A guy in my town who got his brown belt over the internet from a guy he has never met has been given a black belt over the internet from someone he has never met.
the watering down of Jiu Jitsu has set another bench mark
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Why don’t you mind your own freakin’ business and not talk about what I am doing when you don’t even know me?
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Very funny Shen, I know you are on a level above normal BJJ so this doesn’t affect you.
Hespect
People have been saying this for years. I don’t think it’s that bad. The real issue is the nonsensical sporty techniques that are all just nonsense!
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Oh stfu. The gracie self defense curriculum is a joke and way more mcdojo than any modern technique. I mean, if you’re attacked by some spastic pussy with terrible technique they’ll probably work.
Old school shit like spamming Americanas from side control will make you some billy badass in a street fight lmao.
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IMO, it IS getting more watered down in two ways:
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A ‘Black Belt’ in BJJ now means you have some level of skill with sport BJJ. Nothing less, nothing more. By and large, the sport of BJJ has replaced the fuller art of BJJ. So, if it’s not important in sport BJJ, it’s considered not important.
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Getting a Black Belt is a lot more casual. These are actual things I have literally heard [ but paraphrased here] teaching at different BJJ schools or from other BJJ instructors : “Those guys affiliating, I’m gonna give them their black belts”/ “____is a nice guy. He’s not good, but I’'m gonna give him a black belt. Everyone likes him”/ “she’s been coming forever, I’m gonna give her a black belt-- it would be really good to have girl black belt here” / “He want’s to open a school in his country, so I’m gonna give him his black belt. We can go there and do seminars” / “It looks bad if you hold people too long at Brown Belt --someone else is gonna promote them.” / --and my favorite from a Brazilian instructor who was trying “counseling” me about how to promote people: “No one makes people wait for 9 years to get a black belt anymore. It’s not how it was. Look at the other schools. You do that you’re not going to have any students.”
The economics of school ownership and trying to establish a “team” of affiliates are serious factors in people getting promoted. In other words, today people get black belts for all sorts of reasons that have nothing to to with them truly deserving it.
At the OTHER end of the spectrum, the level of Elite sport BJJ players has never been higher.
So yeah, overall, I’d say BJJ is becoming like other martial arts. When I started there were VERY few American BBs --Rorion wouldn’t even give Black Belts to Americans. Period. Today, people have more of a “when I get my Black Belt” type attitude. It’s a given; all you need to do is hang around long enough. In the 90s, I remember seeing an American Purple belt and it was like seeing a freaking celebrity. LOL. I remember seeing Chris Haueter right after he got his Black Belt- and he was competing against a Brazilian BB-- and it was almost unfathomable. It was just a different thing back-then.
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Damn…that sucks…I hope I’m not one of those watered down dudes.
Is your link down? I sent you the money for my promotion, got a confirmation number, but no Black Belt just an error message on your link. I was hoping to go meet you in person after I got my belt since I’ll be in the area…
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This place isn’t safe, hit me up on myspace.
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Look at this cerebral contrarian gambit! A debater on the order of Stephen “the real deal” Douglas. A troubled genius skulks amongst us.
Feels good to have it recognized on occasion. Thank you sir.
Totally agree. I got a purple belt in 2000 and it was a really big deal. There just weren’t many around. I had won numerous tournaments and had a couple of amateur mma fights and you had to compete and do pretty well to get promoted back then. I hadn’t been to a belt promotion in 10 years and went to one last month where a guy got a purple belt and it surprised me. He’s terrible. No way he could even armbar a white belt from his guard. I doubt he could even get his hips out to do the move. He’s been training for years, is consistent, is a nice guy, etc. None of that used to matter, belts were given on ability and that ability actually needed to be proven. I’m not mad about it, just agreeing with you that things are definitely very different.
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People are getting BBs in 4-5 years now at Gracie schools.
That would be about a 3 stripe blue/purple back in the day.
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There was probably a time when I was a white belt where I would have given a shit about who get what’s belt ranking….
Who fucking cares?
The rest of the world thinks we are judo chopping each other anyway
We’re not? Dam it, I thought we learned those at black belt lol
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Good news is BJJ schools still have full on sparring where one can see who knows what…
Well, every strip mall TKD school in America spars too.
TKD was a hard core martial art that was almost exclusively taught by Korean Army vets --many of which were H2H combat trainers in Korea-- who were sent around the world -funded by the Korean government -to expand the art everywhere. They were wildly successful.
In a few short generations, it has become almost exclusively a children’s activity with the quickest & easiest path to Black Belt of any martial art. Just as with BJJ, the sport supplanted the art and the competition rules got weirder and less realistic, until you have the odd game of toe tag that it is today.
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Idk about y’all, but for me, full on sparring consists of two roll out mats, methodically placed betwixt two dumpsters in a random downtown alley…preferably at either high noon or dusk (obv for physical pushing-the-limits purposes)
Glass shards are scattered around the roll out mats…double sided tape is used for the center, whereupon more glass shards are sprinkled.
Both training partners blindfold their coaches. They then flip a coin to see which one must tie a hand to their belt at dead center tailbone.
The third hobo that walks by is offered a shot of Jack to ref the match.
First to tap loses.
Ten years of that and…we talk.
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There’s a guy in the town I live in that started holding pads for people at a boxing club for a few years and decided to open Muay Thai/MMA school shortly after. He apparently went to Vegas and went from never putting on a gi (much less even rolling) to getting his purple belt by a promoter for “allegedly” stepping up and rolling against a black belt because nobody wanted to go against this black belt. Idk shits weird these days