Ok. the next time i see someone basically getting shafted by expending time effort and money on a system that will never deliver on its expectations. And the best we can hope for at the end of this is that the person never has to use it.
I wil use that encouragement.
"It is good to see you getting out of the house and staying active"
In the end, that's one of the most important things most of us get out of our training, whether it is fight-effective or not.
Now, this comes back to a recurring question of how much the system matters, and how much the training approach matters. And I think the answer (as with nature vs. nurture) is that they both matter more than some people think and less than others think. For the moment, let's assume all MA pursuits should end up with effective fighting (to remove argument about whether that's the case or not).
If I say "Karate is crap because of kata", that's a pretty clear bias against a training tool, not really supported by any specific evidence. Even if I could assert (with evidence) that kata were less effective than other means (which incidentally, I cannot), that wouldn't be evidence that there's something really wrong with kata. I might be able to make a similar assertion about a 50-pound heavy bag as opposed to a 75-pound one. But just because on is generally better, that doesn't make the other bad, so my evidence wouldn't be enough. And then we have to decide if the training method is actually the style. Some would argue it is, but there's no reason a style based on forms (kata) couldn't be taught without the forms, just by teaching what was in the forms. It would change the training, but not the system (if we define "system" as the collection of techniques, strategies, and tactics).
So, if a style includes some techniques that aren't effective, is that a bad style? I'd argue it depends how they are used, what percentage of the style/focus they are, and probably some other factors. Okay, if it's 50% ineffective (for fighting - remember our assumption here) techniques, that's probably a weak system. But what if it's 10%, or 25%? I'm not sure at what point it starts to become an actual problem. I expect if we looked into the entirety of every system, we'd find some things (perhaps not taught everywhere) that were less-than-optimal. And then we get the real confusion when some of those are actually quite good, but only under very limited circumstances - are those "ineffective" or "specialized"?
Of course, there are some things we can pretty universally agree are ineffective, in that none of us believe they'd work if we stepped in and let them try it on us. The problem is finding the right line between that and a few objectionable practices within a system - a line beyond which we consider the system "bad".