The Problem With Taekwondo

For those of you that do not study Taekwondo, Taekwondo means the way of the hand and the foot. Very traditional Taekwondo focuses on punching, striking, and kicking. It does NOT involve grabbing, throwing, or wrestling.

The problem with modern Taekwondo schools is they try to incorporate the grappling and throwing of other martial arts. We saw how Bruce Lee took bits and pieces of different martial-arts to create something new. That is okay, I guess. I think Bruce Lee is pretty cool, but I do not like the idea of combining the martial-arts. The main reason: Tradition gets lost!

Traditional Taekwondo provides us with all the tools we need. If we can master Taekwondo, we do not need to learn how to grapple or throw people across the room. I personally think it's more fun to kick them across the room anyway. I've heard so many times that Taekwondo is not practical, but this could not be any farther from the truth. I think all the martial-arts have strengths and weaknesses based on the practitioner. If you are not good with your legs but you are great with your arms, then an art that uses more arms would be more efficient than Taekwondo in that situation. I personally prefer Taekwondo, and I know through forms that Taekwondo can teach me all I need to know. (I don't know it all...I still got a long way to go).

The forms (poomse) in Taekwondo teach us all we need to defend ourselves. The strikes, punches, and kicks alone reinforce how we can hurt an attacker. If practiced correctly and often, the basics in forms will make sure we can respond effectively in any situation. Plus, blocks can be blocks, blocks can be strikes, strikes can be release moves, kicks are kicks, and those weird moves that instructors pass over actually are great release moves. By release moves, I mean if somebody grabs you, you use that move to get away. For example, the big move in Koryo before turning to the last bar (I affectionately call this "pretty burst") is a way to get out of a hold. Forms alone teach us all we need, we do not need to add Hapkido, Judo, or Jujitsu to Taekwondo.

Still, Taekwondo schools all over the US are not teaching students how to effectively use Taekwondo. They rush through the basics and the forms to get to the "fun stuff." The commercialization of martial-arts forces instructors to keep things "fun" so students don't leave and train at the other school 1 block away. The popularization of UFC/MMA has forced many Taekwondo school owners to incorporate grappling just to keep students in the building. It's all about money and profit, which is why I HATED owning a Taekwondo school. It made me sick to go against everything I believed in just so we could pay the electric bill.

I wish there was a way for Taekwondo to get back to basics. I miss it!