Which is the true ITF

terryl965

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In another thread it was mention about the breakup of the ITF and certificates not being giving out with any crendintial so my question is this what is the one true ITF organization out there right now and who is really responsible for the General techniques has he tought them?

I know opinion is different so I'm open to all replys.
Please lets keep this on a professional level shall we.
 
In another thread it was mention about the breakup of the ITF and certificates not being giving out with any crendintial so my question is this what is the one true ITF organization out there right now and who is really responsible for the General techniques has he tought them?

I know opinion is different so I'm open to all replys.
Please lets keep this on a professional level shall we.
Terry, it really depends on who you talk to - IMO, it's GM Choi, Jung Hwa, but I'll have to come back later and tell you why; I have friends over to work out, and they're changing clothes.
 
In another thread it was mention about the breakup of the ITF and certificates not being giving out with any crendintial so my question is this what is the one true ITF organization out there right now and who is really responsible for the General techniques has he tought them?

I know opinion is different so I'm open to all replys.
Please lets keep this on a professional level shall we.

Terry,
You crack me up :flame:

Please define "TRUE"
 
Terry,
You crack me up :flame:

Please define "TRUE"

Master Arnold what I mean today there are several different orgs. out there out of all of them who is holding truest to the late Gen. wishes and are staying to the original guidelines of his TKD.
 
Master Arnold what I mean today there are several different orgs. out there out of all of them who is holding truest to the late Gen. wishes and are staying to the original guidelines of his TKD.

Please don't call me Master as I have not earned the title.

As TKD is a living growing art this question is moot as all three will grow apart as they must. Movement is life. No movement, which is the opposite, is death. Therefore none will go away.

Which president has held truest to America?
The question is flawed.

Just as who is true TKD? ITF or WTF?
They both "ARE". So the question is only to raise the dander of the students.

As only the general could say what his wishes are, and he is dead, then no one can answer your question. Only fight over it with sales pitches.
Bad topic, not productive!
 
I honestly do not know which I feel is the "true" ITF. Personally, I think they should come together and have a tribunal or ruling council or something like that. Why do they need just one leader? Why not have a council? Three factions, three votes, majority rules. Equal representation, etc. It takes a lot of the power trip out of it. I am probably over-simplifying it because I have not really followed the split too closely, but it could make it a nice simple solution if it did work.
 
Please don't call me Master as I have not earned the title.

As TKD is a living growing art this question is moot as all three will grow apart as they must. Movement is life. No movement, which is the opposite, is death. Therefore none will go away.

Which president has held truest to America?
The question is flawed.

Just as who is true TKD? ITF or WTF?
They both "ARE". So the question is only to raise the dander of the students.

As only the general could say what his wishes are, and he is dead, then no one can answer your question. Only fight over it with sales pitches.
Bad topic, not productive!

Sorry did not mean to bring up a bad topic, I thought it could be productive and a nice converstation about the direction of the ITF?
Sorry about the Master thing, I just assumed you was.
 
I honestly do not know which I feel is the "true" ITF. Personally, I think they should come together and have a tribunal or ruling council or something like that. Why do they need just one leader? Why not have a council? Three factions, three votes, majority rules. Equal representation, etc. It takes a lot of the power trip out of it. I am probably over-simplifying it because I have not really followed the split too closely, but it could make it a nice simple solution if it did work.


Sounds like a plan but it will never come to that I'm affaid to bad we all just cannot work together to unite TKD instead of spitting it all the time.
 
There was a great deal of bad blood on all sides as the 3 split - as DArnold said, Gen. Choi is dead, and no matter what others say, there is no way to really know what he wanted, because the documents left behind are contradictory and therefore inconclusive. While I personally lean toward GM Choi, for reasons I don't really want to enumerate here because of the problems such discussion has historically caused, dwelling on the reasons why and the "true" ITF - whatever you mean by "true" - will only serve to keep alive the negative feelings that occurred during the splits.

While I wish WMKS Shogun's solution would work, I find it to be unlikely in the short term, at least, because of the nature of the splits, how they happened, and the negative feelings thus caused - to work together, people from each group would have to put aside those feelings, at least to the extent that they could work together, and I don't see that happening at the moment, because there are too many people who were personally involved, and personally hurt by the events leading to the splits. In another generation of TKDers or two, working together may well be more possible - and I hope it is - and I will be very happily surprised that if it happens sooner... but I'm not going to worry about it right now - I'm just going to practice the best I can, and keep teaching my students the best I can, because in the long run, that's the most important part.
 
My understanding is that, when Gen. Choi died it broke into 3 camps: each claiming to be the "true" ITF. I'll defer to our ITF experts for details, correction & clairification.

My guy just knew that the forms he did were ITF, so he declared himself state rep. He had a printer make up a certificate with the ITF logo on it. Since iy was in the 1980's & most folks had never seen an ITF before, he snowed us all.

At this point, most ITF based folks can trace their lineage to the General, I'd bet.
 
I know the ITF is split into 3. However, we do the ITF poomsea that is depicted by Jhoon Rhee in his paperback pubs. So honestly, Lets just say that MSK is headed by Mike Morton, so he tells me his son how he wants hapkido to continue.

Would that not make me then the successor. I know this has happened in EPAK as well. It all has to do with money and who is getting it and who isn't.

Just a thought.
 
Well I know what our club's take on it is.... we've disbanded and we now only call ourselves ITF Style. I believe there was something very political with money involved and one of the split sides asking us for funds when we were talking to the other side and we refused to play the game.

We now talk about Gen Choi as our founder and don't get involved in the politics any further other than to stand back and watch the bickering.
 
Shaderon, I think a lot of dojangs have taken the same stance as yours. There are a lot of orphaned former ITF dojangs still practicing the ITF/Chang Hon style of Taekwon-Do that do not want to get involved with the politics of the 3 ITF groups.
 
I honestly do not know which I feel is the "true" ITF. Personally, I think they should come together and have a tribunal or ruling council or something like that. Why do they need just one leader? Why not have a council? Three factions, three votes, majority rules. Equal representation, etc. It takes a lot of the power trip out of it. I am probably over-simplifying it because I have not really followed the split too closely, but it could make it a nice simple solution if it did work.
It shook out ugly. The old board on itf-information.com was filled with people bitterly and snidely arguing over things as petty as the true weight distribution on an L-stance. (This proved somehow that at least one of the orgs was legit.) Hard to corral out of control egos like those.
 
There was a great deal of bad blood on all sides as the 3 split - as DArnold said, Gen. Choi is dead, and no matter what others say, there is no way to really know what he wanted, because the documents left behind are contradictory and therefore inconclusive. While I personally lean toward GM Choi, for reasons I don't really want to enumerate here because of the problems such discussion has historically caused, dwelling on the reasons why and the "true" ITF - whatever you mean by "true" - will only serve to keep alive the negative feelings that occurred during the splits.

While I wish WMKS Shogun's solution would work, I find it to be unlikely in the short term, at least, because of the nature of the splits, how they happened, and the negative feelings thus caused - to work together, people from each group would have to put aside those feelings, at least to the extent that they could work together, and I don't see that happening at the moment, because there are too many people who were personally involved, and personally hurt by the events leading to the splits. In another generation of TKDers or two, working together may well be more possible - and I hope it is - and I will be very happily surprised that if it happens sooner... but I'm not going to worry about it right now - I'm just going to practice the best I can, and keep teaching my students the best I can, because in the long run, that's the most important part.


If it was important to the general he would have taken care of it. He knew his time was short and he sold his soul to promote ITF and also so he could be buried in NK. But that was done over 2 decades earlier as there are letters that prove this.

Now besides the three ITF's fighting over the name he also did not take care of the business of trademarking the name/logo globaly. So the three ITF's are also having to do battle with whomever was the head dictator in the country to regain rights. (paid for by students)

Just last week letters were sent out to members of the ITF's in the USA by someone who trademarked the name but is no longer associated with the ITF wanting money if they want to use the logo. They are using it to extort money from the three ITF organizations in the USA. And the funny thing is that that they no longer support or belong to any ITF.
 
It is always sad when a founder of a martial art is unable or just simply does not clearly make his wishes known regarding who will be the next successor. Very sad and particularly so when the organization is very large and has so many members and so much money involved.
 
It is always sad when a founder of a martial art is unable or just simply does not clearly make his wishes known regarding who will be the next successor. Very sad and particularly so when the organization is very large and has so many members and so much money involved.


I agree Brian but where does it go from here and how do we protect the dignity of the Ar?
 
My understanding is that, when Gen. Choi died it broke into 3 camps: each claiming to be the "true" ITF. I'll defer to our ITF experts for details, correction & clairification.

At this point, most ITF based folks can trace their lineage to the General, I'd bet.


I agree that most (but not all) can trace it to him. I'm also with Kacey, wanting to lean towards the General.
 
I agree Brian but where does it go from here and how do we protect the dignity of the Ar?

By what you do with your own Integrity.(Unless you are the head of one of these organizations). If you feel so inclind, speak out and don't support organizations that do not have TKD and their students in the forefront of what they do.

Organizations are usually as childish, if not more, than young black belts argueing "REAL SELF DEFENSE"
 
By what you do with your own Integrity.(Unless you are the head of one of these organizations). If you feel so inclind, speak out and don't support organizations that do not have TKD and their students in the forefront of what they do.

Organizations are usually as childish, if not more, than young black belts argueing "REAL SELF DEFENSE"

Sir I always try to be respectful and have integrity all the time and do my best to promote the Art I love with a passion. I'm really a indepentant school looking for an org. that has the same integrity as me without selling out to anybody. I do not mean to ask so many question that have no real answer to them, just trying to make converstation and find intelligent answers out there in the web of life. Love your last line.
 
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