Should it martial arts be licence?

[still learning]

Hello, Do you feel it will help the martial art schools if they were licence and regulated by the goverment? By the Federal,States, or local.

Something like, a mechanic licence, hairdressor, or medical doctor?(this is extreme). A PUC licence, ed-teacher licence, electrical licence.....since the schools charge money for there services, and contracts on involved here?

What are you thoughts on this...agree or disagree and why?

.......Aloha ( personally it is NO for me)

 

[Blindside]

Nope, that puts the guv'mint in the position to decide what is and what is not a "martial art." I don't want to go down that route.

Lamont

 

[Jade Tigress]

There is so much variance even between the same styles of arts, that it's virtually impossible for them to decide what's standard, much less a government that has no clue. It would never work...

 

[lenatoi]

Absolutly not! The Gov. regulates too many things already.

 

[RoninPimp]

Why give the government another job to do poorly?

 

[Makalakumu]

Lots of European countries require martial arts instructors to be licensed. I'm not sure what the requirements are, but I know it exists. BTW - I think its a bad idea.

 

[Kacey]

I think it depends on what you're licensing. If, as Jade Tigress said, you're trying to license quality instruction, I don't see how you could - the standards are too variant within and between organizations, even those which technically have the same knowledge base. Who and how would judge competence? Where would you get the personnel? Who would set the standards? Would it be a lifetime certification? If not, how often would you have to recertify?

If you're licensing instructors (rather than instructing) that they have, for example, passed a fingerprint check (for things like rape, child abuse, etc.), or that they are certified in CPR or First Aid... well, the good ones are certified for First Aid (I am), and for the rest... well... do you really want to get the government involved in these things? And will it really be effective?

I would say no - I can understand, in theory, the reason for such licensing - but in practice, I think it would be like many other kinds of licensing: the people for whom it is irrelevant (that is, the ones who would qualify) would pay the money, undergo whatever testing/licensure/paperwork was required, and (most likely) pass the cost onto their students, and the others would fake it or ignore it. The fakers would give their students (and/or students' parents) a false sense of security, and the ones who ignored it woudl probably just claim it was meaningless. Either way, I see it as an added obstacle to the law-abiding, and no real deterrent to the law-breakers.

 

[SFC JeffJ]

Just as an example of how well licensing works, how many people are ticked off at licensed contractors they've hired?

 

[tshadowchaser]

I still say no group can regulate who is a good instructor in all systems and much political fighting would cause the downfall of many organisations.
There would be a lot of martial arts going into hideing and shadow societies if the goverment tried to regulate who could teach

as an examole can you tell m what is required by my organiation for each rank and what ids required for someone to be an instructor in my art. If not i would not want you requlating who could teach my art

 

[IcemanSK]

I don't think its a good idea for a lot of the reasons already stated. But from another angle, what government agency would oversee it? How would it be paid for? An MA instructor's tax? As others had mentioned, what would the standard be & who would get to decide that?

I understand why there might be a need for it. Lord knows there's enough bad MA instructors out there. But there's bad plumbers out there too....And their licensed!

 

[MA-Caver]

For God's sake hell no! As with all the reasons stated above and also who is going to decide what and how far should a person's MA skills be regulated?

Plus you're going to get every stupid moron out there that's too cheap or overconfident to go to a real school and learn it properly vying to get a license to impress their family and friends and they probably won't know dick about (real) MA. Not to mention the sudden BOOM in McDojos that will promise a MA license in Two weeks... or less!

 

[Hand Sword]

Absolutely not!

 

[Hand Sword]

I'm not that upset, My computer got stuck, and then posted it 3 times!

But, it does drive home the message--LOL!

 

[bushidomartialarts]

sadly, there's movement in that direction in several states already.

i think we agree that it would be a capital-B capital-T Bad Thing if martial arts started having to deal with government regulation.

what would be nice is if most schools could get together and start some form of self-regulation like many industries do. that would improve quality across the board and probably keep the g-men off our backs.

 

[Hand Sword]

That kind of stuff (the government stuff) might actually be a great benefit to the arts. It will force it underground, where the real training would occur, just like in the ancient times!

 

[MA-Caver]

<snip> what would be nice is if most schools could get together and start some form of self-regulation like many industries do. that would improve quality across the board and probably keep the g-men off our backs.

Well it's like congress (in Washington) ... You got a bunch of people all working towards the same goal but having their own individual ideas on how to do things ... get them to agree ... well great... if not... well it's going to take a while. Question is do we have enough time? History has shown that "G-men" aren't that patient.

 

[Korppi76]

Lots of European countries require martial arts instructors to be licensed. I'm not sure what the requirements are, but I know it exists. BTW - I think its a bad idea.

Any examples of this?
I am just curious.

 

[Makalakumu]

France and Spain both have license requirements.

 

[MJS]

Hello, Do you feel it will help the martial art schools if they were licence and regulated by the goverment? By the Federal,States, or local.

Something like, a mechanic licence, hairdressor, or medical doctor?(this is extreme). A PUC licence, ed-teacher licence, electrical licence.....since the schools charge money for there services, and contracts on involved here?

What are you thoughts on this...agree or disagree and why?

.......Aloha ( personally it is NO for me)

Absolutely not!! IMHO, there are already enough people out there that are supposedly in charge of running things, and they don't seem to have a clue! If you're going to be in charge of something, I'd want the person in charge to know what the hell they're doing!

I'll use this as an example. Look at the UFC. There was a certain Senator out there, who felt that it was his job to decide what people should be watching. Now, he succeeded in getting it yanked from PPV, but it was a short lived absence, due to the fact that its back, and stronger than ever!! My question is: What the hell did this Senator know about MMA fights? Did he reasearch anything? Why did he feel that it was ok for him to tell people what they can watch and on PPV no less!!

I could just imagine what would happen to any of the arts out there if the gov't were to be in charge.

Mike

 

[stickarts]

The Government's time and focus could be spent better elsewhere than trying to issue licenses for the martial arts!
I hope it never comes to that.