MMA For Kids: Too Violent or Just Right?
Interesting video about MMA for kids. There is a close look at the “Shark Tank” school in California that allows kids as young as 6 Years old to spar full contact.
MMA training can be great for kids, but there will undoubtedly be some “Cobra Kai” teachers that will push kids to the brink of unsanctioned, unsafe fights and a kid will eventually get hurt forcing the government to step in. Watch the video and decide for your self if MMA is too violent or just right for your kid.
Dan Doyle and Frank Shamrock debate the issue
Stumble it!
August 21st, 2008 at UTC5208UTC p20084631UTC21:
Looks like they’re trying to raise a whole new generation of faux-hawk frat-boy douche-bags.
There’s nothing disciplined, positive, or helpful about teaching young kids to pummel each other. This kind of shit just proves that too many punches to the head inhibits your reasoning and judgment. This is the kind of shit alcoholic abusive parents push their kids into.
August 22nd, 2008 at UTC1108UTC p20085031UTC22:
Thanks…uh anonymous, but you logic is so riddled with fallacies, it’s not even worth addressing. However, in the spirit of fairness I will leave it up, so people can see how irrational, swept up by emotion, and absurd people can be. Not to mention a lesson in logical fallacies.
November 18th, 2008 at UTC3011UTC p20080130UTC18:
Been almost 4 years now since I started training in MMA (BJJ/Muay Thai), love it and even encourage some other friends at work to give it a try, but kids have fewer restrictions from the law and won’t feel obligated to control themselves much since they are not full grown adults, so you’ll be more likely to see ” the boy who armbared the hell out of his classmate”, or “the senior who rampage-slammed the freshman” then the injured children’s parents who will blame the sport, who will blame the school, who will blame the academy that taught them. Let’s face it, kids will be kids, you can control every child 24/7 and there’s a good chance they’ll use their training in the worst way possible. (unless there’s legal punishment for youngsters involved in using combat sports to injure someone) otherwise they’ll just give a bad name to MMA, that’s my 2 cents.
November 18th, 2008 at UTC3411UTC p20082730UTC18:
MMA Fan, you forgot to mention your age! Good to hear young folks are training MMA.
As for the kid that armbarred another kid or slammed “the freshman”, that comes donw to parents instilling the proper character and ethics as their children grow up. That same kid with a bully mentality will use anything available….whether he’s taking up Boxing, Karate, Kickboxing, Wrestling a stick, knife or a gun.
MILLIONS of children across the world are doing Wrestling, Boxing, Kickboxing, Judo, BJJ and Karate and give another kid a black eye or slam them into unconsciousness. It doesn’t give a bad name to those sports, so why should MMA be treated differently?
November 18th, 2008 at UTC3611UTC p20084930UTC18:
Oh and thanks for the intelligent, mature post MMA fan! Goes to show we can disagree and do so in a mature fashion. You should check out our forum!
January 7th, 2009 at UTC2101UTC p20093531UTC07:
As a martial arts student, and a new parent, I certainly plan to train my daughter to defend herself, but the approach I see in the video appears far too aggressive. Kids pick on kids, using whatever skills they have. If the focus is on combat skills alone, then children are going to get hurt, probably seriously. If properly taught, though, core values such as honor, integrity and good sportsmanship will be stressed above the fighting. A properly trained child should be able to defend themself without feeling the need to pick on other kids to build up their self-worth. That is the goal of martial arts training, as I see it.
January 8th, 2009 at UTC5301UTC p20094731UTC08:
JSS, thanks for the comment. It is much appreciated.
MMA as you may know is comprised of many martial arts: Judo, BJJ, Karate, Boxing, Wrestling, Muay Thai etc. In each of these arts you have young children training as early as 4 years old. This is accepted socially, but for some reason not accepted if you put them together. I think the paradigm needs to be challenged.
January 8th, 2009 at UTC5401UTC p20092631UTC08:
I’ve been a muay thai practitioner at an MMA gym for a few years now. On a few occasions, I’ve had the pleasure of teaching muay thai to young boys and girls(8-10).
These kids are much smarter than the mma critic gives them credit for. As a matter of fact, they seem to grasp the concept of honor, comradely, and safety more than some of the adults I’ve worked with. The kids learn important lessons in social dynamics in a gym. They learn how to protect themselves as well as become conscience of the safety of their peers. They push themselves hard to see how far they can go. They learn the importance of a calm mind. I feel like these are the qualities that will breed a strong minded adult.
btw- the kids I work with are all from a really rough neighborhood. I have not heard a single report of any of these kids engaging in street fights or bullying. As a matter of fact, the parents (who are usually poorly educated and work low paying jobs) come to me and tell me how they work harder in school, have gained more good friends, and act out less frequently against them since taking up martial arts.
having said that, a certain level of safety must be enforced. perhaps a governing body of mma teachers can come to an agreement of how to protect these young fighters from serious injury.
January 15th, 2009 at UTC3101UTC p20090031UTC15:
I started practicing mixed martial arts when I began highschool because I always held an interest in martial arts. I’ve been training at my gym for 6 years and I have began helping my coach teach both adults and kids as well…. like Sharked says…. this guy doesn’t give kids enough credit. They know what is right and wrong and if a kid is gonna be a bully he is going to be a bully not because of the fact that he started doing martial arts instead of football. The key lies in the kid’s parenting and environment. As Frank said, this man has clearly never even set foot in a gym….he obviously had no idea who Frank was to begin with… he wasn’t just relying on “second hand opinions”, if anyone knows about mma first hand it’s Frank. I agree with Frank, while I can’t vouch for every mma gym on the planet, I know that at mine, all students are taught about honor, loyalty, courage, restraint, empathy and the importance of morals and the consequences of their actions. We are in a somewhat sketchy neighborhood and my coach goes out of his way to make the gym accessible to everyone in the community who wants to join. There has only been one time when one of our students came and told me that he got into a fight (he told me he felt bad and didn’t know what our coach would say…) When I asked him what happened he said he tried to walk away but the kid hit him so he hit him back and than shot in for a takedown, they scrambled, he mounted him and just held him there until someone called the teacher… needless to say I was proud of the kid and we told him he did the right thing. We teach the kids to always keep from hurting others but to also stand up for themselves and others if they are picked on….and if the guy wants to talk about “taking too many punches to the head” he is much better off criticizing boxing than mma… at the end of the day I started training in mma as a kid…. I’ve always had a love for it and 6 years later I am now in university and part of the reason is because the work ethic I learned in the ring and on the mats pushed me to excel in other areas of my life…. in fact most of the people at my gym in my age group are university or college students or doing something with their life. As Frank put it…this is just another soap box for everyone to stand and shout on… another band wagon, another black sheep for parents to blame their lack of parenting and society’s problems on…… it will pass.
January 16th, 2009 at UTC5901UTC p20094031UTC16:
WELL SAID, Atilla. Thanks for sharing.
February 6th, 2009 at UTC5502UTC p20092828UTC06:
Great story. Let me first say, I don’t practice mixed martial arts. I could immediately feel the emotional context with which so many people might rush to judgment on this issue. That was calmed quite a bit by my person experience having wrestled for 3 years.
There is a great deal of violence in wrestling. A great deal is also done to try and limit the probability of permanent injury as a result of competition. In these videos you can see where that is taken into account to some extent: No head blows or elbows, if someone is in an arm bar, etc, they stop the fight, I did not see them wait for a tap. However I did see at least one slam where a kid brought another to the mat on his head. It seems to me that there is also other grave risk of injury due to strikes like punches and knees in the competitive side of the sport; something I never had to deal with in wrestling for the most part. Am I right that most other striking sports, and martial arts use pads to address this issue for younger competitors? Head gear and maybe even body pads might be a good idea in my opinion.
I think Mr. Doyle is right that violence leads to scars later in life. However, I think that in most cases sports violence does not. There is a clear difference in my mind between violent crimes and voluntary or reasonably expected sports violence. This is where parents and adults come in. They tell the kids what is expected. If you ever played any sport you know this is true. The parent or the child can then decide if they want to continue.
I think Mr. Doyle is also right about parents getting advice from professionals. Ask yourself this: Will a doctor recommend my child play football? How about wrestling or hockey? Any doctor worth his salt will recommend against it. Any sport with physical contact will result in injury and emotional trauma at some point, even something like basketball or soccer. There will also be risk of permanent injury. Mr. Doyle says that forcing another kid into submission is a problem. This happens in every sport. Yes, I definitely cried as a kid after losing some wrestling matches. It does not feel good to be physically or mentally dominated by another person. There is a real emotional aspect to it. I’m actually a better person for those experiences. It taught me respect for others and what they were feeling… empathy. This respect for others was drilled into our heads every day, and when these disappointments happened on the mat we knew how to handle it. This empathy has defiantly carried over to my life outside sports.
I do not understand where he sees MMA resulting in lack of empathy. There is no evidence that these children are being taught that. As a matter of fact he only has speculation on what other might think. Sympathy, compassion, and understanding are in fact a fundamental part of all sports. In my opinion this is especially true in fighting. In the wrong hands these kids may learn to throw empathy out the window, but it’s more likely they will learn empathy through the sport, where they had no understanding of it before. I think Mr Doyle has watch the karate kid too many times, and thinks there’s a bunch of Kobra Kai running loose. This is where good parenting comes in and the parent must know and monitor what their child is learning.
Well, that’s my 2c.
February 18th, 2009 at UTC0802UTC p20094428UTC18:
As a practitioner of Aikido and Ken-Jutsu, I find that MMA has some interesting points and some that seem to only apply to a more competitive setting. I can definitely appreciate the martial attitude and quite a few of the techniques seen in MMA, but the take downs and ground fighting don’t seem to have much relevance outside of a ring. Well, I guess if you want to ground fight with someone and then have their friends join in, that’s your choice.
Seriously though, there are the good and the bad in MMA. But that is the same with any martial art.
February 25th, 2009 at UTC2802UTC p20092428UTC25:
Futon-Matt, you may be an expert on Aikido or Ken-Jutsu, but you should avoid trying to be an expert on MMA if you have no experience. Would it be fair if I told you all about Aikido and Ken-Jutsu and what it was capable of and not capable of? That would be pretty arrogant, wouldn’t it?
As a person who has not only direct experience on the street, but has seen dozens of fights, and has friends that are bouncers I can tell you that the clinch, takedowns and groundfighting happen in the VAST majority of fights. The problem with fantasizing how you think fights go is that it is always out of touch with reality. There always seems to be other friends around to get you while you are on the ground. I guess we MMAers don’t have any friends and I guess when you use your stand-up…er…Aikido or Ken-Jutsu, your opponents friends honor the one on one battle? “Oh let’s not jump in. They aren’t fighting on the ground and he’s doing Aikido!”
Lastly, you may NOT have a choice. What happens if you get put on the ground? Again….when you fantasize or pontificate you forget these variables.
March 10th, 2009 at UTC4103UTC p20093731UTC10:
Wow, I’m surprised at the reaction. I think I gave MMA an ok rap, sorry if you took my remarks as anything other than what they were, observations. I’ve been in fights, and still don’t like the idea of going on the ground, just my two cents. I did wrestle in high school, so going on the ground isn’t a foreign concept either.
Oh yeah, I never referred to myself as anything other than a practitioner, expert is not something I’d ever call myself.
Thanks for interesting reading.
BTW, if you don’t want a discussion, don’t offer comments as an option.
March 10th, 2009 at UTC0903UTC p20092331UTC10:
Here’s an interesting video showing what the marine corps teaches about ground fighting, at least in one of their training facilities. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8LCPvrdLMI&feature=related
At around 7:00 in the two hosts try to put together everything they’ve learned in their brief training at the marine facility. Now, there’s quite a bit to be said about the length of their training, as well as the skill of their opponents, but when the two host went to the ground they got more then they bargained for.
I’m very interested in hearing what people who have more experience with this subject have to say, so if you’re interested in keeping the discussion going please do.
March 17th, 2009 at UTC5103UTC p20093331UTC17:
You are mistaken about not wanting a discussion. Is that not what we are doing right now? I have my opinions and you have yours. I feel your opinions are based on conjecture. Mine are based on actual experience in MMA.
The error in your thinking is that it is a CHOICE to go to the ground. You may NOT have a choice. Secondly, strategically it may be the best tactic. If you got in a fight with a pro Boxer, and he was battering you badly, imagine how well you would do if you took him down and was sitting on his stomach elbowing?
Be my guest and jump onto the forum. You would be surprised how many BJJ and MMA guys who have TMA experience, even instructor level in Kenpo, Karate, etc. They would love the discussion.
All the best,
-Joe
March 18th, 2009 at UTC1503UTC p20091131UTC18:
Choice is a good word, I think in this discussion. Many times I see televised MMA bouts involving two guys slugging away at each other and one of them chooses to go in for a take down. Not, has too, they seemed fine doing what they were doing, but instead made a decision about a change in tactics. This is different from the whole, if I ever get put on the ground argument Joe. I’ve experienced take downs in wrestling and seen it often in MMA fights.
I’m not going to get into that whole “my line of thought is the only correct way” of thinking or anything, or tell anyone they’re wrong. If a specific tactic works for you then roll with it. I’ve never been in a fight where I “HAD” to go to the ground, I prefer to keep distance. In the dojo we work on ground pins and arm bars on the ground. But, in the dojo, much like the ring, training takes place under specific conditions. I also work with weapons and don’t think going on the ground against an opponent with a weapon is something I’d ever consider.
All the best as well,
-Matt
December 23rd, 2009 at UTC1412UTC p20090331UTC23:
Here is an in depth analysis and this will finally lay this question to rest
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wo5Vef_UiYw