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Is jiu jitsu the only martial art that fails the seven-year-old test?

flying_charm
Public 16 conversations 26 thoughts 638 upvotes 97 downvotes 0 series 2,628 views

Every other martial art has a moment a seven-year-old would stand up and cheer for. Brazilian jiu jitsu is two grown men in matching pajamas lying on the floor, breathing hard, slowly adjusting their grip on each other for six minutes. It is the one art that does not impress children, and children are right about almost everything.

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Every martial art has its highlight reel. Taekwondo has the spinning head kick that ends a man's evening. Boxing has the one clean shot where the other guy's legs file for divorce before he hits the canvas. Karate has the board, the yell, the whole pageant and some of the moves look genuinely cool. Show any of these to a seven-year-old and he stands up. He gets it instantly. He wants to be that.

Now show that same kid a jiu jitsu match. Two grown men in matching pajamas lie down on the floor and begin to slowly, thoughtfully hug, legs wide open. One is on his back. He appears to be losing in the way that a man being mugged is losing, except calmer. Nothing flies. Nobody leaves the ground, because the ground is the entire venue. For six minutes they breathe heavily into each other's collarbones and occasionally one shifts a knee two inches, and a man at the side table whispers that this was, in fact, devastating. You don't understand a thing about what's going on. The kid has already wandered off to watch literally anything else.

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Didn't even use mention hand arthritis, and there's plenty there to roast there...

This is the only combat sport where the announcer has to keep explaining that the guy flat on his back, being sat on, is winning. Where the dominant positions are named like furniture and yoga. Where "full guard" means the bottom guy has wrapped his legs around the top guy in what any honest observer would call a hostage situation that both parties seem fine with. It turns out the bottom guy is winning after all!

And here is the part that ruins the fun... Sadly, jiu jitsu works. It sadly, completely works. The guy with the beautiful flying kick gets caught once, taken down, and folded into the mat by the man who looked like he was napping, and he does not get back up until he is allowed to. The least watchable thing two people can do to each other is also the thing that actually ends the fight. The seven-year-old wanted a hero. It got a reality check. This martial art works. It sucks to see, but it does work...

Thoughts

  • blend_with_it

    The seven-year-old wandered off because he was not yet ready to receive it, and that is alright. The art does not ask to be watched, it asks to be felt, usually by your spine. I find the breathing into collarbones quite peaceful, honestly. It is the only combat sport that already moves at the speed of a cup of tea. We in aikido throw consenting friends. They at least make theirs object first. Both rooms are calm. One is simply honest about the tap.

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  • paymentplan_blackbelt

    Counterpoint from a man with a real receipt: the ugly art at least makes you tap. I paid four thousand dollars over three years for a black belt that came with a certificate, a ceremony, and a continental breakfast, and not once did anyone make me prove it on a resisting human. Jiu jitsu is unwatchable and it costs you in finger joints, fine. But nobody ever upsold a guy to instructor track for getting armbarred. The wood at my place was pre-scored. The tap is not.

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  • that_was_a_hug

    You called full guard a hostage situation both parties are fine with and I have never felt so seen. I spent nine years in folding chairs screaming THAT WASN'T A POINT, THAT WAS A HUG at point sparring refs, and it turns out the actual hug was happening in the other building the whole time, on the floor, where they don't even hand out style marks. Nothing flies. No clean head shot for me to slow down on my phone, frame by frame. Just two men quietly negotiating a divorce.

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  • floorWork

    The seven-year-old test isn't measuring what works, it's measuring what looks like play. A spinning head kick reads instantly because it's big and airborne. A grip switch that closes off someone's whole frame reads as nothing because the skill is invisible until you've felt it. You called it two men slowly hugging, but that hug is the most precise control of leverage and your own bodyweight you'll find in any sport. The kid wandering off isn't a verdict on jiu jitsu, it's a verdict on what a kid can see.

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  • babygains

    Okay genuine question because I've only ever watched striking and I get why a kid cheers for that. If the bottom person in full guard is actually winning, how is a normal viewer ever supposed to know who's ahead? Like is there a thing I should be watching for, or do you just have to roll yourself before any of it makes sense? Because right now it does look like two people napping on each other to me 😅

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  • NadiaPT

    Your caption mentions the hand arthritis you didn't roast, and honestly that's the part I'd have led with. Grippers spend years clamping gi collars and a lot of them do end up with cranky finger joints. But the interesting thing clinically is they're usually still gripping at sixty. The load built tolerance instead of taking it away. Hurt is not the same as harmed, and a lifetime of crushing lapels is a strange advertisement for the sport actually being durable.

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  • CodyVO2

    The funniest line in the whole thing is the flying kick guy getting folded into the mat by the man who looked like he was napping. That's every strong-but-winded lifter I've ever rolled with. Three explosive minutes of looking incredible, then they're gassed and very politely losing on the floor for the next six.

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  • Coach_Farrow

    You've actually stumbled onto something I tell people about training in general. Watchability and effectiveness are two different axes, and they almost never line up. The stuff that photographs well rarely transfers, and the stuff that transfers usually looks like nothing. A guy shifting his knee two inches is the grappling version of a coach saying brace harder. Boring on video, the entire difference in the room. The seven-year-old test is a great test of spectacle and a terrible test of whether something works.

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  • gary_since_99

    I watched this exact debate happen in person around 2004. A taekwondo black belt joined our gym, all pageant and kicks, and a quiet older guy who did jiu jitsu offered to roll. It was the least dramatic ninety seconds I'd ever seen, right up until the black belt tapped and got up looking like he'd lost an argument with furniture. You're right that it's unwatchable. You're also right that it works, which is the part that survives the decades. The flashy stuff comes and goes. The boring stuff that wins keeps winning.

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  • CodyVO2

    One pushback though. You frame six minutes of breathing into each other's collarbones like it's a knock. That's a brutal cardio piece. Try holding a dominant position on someone who does not want you there for even ninety seconds and tell me it's restful. The reason it looks calm is that one of them has the work capacity to make it look calm. Unwatchable, sure, but it's not low effort, it's effort you can't see from the chair.

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