into a way to amass both power over others and money. Through the politics of restraint, condemnation, false claims and dishonesty, these early Western practitioners--products of Oriental martial arts politics, have themselves sown the seeds of politics and dishonesty amongst their students, who unfortunately, will probably keep the tradition of politics alive in the martial arts community. Ego and money--pride and greed--are the very roots of politics in the martial arts. Where now are the virtues of Bushido and Budo? They are in one’s heart . . . or they are not.

STRATEGIES TO LIMIT POLITICS IN THE MARTIAL ARTS

Understanding the basis for politics in the martial arts allows us to develop strategies to limit its growth in our generation. Below are the typical types of political paradigms, their basis and strategies for countering such form of political activity:

Political Paradigm: Claiming Dubious Rank

Major Basis: Narrow self-concept with an incessant need for affirmation, hence, rank.

Strategy: We should be encourage our students--especially those with significant martial arts skill- to be balanced and have broad interests and activities outside of the martial arts. Strive to put in place a self concept that is multifaceted. Also, we should encourage our peers, seniors and remind ourselves to be balanced and have other facets of our self concept other than the martial arts.

Political Paradigm: Claiming Dubious Lineage

Major Basis: Same as above. A narrow self concept requires the individual to feed inordinately from the sole facet of self concept. Claiming Dubious Lineage is an activity that is used to attempt to prop up a person with a self concept that is too narrowly defined.

Strategy: Same as above, plus another. If you are claimed as lineage, falsely by someone, quickly and publicly deny that claim. Do so in writing and through other forms of communications. Make no moral judgements--just deny the claim, stating that there has, perhaps, been a mistake--but be crystal clear as to what is true. In other situations, such as the claiming of your teacher’s lineage, I believe silence is, probably, the best strategy. One should try to become directly involved in only things that directly impact the self and/or your students.

Political Paradigm: Outlawing Contact With Individuals, Organizations or Systems

Major Basis: Insecurity and fear of losing power or control over students, and/or fear of losing money to another.

Strategy: We should teach our students to keep blinders off. We should encourage them to experience other elements of the martial arts either by visiting other dojo or training with other-style students. If we are secure in our art, our teaching and ourselves, we will not need to program our students to become zealots. Zealot students constitute a weak base within a dojo. Also, integrate elements of other systems, as long as they work and reinforce your technique. After all, Chojun Miyagi, the founder of Goju, collaborated with Nagamine Shoshin, a Shorin Ryu Sensei in the development of the Gekisai Kata. As well, Gokeni, a Chinese Boxing practitioner, was key in the development of Miyagi’s Goju Ryu curriculum. So, be open and friendly to other systems--support their tournament and activities. Never degrade another system. Be courteous. Be nice. Be secure.

Political Paradigm: Condemnation of Individuals, Organizations or Systems

Major Basis: Insecurity and fear of losing power or control over students, and/or fear of losing money to another.

Strategy: The above strategy applies not only with regard to outlawing any contact, it applies to making negative judgements of people, organizations and styles, as well. Zealots define themselves, not only in the deification of their own belief set, they also define themselves by condemning and judging all else. We should avoid supporting zealot behavior in our dojo or organizations and support respect our students’ ability to evaluate and choose for themselves.

Political Paradigm: Labeling Individuals, Organizations or Systems As Not Traditionally Correct or Valid.

Major Basis: Insecurity in one’s own technique and self doubt of one’s own curriculum or system.

Strategy: Teach only what and how your were taught from your teacher and then build on that tradition without diluting, changing or detracting from your teacher’s curriculum. Be clear to students what of your teachings are the same as your teacher’s, and which are your additions. As long as your students feel secure they are on a correct path, and especially if you know in your heart that you are, you will likely not spawn students who will decry others as not being valid or traditionally correct.

SUMMARY CONCEPT

My father taught me much in his own way. He taught me to invest my money and myself into experiences. I can remember him saying, “Then, no one can ever take that away from you.” He also taught me a kind of fearlessness as he often said that it is impossible to fight right. Such simple wisdom is the very basis for these strategies to limit politics in the martial arts. We should teach our students to be balanced and multifaceted individuals who define themselves through many things outside the arts. We should teach our students to keep blinders off and trust in their own strength--and never become a zealot, whose way is to condemn and attempt to limit others, only to limit their own growth and health as an individual. And, as my teacher would say, do a little, often. Eventually, mist and raindrops do sculpture vast and beautiful canyons.

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