LDS doctrine is to philosophy as BJJ is to Aikido


Vort
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When my now-adult children were younger, they took lessons in aikido from a very nice man who lived locally. Now, aikido bills itself as a gentle, non-violent, and strictly defensive "martial art", where "martial" means "having to do with war" and "art" apparently means "we enjoy making up internally self-contradictory terms". Whatever; judo means "the gentle way", and there is very little gentle about judo, so if aikido wants to claim itself as a "non-violent martial art", I won't make too big a fuss about it.

And my children loved aikido; it let them exercise their gymnastics skills while doing something fun. The problem I had when watching my children (and a later class of adults) practice aikido was that it did not appear to have anything to do with self-defense or, regarding actual fighting outcomes in a self-defense situation, with reality. For example:

Please note that this video is not some hatchet job cooked up by haters. It is done by a pro-aikido body. This is what aikido really claims about itself. It's pure fantasy passed off as reality. It pegs the bogometer, yet many thousands around the world find such things not only believable, but inspiring. They build their lives around aikido.

Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ) takes quite a different path. BJJ would be better called "Brazilian judo", because it's the Brazilian Gracie family's version of Jigoro Kano's original judo. They accepted and adopted Kano's philosophy that your "fighting style" doesn't count for anything unless you can actually use it in actual combat. Kano built judo around the idea that if you learn various non-lethal techniques and then practice them a whole lot, you can become much more proficient at actual self-defense than the guy who "practices" various lethal methods that he can't actually try out because, you know, someone might get killed. Judo (and BJJ) spend the honest, painful hours actually learning how to respond to various attacks, while those in the latter camp (not just aikido, but certainly including most aikidoists) end up using essentially the Think Method:

But their results usually aren't as good as Professor Harold Hill's.

This is how I view LDS doctrine vs. the philosophies of men. LDS doctrine requires you to get on the mat and actually learn to do the things that are needful. The philosophies of men just look from a vantage point (as they suppose) way above mere men, spout out fair-sounding words, and then tell everyone to get in line. Communism? Feminism? Social justice warriors? It's all aikido. In the end, society will get beaten to a pulp while the adherents of such popular philosophies flail about, insisting that their deadly techniques will soon have the desired effect. Meanwhile, Satan and those who profit by society's destruction nod their heads and laugh.

So, let's see, I've managed to disrespect aikidoists, feminists, communists, and SJWs. That should skyrocket my already exploding popularity.

Edited by Vort
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There's a reason you don't see much of Aikido in the Octagon.  It's the same reason you don't see much of feminists, communists, and SJWs in the dog-eat-dog world of the Third World.  I mean, you don't have communist ideologues - the communists there are not philosophers but para-military forces.  But in this same Third World, the LDS Church is expanding by leaps and bounds.

Edited by anatess2
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2 hours ago, Vort said:

When my now-adult children were younger, they took lessons in aikido from a very nice man who lived locally. Now, aikido bills itself as a gentle, non-violent, and strictly defensive "martial art", where "martial" means "having to do with war" and "art" apparently means "we enjoy making up internally self-contradictory terms". Whatever; judo means "the gentle way", and there is very little gentle about judo, so if aikido wants to claim itself as a "non-violent martial art", I won't make too big a fuss about it.

And my children loved aikido; it let them exercise their gymnastics skills while doing something fun. The problem I had when watching my children (and a later class of adults) practice aikido was that it did not appear to have anything to do with self-defense or, regarding actual fighting outcomes in a self-defense situation, with reality. For example:

Please note that this video is not some hatchet job cooked up by haters. It is done by a pro-aikido body. This is what aikido really claims about itself. It's pure fantasy passed off as reality. It pegs the bogometer, yet many thousands around the world find such things not only believable, but inspiring. They build their lives around aikido.

Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ) takes quite a different path. BJJ would be better called "Brazilian judo", because it's the Brazilian Gracie family's version of Jigoro Kano's original judo. They accepted and adopted Kano's philosophy that your "fighting style" doesn't count for anything unless you can actually use it in actual combat. Kano built judo around the idea that if you learn various non-lethal techniques and then practice them a whole lot, you can become much more proficient at actual self-defense than the guy who "practices" various lethal methods that he can't actually try out because, you know, someone might get killed. Judo (and BJJ) spend the honest, painful hours actually learning how to respond to various attacks, while those in the latter camp (not just aikido, but certainly including most aikidoists) end up using essentially the Think Method:

But their results usually aren't as good as Professor Harold Hill's.

This is how I view LDS doctrine vs. the philosophies of men. LDS doctrine requires you to get on the mat and actually learn to do the things that are needful. The philosophies of men just look from a vantage point (as they suppose) way above mere men, spout out fair-sounding words, and then tell everyone to get in line. Communism? Feminism? Social justice warriors? It's all aikido. In the end, society will get beaten to a pulp while the adherents of such popular philosophies flail about, insisting that their deadly techniques will soon have the desired effect. Meanwhile, Satan and those who profit by society's destruction nod their heads and laugh.

So, let's see, I've managed to disrespect aikidoists, feminists, communists, and SJWs. That should skyrocket my already exploding popularity.

I see this very much in an old friend of mine. He was divorced about a year and a half ago and has spent the whole time since in meditation, going on grand adventures to other countries and literally spending weeks in solitude or with counselors and others looking for some sort of awakening. When we meet together, he talks about all his struggles and addictions and expresses his ideas on how he can react to them, over come them and what the root of it all is. But in the almost 2 years I have known him, very little about his personality and behaviors have changed. He still talks about what should or ought to be... but doesn’t do much about it. Even the council I see him give to others, it is all theoretical and he pushes back against any suggestion that encourages a course of action (because when someone acts, then that means all other ideas must be wrong... and that can’t be so, everything is relative after all 😛 )

Then you look at a different friend of mine who probably hasn’t delved too deep in any sort of “awakening”, but has gone from a punk kid in highschool with sex and video game addiction to overcoming his addictions, owning his own business, making $100,000+ a year, and is an amazing leader in his ward.

And as a side note that shouldn’t come to anyone’s Surprise... My first friend is left in his political thinking and my second friend is right in his.

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