Do you feel that people are losing interest in Martial Arts in general?

[mukashimantis]

I'd like to see what people from around the U.S. and the world think. Are people losing interest in the fighting arts, or are they following the normal, up and down peaks of interest? You usually see a resurgence of interest when a new movie, style or artist appears.

 

[Kong Soo Do]

I cannot speak for all areas, but I can't keep up with new student requests. I have to maintain a waiting list. This may be dependent on the art in question though?

 

[wushuguy]

It depends a lot on the environment and culture. Like in the area I live, it's generally safer, and there's tons of kids that do TKD, karate, and kung fu. But in the area next to us, the town there is more, well, dangerous, so you have less kids going to tkd, and more adults looking for self-defense courses.

As for trends, with the Ip Man movies, recently a lot of interest was generated for Wing Chun. It may help a little but people who will really want to do martial arts don't necessarily pay attention to what ever movie or style is advertised. They know what they want and go for it.

 

[Flying Crane]

I think we've been overly saturated with martial arts. Most of what's going on around me, I just cannot even stop and watch or look at it.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

I think we've been overly saturated with martial arts. Most of what's going on around me, I just cannot even stop and watch or look at it.

I would agree that we have become over saturated with a lot of bad martial arts. So much so that people cannot tell the good from the bad!

 

[Aiki Lee]

I think interest in martial arts is steadily increasing, but I do agree we are overly saturated with poor quality schools. I do feel that only 1% of the population is really interested in martial arts though. 5% of the population my do it just to fill up their time or get some form of alternative exercise.

 

[Cyriacus]

There are more and more Outlets becoming available, therefore each Outlet has less overall Students.

The Population Increases, the MA Population only slowly Increases, therefore the Number seems Small.

 

[geezer]

Don't know about people in general and their interests, but in my experience, good students have never been all that common, even when the martial arts were a big fad.

Sometimes I feel that martial arts in popular culture have steadily lost respect over the years due to the endless stream of really cheesy movies, and the way the MAs are portrayed in pop culture. Then there is the increase of interest in competitive martial sports... For a while I thought that was a good thing, but nowadays there are a gazillion mma warrior-wanabees and keyboard commandos out there dissing traditional martial arts. I respect MMA, Muay Thai, BJJ and other competitve arts practitioners ... a lot. But, spare me the loud-mouthed, couch-potato fanboys. Please!

Finally, there are the chains of McDojos churning out hordes kiddy blackbelts, like my step brother's kid -- the 12 year-old second dan who has since quit TKD for "cooler" sports since he's in junior-high now. Some styles are so associated with kids programs that I've heard them referred to "ballet for boys". Kind of disrespectful to both the martial arts and ballet. Ballet -- honestly, I really respect ballet. I knew a professional ballet dancer once. Talk about discipline and hard training!

Anyway, it all kinda adds up to the point where a lot of people see the martial arts as a big phony joke. Can't say I really blame them.

As for myself, I'll keep training with a few guys in a park or garage. I'd like to have a few more students, but only if they really want to be there. I'm sick of the type who drift in and out, skip class without a good reason and don't give a good effort even when they are there. But you know what? I'm pretty happy with the group I'm in, just as it is.

 

[K-man]

My friends who are running large profitable schools have told me that there has been a drop in numbers wanting to learn karate and that has translated into the size of their classes. However, that drop was more than offset when they heavily promoted MMA. Until the next 'big thing' MMA is the 'must include' if you are trying to run a profitable business.

For me, I'll stick with geezer and just train a handful of dedicated guys in practical, down to earth karate.

 

[puunui]

I'd like to see what people from around the U.S. and the world think. Are people losing interest in the fighting arts, or are they following the normal, up and down peaks of interest? You usually see a resurgence of interest when a new movie, style or artist appears.

I think more people are training in the martial arts today than ever before. I think people come to the martial arts today for different reasons than 40 or 50 years ago.

 

[puunui]

I cannot speak for all areas, but I can't keep up with new student requests. I have to maintain a waiting list. This may be dependent on the art in question though?

How many students do have at any one time? And where do you teach them? I believe you told us you closed your commercial space, for whatever reason.

 

[Danny T]

Your post title asks about interest in the martial arts.
Your question within the post asks about interest in the fighting arts.
I opine these are two different things. Not all martial arts are fighting arts and for certain not all martial arts training is fight training.

Interest in the Martial Arts is very good in my area. That said, interest in those arts that are specific towards ‘fighting’ is not as strong though there are many, many interested in sport fight training for their training. For us; a large portion of our membership train in Muay Thai and MMA for their training but have absolutely no desire to compete in the fighting aspect of the art. These same members are least likely to attend any of our ‘self-defense’ sessions. However, they train very hard and seldom miss any of the sessions. They also bring in many new prospective members. The smaller portion of members from our MT and MMA classes do compete in sport fighting. (overall they have been very successful. -more wins than losses-)

Our Wing Chun and Pekiti-Tirsia classes are strongly attended but not near so as much as the Muay Thai. Those who do these self-defense and ‘fight’ training are very dedicated to protecting themselves and their families. They train for a completely different reason and their mindset is completely different therefore, what and how they train is different. However, within these members we have some who simply enjoy this training and the self-defense aspect is but a by-product of the training.

Our Kickboxing program is dedicated toward fitness and conditioning. None of these members are interested in fighting at all but they train very hard and are excellent members to work with: dedicated, hard working, and consistent with their training.

Our Shotokan program is the most highest attended of all the programs we provide and very few are interested in any kind of fighting. They enjoy the training for focus, discipline, exercise, art, self-confidence. They also train hard and are excellent members.

In our case interest in the martial arts is strong, interest in fighting arts is not as strong. People come to the martial arts and use the training for many different reasons. Fighting is but a very small part of it.

 

[mukashimantis]

I think you've summed it up well.

 

[stickarts]

Our school enrollment is up and I have a large number of seminars and other events occurring this year. Interest seems good to me. One thing I would like to see is a better representation on tv of martial arts. Martial arts seems to be spoofed more often than not.

 

[MJS]

I'd like to see what people from around the U.S. and the world think. Are people losing interest in the fighting arts, or are they following the normal, up and down peaks of interest? You usually see a resurgence of interest when a new movie, style or artist appears.

I don't think that people are losing interest in the arts. I think you're spot on when you mention a new movie, style, etc. As for the type of art....I feel that depending on the person, they will be drawn to a specific art. Ex: someone who's looking for something to do after work, may not be drawn to an art with heavy contact, something with a heavy SD or fighting focus.

 

[WCman1976]

From what I have seen in my area, the interest goes in peaks and valleys. You are more likely to see a consistent student body at the TKD or karate schools, but that's because those classes are full of kids whose parents are making them go so they get SOME kind of exercise. At a school like mine, it is a little different. Newcomers will be all excited when they first get there. (I'd say the last 15-20 new students took up wing chun because of the YIP MAN movies.) However, once they realize that Sifu wants them to focus on just the first section of Sil Lum Tao for an indefinite amount of time, their interest wanes. Once it becomes real work, they're out the door. I guess what I'm trying to say is: interest can appear to be high, depending on when you visit the school.

 

[Razor]

I think perhaps that more sporting arts might be rising in popularity. At my university the MA clubs organised an MA day which involved all of the clubs in the sports hall at the same time giving demonstrations etc and people could drop in and have a go. I realised the day before that the Bujinkan club is the only non-sporting martial arts club (the other clubs are MMA/BJJ, Judo, (Shotokan) Karate and Thai Boxing). All of the sporting ones seemed to be a lot more popular with many members, Judo was the only exception. I was talking to the instructor we had on the day and we both thought that perhaps combat sports have become more popular for whatever reason.

On the issue of general interest, very few new people turned up even though we advertised the event all over the campus and online, and it was aimed mainly at new people coming in and having a go. A graduate who has been to the event over several years said that it is usually the same most years. Most of the people were already members of MA clubs and went around to try other ones. Therefore it seems in this area at least, even at a university (where many people end up trying new things anyway) few people are interested in MAs. Or perhaps this is just among lazy students who can't be bothered to do anything on a Saturday!

 

[WingChunIan]

from a UK perspective, I'd say the martial arts are as popular as they ever have been its just that there is now a much wider variety of choice and schools available to anyone wnating to learn. The movies and popular culture play a big part in making the martial arts cool, in the 70's /80's it was bruce lee, chuck norris, in the 80's / 90's Van Damme, dolph lungdren,90's / 00's UFC dominated. If the UK wins any medals in TKD or Judo at the 2012 olympics there will be a small peak of interest but to really drive a new wave we need a media sensation.

 

[Black Belt Jedi]

I think people, mostly adults are losing interest in Martial Arts, mostly the Traditional systems. There can be many reasons abroad. One reason can be the economy, people are losing their jobs or that they are working double shifts/extra hours etc. and can't commit the time to come to classes. Other reasons can be injuries and marital/family problems, or just too lazy to show up to class because they worked in the day and felt tired at the end.

This is what happening in my school, the kids classes are quite consistant in terms of a big number of attendence, but since coming back from the Christmas break, no adults showed up to class for a number weeks in a row. So my school needed to drop of flyers door to door really soon.

 

[tshadowchaser]

I agree that the economy is causeing many to stop their studies.
Most moms and dads want their child to climb in rank and go to tournaments but most fighting indturctors are unwilling to instruct little jonny in how to really fight. The legal problems that might cause are to high. Also mommy dose not want little jonny getting hurt.
I agree that the fighting aspect of the arts may be down in many areas but as has been said befor it depends on how much crime there is in that area on what people want to study