WELL ALL I HAVE TO SAY IS HI MY NAME IS MICHAEL MCLAREN FROM DUMFRIES AND IVE STARTED SHOTOKAN ITS REALLY GREAT, GREAT FOR THE BODYS ASWELL.

ANYWAY SINCE I ONLY GO 2 TIMES AWEEK BUT I STILL NEED HELP WITH IT SO I WAS WONDERING IF YOU CAN TELL ME OR SHOW ME SOME FIGHTS OF SHOTOKAN PLEASE :new_olymp

I CANT HEAR YOU

If this is a troll, well, damn, I've bitten. But Dumfries is pretty local for me, so I've been suckered out of lurking into giving you the benefit of the doubt, even with the Special Olympics logo.

Firstly, lose the block caps. Using block caps on the Internet is like dribbling saliva from the corner of your mouth while yelling incoherently at the top of your voice: people assume you're either a child or clinically retarded.

Secondly, check what forum you're posting in. This is not a forum for introductions. This is a forum for discussing martial arts history. Your post was not about the history of martial arts. Do I need to spell this out further?

Thirdly, most Shotokan Karate is not for fighting with. It's conceivably pleasant recreation, but unless you're actually sparring full contact (which very few Shotokan schools do), it's very nearly as useful as ballet for combat purposes. I reiterate, full contact sparring, not point sparring.

If it's fighting effectiveness you want, go find a judo place or boxing gym. Scotland has plenty of both. Muay Thai and Brazilian jujitsu are also effective, but you'd probably need to travel some way to find either.

Fourthly, my welcome was warm and friendly compared to what the rest of this forum is going to do to you. When you've introduced yourself in a more appropriate place, you're going to be roasted for doing Shotokan. No-one will take you seriously. You can win quick respect in some quarters by claiming to do Ving Tsun, but some people still won't be won over until you reveal that you do the real Ving Tsun, not the pussified stuff taught elsewhere. To prove you do the real Ving Tsun, you should manufacture a "lineage" of vaguely Chinese-sounding names starting with "Yip Man". After you've won them over, you can announce you're changing your art to Shotokan and such will be the regard you're held in, no-one will argue with you.

Sophist

Here:

http://www.jka.or.jp/english/e_index.html

and if you are shotokai:

http://www.shotokai.com/ingles/

are you a shotokan or a shotokan't?

This is just a personal grift, but the JKA blows. As do most organisations that back the sportification of any style.

ok and hi to everybody

now what is wrong with shotokan and why you getting on me ive done nothing wrong to anybody

Well it would have been wise to read the site for a while and at least learn where to post and such. Anyhow, there is some good stuff in karate; I like being able to ring door bells with my big toe. (Ronin69 and I are karate black belts by the way)

There are better sites for you to "learn" about shotokan, namely the ones I posted for you.

Reading the site wouldn't be a bad idea. Newbie hazing is something of a tradition here, and you've increased your chance of being targetted by using block capitals in your first post and picking the wrong forum to introduce yourself in.

What's wrong with Shotokan? Well, that depends what you want from your martial art. If you want some brisk stretching, some vaguely Oriental-styled discipline and a few hours of dressing up each week, almost every Shotokan dojo may fit the bill. If you want something that will teach you to fight, you're probably in the wrong place.

If you're going to learn how to strike effectively, you need to spar. Moreover you need to spar with full power often enough to break yourself of easily acquired bad habits such as leaving yourself open or delivering weak ineffectual blows. Very few Shotokan dojos do this. This is not a problem with all karate - for example, Kyukoshin karate is known as an effective striking art because they train in precisely that way - but the vast majority of karate dojos avoid full contact sparring. No matter how good your techniques may be, if you don't train them realistically you'll be unable to use them when you need them. For striking this means getting hit hard and often to learn to defend yourself, and hitting other people who're trying to avoid being hit. In arts such as boxing, this is understood as a very basic principle, and almost any place you go will have this sparring.

Fairly similar principles apply to grappling, which is why wrestling or Brazilian jujitsu as usually trained are superior to aikido or traditional jujitsu as usually trained. The martial arts where people compete against resisting opponents are the martial arts that are effective to fight with.

If the reasons you do a martial art are related to neither fighting nor self defence, then these issues are of no consequence. However, as you mentioned Shotokan "fights" in your first post, I assume these things matter to you.

Bullshido tends to be hostile to martial arts that claim to be effective as a defence without doing full-contact sparring. Champion such an art at your own peril.

Bullshido also tends to be hostile to Wing Chun/Ving Tsun for more complicated reasons, and the part of my last post mentioning it is where my resolve to be helpful broke down and I suggested you should do something likely to get you heavily flamed. Reading the site will guard you against falling into such pitfalls.

which dumfries are you from? there's more than one. i am "near" dumfries, and sophist is near dumfries, but i am not near sophist. no, not nearly near.