The Convocation of Combat Arts
Best of the martial arts on the Web!
Money and martial arts
I'd like to hear some of your views on money in the martial arts. Do you think money puts the integrity of the art at risk? What should come first, the business or the art? How commercial is too commercial?
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Rick Matz on -
Learning a skill and being able to teach it requires a huge investment in time an energy. I have no issue at all compensating a teacher.
Trying to teach a martial art to make a living would be an extremely difficult thing to do. You either have to build a large organization to support you, or you need a "day job" that provides you with a stable income and benefits which allows you to teach without much concern that your school is going to support you.
-
Permalink Reply by Nick Lowry on -
I think the distortion of budo by money making is sad and degenrative. Money associated with tuition makes sense to me, though I question teaching authentic budo to minors; if you wouldnt arm a child with a knife or gun, should you be arming him or her with real waza, and if you are not teaching them real waza, are you defrauding the student/parent in some sense? I think real martial ways are for real grown ups and if you are not teaching kids real budo then dont pretend you are.
I also really dislike the exchange of money for ranking in all its permutations. If budo organizations need dough, they should produce products, sell education, charge a membership fee, etc. -- but to tack on charges for something you have worked for and "earned" is crass and egregious in my book. Go to college, get your education, earn your degree, then pay extra fees to graduate-- sounds like a back-end scam to me.
-
Permalink Reply by Urban Samurai on -
I agree with all your comments. I take issue with people teaching martial arts purely for profit. Everyone is entitled to make a living but there is a fine line between earning a living and taking advantage of people who put their trust in you at the end of the day. I wrote an article on this subject. For anyone interested in reading it, here's the link:
http://urbansamurai.org.uk/2009/05/28/chasing-the-training-dollar/
About
© 2010 Created by Nathan Teodoro on Ning. Create a Ning Network!
