Caveat: This article is mine and mine alone. I the author of this article assure you, the reader, that any of the opinions expressed here are my own and are a result of the way in which my meandering mind interprets a particular situation and/or concept. The views expressed here are solely those of the author in his private capacity and do not in any way represent the views of other martial arts and/or conflict/violence professionals or authors of source materials. It should be quite obvious that the sources I used herein have not approved, endorsed, embraced, friended, liked, tweeted or authorized this article. (Everything I think and write is true, within the limits of my knowledge and understanding. Oh, and just because I wrote it and just because it sounds reasonable and just because it makes sense, does not mean it is true.)
Please make note that this article/post is my personal analysis of the subject and the information used was chosen or picked by me. It is not an analysis piece because it lacks complete and comprehensive research, it was not adequately and completely investigated and it is not balanced, i.e., it is my personal view without the views of others including subject experts, etc. Look at this as “Infotainment rather then expert research.” This is an opinion/editorial article/post meant to persuade the reader to think, decide and accept or reject my premise. It is an attempt to cause change or reinforce attitudes, beliefs and values as they apply to martial arts and/or self-defense. It is merely a commentary on the subject in the particular article presented.
In a recent posting I noticed a sign in the background of a video included in the article that said, “ Combat Sport.” I had to take a moment and stop to think, “How can combat be a sport; how can a sport be combat?”
Are they intuiting that their sport is based on something combative? I assume because of the sign and statement that they are trying to convey that their sport is a combat oriented system but I say, “How can you make a sport combative in the true sense of the word, combat?” Maybe I am being nit-picky but I also find communications, especially the written word since it is missing so many important communications venues such as facial expressions and body language, critical to teaching and understanding.
When I see the phrase “Combat Sport” I sense a presupposition. I sense a type of subconscious influencing to provide a sport more power and perception than would be true in reality. When one uses a presupposition in a statement they are actually insinuating that their sport is actually about combat. They want you to focus on the idea that what you are encountering is a sport but by presupposition they are fooling you into thinking it is actually combat thereby triggering our instincts toward survival and the sense that you are entering a world of the warrior who can and will do combat (stretching the idea and meaning here to influence you toward my view - presupposition you might say - in other words selling a product by making it out to be more than it is).
Combat is defined as, “Fighting between armed forces; battle; war; warfare; death-match; to take action to reduce, destroy, or prevent something undesirable.); to fight; to do battle; to attack and more.”
Sport is defined as, “An activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment.
Combat is no an activity for entertainment but of death and destruction. Sport has nothing to do with death and destruction or any type of political world agenda to force something of that nature on another or “Others.”
Yes, to use that phrase as a selling tool one might falsely assume that the sport, safe, is going to teach them how to fight using combat style techniques, not safe, stimulating a deep seated desire to prove oneself in combat through a sport that will actually never be combat because in combat, when you prove yourself, you kill with the goal of not being killed to achieve the goal of your government, etc.
I guess truth in advertisement is subjective according to gains and losses of a social and/or economic nature in modern society. If one who trained in a combat sport inadvertently participated in violence where one died, who tried to argue self-defense based on that combat sport, then would face the wrath of both society and the legal system regarding the truth of combat as perceived in a self-defense, defense. Combat gives the impression of an aggressive killing machine vs. proper use of force as related to applied force of the attack to achieve a goal in self-defense of stopping said attack while remaining in the self-defense square - a legal argument you broke the law with good reason. To be trained in a sport based, by the teacher, the school and the ads, on combat, to be perceived equal to teaching and training our military to kill with prejudice, means you were out there searching to destroy your adversary. See how it might, it may, it could be perceived as an unlawful act?
When I see, read or hear such terminology used to sell products I feel that the only reason they are able to do so is because it has not yet led to some dangerous, grievous and violent outcome when used. Take a recent article about a Jujitsu professional whose combative mind-set using a combative sport broke the law using his training to beat someone vs. being attacked and using appropriate self-defense forces, etc.
Gotta wonder how many are being seduced and persuaded into thinking something is other than what it really is.
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