There has been hate/disagreements as to who’s doing it right and whose doing it wrong between traditional Martial Art Masters and the ever-growing wave of Freestylers.

How it happened originally, Martial Arts originated from Shaolin Temple via Budhist Monk Ta Mo. When population boomed, Japan was formed and they copied the Chinese Martial Arts (initially called CHINA FIST and later renamed “Empty Hand” when they refined it and thought it was complete enough). As Chinese people were Conservative and hide their arts (SIFU’S mainly passed everything to their son’s and only sometimes to close families). Even today, the whole art of Dim Mak of a style is only known fully by one person per generation. This is criticised to be bad habit of Real Chinese Martial Artists but is understandable because it’s dangerous if the training practitioner has bad intentions. Karate was initially mass marketed by the Japanese to gain recognition right from the beginning and the beauty was that it was simple to learn and see the change after a couple of lessons (as opposed to seeing real results after 10 years+ of Chi Kung training and Tai Chi).

Start

Simple Moves

Mediocre Moves

Advanced Moves

Many foreigners adopted Karate, Judo etc etc, because it was so mass marketed by the Japanese. It was Bruce Lee that soon began to teach the Gwi Lo's and won his WAY by settling the matters with traditional Chinese Sifu's. Nowadays, Wu-Shu is slowly overtaking because of its fanciness which I reckon has diluted the martial arts even more (China government fear revolution due to it’s past history but Martial Arts is still a treasure of China therefore the plan is to market it like Japan does but leave the DEADLY power and pass on the beauty only which is simple to learn like learning a kata but with more flexibility and aeriel. Most foreigners fall for it and these days, supposed Sensei’s and Sifu’s (Whether foreign or not) teach totally unorthodox techniques which is known as freestyle to their student’s and because it’s so flash, beginners BUY it 100%. I’ve seen it myself especially in America, all them East Coast Demos n stuff (SAD BUT TRUE).

NEVERTHELESS Freestyle performers still require a respectable amount of skill so is still an art because it’s still good to the body. Obviously freestyle is not “martial arts” BUT MANY MANY people think it is (and they appear in martial art tournaments which pisses traditional martial artists off!). This degrades “martial arts” (not saying that people who do freestyle is degrading; I do freestyle in my spare time because there are more of these people in the World now so I join in the fun); see it from this view “A PC can be used for work and for play, it’s not comparable- IT'S JUST BAD TO PROMOTE AND ASSOCIATE FREESTYLE AS MARTIAL ARTS.

MARTIAL ARTIST COMMENT:

First off, I think we can all agree that with traditional nunchaku, you hold the rod 1" from the bottom when in forward grip. Granted, you won't get many freestyle wrist rolls off from this position, so if that's what you're interested in doing, you will obviously have to make changes. Just as long as you understand you sacrifice power and reach to do so. That's the funny thing about the nunchaku too; it is such a popular weapon (thanks to Bruce Lee), which is probably why there is so much fluff out there. The students want it, and the teachers give it to them whether they understand it themselves or not.

My problem is with Websites and Teachers showing improper, flashy and ineffective techniques, whether it be nunchaku, staff, karate or anything else. Beginners with no previous experience don't know the difference. I’ve seen god knows how many self taught instructors over the years and passing THEIR skill to THEIR students as good technique. My problem with this is that the students are blindly listening to their instructors and don't realize that they are learning freestyle and not martial arts. Then these students go out into the world and open a dojo and continue to pass on this technique as good technique...because they don't know any better (fault not on their side), and their sensei tells them it's good. THAT'S what I mean by harming the martial arts. It's a plague that is spreading all across the martial arts community and I see it every time I judge/ref a tournament.

I see you guys as taking a weapon and turning it into a plaything...a toy. To me, it isn't elevating it, but rather, degrading it into something that is lesser than what it was. Again, a matter of perspective. There are martial arts out there that are doing the same thing; lessoning the combat applications and turning them into a sport. It is not advancing the art, but rather degrading them and making them into a "toy/ sport". In real life or death combat would you follow your dojo code and kick above the waist ONLY- NO I don’t think you would, please THINK 1 st and you’ll find that distinguishing between a sport and Real Martial Arts will be a lot easier. I wish there was more appreciation for freestyler skills in theatre, and talent events. I would however like to see less juggling in tournaments dedicated to martial arts.

From the Martial Artist’s perspective; the people want the line to be finely drawn between Freestyle Art and Real Martial Arts to prevent the REAL THING (martial arts aspect) to be mistaken and overwhelmed by Freestylists claiming they themselves are better because they r faster and flashier!!!

FREESTYLER COMMENT:

I should go ahead and label traditional nunchaku power techniques as silly too. Sure, they'd be great for fighting. But who would realistically use a nunchaku for fighting these days? I don't like the idea of living in an 8'x8' jail cell. So training to use a nunchaku for fighting is just as "useless" as training to use a nunchaku for entertainment.

In the end, I do it because it's fun. Not because I plan on beating the daylights out of a mugger. Nunchucks was initially a farming tool and later became a weapon by villagers to defend from other aggressive tribes. Then became a weapon for defending (the reason it’s banned is because undisciplined and money making Sifu’s and users use it for creating havock, that’s why Real Martial Arts are only passed down to carefully selected individuals in China in the old days) Since the ban, people alternatively use it for freestyle. It was branched out:

Farming Tool
/	\
Weapon	freestyle

This is good because this freestyler knows what he is doing isn’t martial arts and it’s for fun. They seek for Martial Artists to view them as elaborating the weapon into another state of use other than self-defence and hope that martial artists not just view them as kids playing with it like toys.

MULTI LEVEL THINKER COMMENT:

It's quite simple. Some people don't know what they want. They train classic nunchaku and then they watch some freestyle show and they are just jealous that they can’t do something like that. And on the other hand, people which train many years freestyle nunchaku when they heard that their skills are useless in real fight are angry because they’ve dedicated and trained so long and now someone telling that it's bollocks. But that is true; some people train for combat including me for fun, juggling and freestyle. It's ok until that we know what we want to get and for what we train for.

I train nunchaku mostly for freestyle but I know a guy who trains mostly classic art of nunchaku. I perform much better wrist flips but if he wanted to, he can beat me in nunchaku fight very easy. But we are friends and I train him freestyle, he train me combat art. I'm better with this, he is better with that. What's the big deal?

These are the new experienced people who have the open mind to accept the changes in the eras and just go with it. Provided they know what’s going on and can transfer it to other’s properly it’s OK.

I myself reckon freestyling inspires creativity in one’s mind and enlightens them to self learn in life in general and not just require spoon-feeding. BUT those that seek for copying other people’s techniques and adapting it (calling it another move) into a hybrid move will obviously take longer to get this creativity benefit. However I will definitely prefer traditional martial art ways as the stringent rules you adhere to develop proper discipline and refines the mind of true dedicated students (not on and off). Also, it’s an advantage to be able to promote one’s health and additional ability to protect your loved ones as well as ones self at the same time of enjoying the training.

A proper Sifu will show you the techniques and little applications but won’t TELL you the solution to applying the technique successfully with regards to the kind of power and timing needed. In the Chinese language, we have 4- 8 character proverbs and once you’ve heard the specific phrase related to a set of techniques from the Sifu and FULLY UNDERSTAND IT. All the moves that the Sifu taught will fall into place and the student’s WAY (‘path’ as most like to put it or ‘way of thinking’) will rise up automatically as well as defence skills if there was ever a proper ranking gauge can be devised! This is opposed to detailed instructions of alignment of body and power exerted to loudness of war cries often seen in Sensei’s these days. I thought the belt ranking system was bad enuff but in UK (dunno about America and elsewhere) I’ve seen little 8-year-old karate black belts lol. Also I have a mate whose friend is green belt stripe 2. He pays not only hourly lesson fees BUT examination fees per Karate kata and goes through like 3-4 stripes before advancing to next colour belt; WHAT FOOLISHNESS those degrading scavenging tramps of a sensei.