and in further news of how my life has taken a serious turn toward the peculiar

[lolaraincoat]

My regular karate teacher, the guy who teaches the class at my gym, is great. Well, lately he has grown an unfortunate goatee, making my crush on him disappear, but he's still a fine teacher and a good martial artist. But he's not "the sensei" -- that's his teacher, who runs a multi-site karate program. Sensei is, as I may have hinted, a jerk. He's a particular kind of aging-martial-artist jerk, of a kind I've seen before but find difficult to describe precisely. Usually but not always these are male jerks, and they have gotten a little too far on physical strength rather than -- let's say -- balance and flexibility of body and spirit. (And wow, yes, there really is no way to write about the martial arts without sounding like a fool. Bear with me.) So when they start to age they sometimes succumb to the temptation to substitute other kinds of power for the physical strength they're, inevitably, losing. Very experienced martial artists can become bullies or worse.

The classes at my gym only meet for half the year. Between terms, I train at the main dojo. I try to avoid the classes that sensei teaches -- his senior students run better classes than he does, with more attention to detail and less sitting around listening to sensei go on talking about nothing in particular other than his own special unique greatness. I've had to ask myself whether the training I can do at this dojo is worth the nonsense, and concluded that, at least for now, it is. Changing dojos is hard, and anyway this sensei must have been great once because his senior students are so good, and anyway except for belt tests he's easy to avoid. And I don't feel myself to be unsafe at this dojo, not physically or emotionally.

That calculus was undone last Wednesday night.

Sensei's end-of-class endless talk to the class began with the movie Letters from Iwo Jima, which he wanted us all to go see so that we would "understand the Japanese martial spirit" (and the set of assumptions underlying that statement already is fucked up in so many ways) and then drifted on to, whoops and oh dear, talking about the German "fighting spirit" in WWII, and how Hitler's generals laughed at him when he wanted to invade France but he was right, because he had the fighting spirit, and even though Germany was at a huge disadvantage they nearly won the war anyhow and they would have except that their Jewish scientists were all chased away so the other side got the atom bomb. But still, he concluded, even though killing the Jews was wrong, you just have to admire that German fighting spirit.

So I knelt there, staring at the ground in front of me, consciously deciding not to stand up and walk out, but I haven't been back to class since. I don't want to go back, but I don't want to get into a big fight over this either, but I don't want to just drift away, but I don't want to do anything that would make it impossible to train with the teachers I like at my gy and elsewhere, and I don't want to have to change styles again, and I want to finish learning all the kata in this style ...

But I don't want to go back.

Comments

[petronelle.livejournal.com]

Your response to this guy's politics makes sense to me. Dojos have indubitably abandoned for less than the invocation of Godwin's Law.

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Hah! right! it was Godwin's Law in the real world!

[amelia-eve.livejournal.com]

I don't know anything about martial arts etiquette, but I know I would not want to give this guy one more penny of my money. I don't think it is necessarily your responsibility to call him on it, but you don't have to stay, either.

I hope you can find another place that is more hospitable to you philosophically and still as fulfilling athletically.

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure that there is such a thing as martial arts etiquette -- or rather, most dojos have their own variation on a general pattern. I'm not paying this guy or his dojo at the moment, just my gym (i.e. the JCC. Isn't that poetry?)

And I'm pretty sure the sensei is not consciously antisemetic as much as he is full of weird fantasies, best left unexamined, about manly warfare. (He may also have that Canadian anti-US attitude spilling over into this, taken to sick extremes, as in "any country that fought the US is brave! and heroic!") Not that unconscious antisemetism is much better.

[amelia-eve.livejournal.com]

The JCC? That is rather rich.

I think you may be onto something about the twisty nature of anti-US sentiment. Did you read this discussion about European anti-Americanism and anti-other things in vaznetti's LJ? It's part of an interesting pattern.

Rather off that part of the topic, I am always fascinated at the ways martial arts traditions parallel but differ from those of yoga. I'm so much more comfortable with rambling lectures about the evils of BGH and acid rain than with anything that would lead to where you ended up.

[ellid.livejournal.com]

I think you should contact your *teacher*, not the so-called sensei, either by telephone or in writing, and ask for a referral to a different dojo. This guy sounds like an anti-Semite, and you do not need to listen to his blathering.

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

I might discuss this in person with my teacher, if I decide I want to stop training with him as well as with his sensei. He would deserve an explanation. But he won't be able to help with a referral as he's never trained with anyone other than his sensei.

[twistedchick]

Don't they have inter-dojo events some of the time, possibly some sort of martial-arts day for all willing dojos in Toronto? If so, your teacher might know someone and a referral would be useful.

Your experience -- and your reaction to it -- resembles in some ways the precipitating event that got me out of the Roman Catholic Church: a sermon praising people and events that I could not in good conscience agree with. (I know it's not exactly the same thing; I could go elsewhere without needing a referral.)

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Actually, one of the ways in which I can tell that this is a weird-in-a-bad-way dojo is that they *never* get themselves involved in events with other dojos -- no open tournements (which is okay; I think tournements often encourage the very worst tendencies in martial artists) and no seminars and no camps and no visiting teachers and no contact with the dojos at which the sensei himself trained (which is less okay) ... So, no, I'm not too hopeful about a referal. I will probably have to spend a few weeks wandering around Toronto trying out dojos at some point this summer. Which, now that I think of it, might be fun!

Meanwhile, yeah, leaving a dojo and leaving a church have quite a lot in common, it seems to me ...

[twotoedsloth.livejournal.com]

Well,that's because belonging to a dojo is a lot like belonging to a church (or at least, in the case of the Good Dojo, like belonging to the sisterhood at my mother's temple).

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

it was, it was! right down to the frequency of the potlucks! which perhaps had something to do with the roots of its two founding senseis.

[elphaba-of-oz.livejournal.com]

I would have found it impossible to remain in that room. I suppose that makes you a better martial artist than I.

Just the same I wonder if there is a way for you to continue training with the best of this assholes students. Have any of them broken off and started their own dojos?

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Or I'm a much worse martial artist. Depends on how you value acting-in-the-moment, or heroic gestures.

That's a really good question. It might be a little difficult to find out, but the answer is, probably yes, but that doesn't necessarily mean that I'd want to train with them either.

What I really want, of course, is my beloved Brooklyn dojo back again. But I can't have that.

[elphaba-of-oz.livejournal.com]

I'm not a better martial artists. I am probably a more thoroughly indoctrinated Jew.

I wish I could give you back your dojo. Why don't you start your own?

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

I wish you could too. Why oh why oh why-oh, why did I ever leave Ohio Brooklyn?

But no, I am years of training (with some dojo somewhere ...) away from starting my own dojo, and also, wow, no, much too much work, and I don't want to teach anyone karate, I just want to learn it -- hey, teaching is my day job, you know?

[cordelia_v]

Jesus Christ on a hog.

What a fucked-up person. How truly fucked-up. Not to say that I haven't met and heard worse. When you do German history yourself, you become a magnet for such nut jobs. But this guy is pretty far out there, as these things go.

That's a tough calculus. I am so sorry that something that is so important to you has been spoiled and made more difficult. Esp. right now. How awful, to have to listen to that, and then to have to juggle all those factors in your head and heart.

*hugs you, and strokes your hair*

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Yes, he's fucked up, and in ways that we both recognize -- hearing nut-job fantasies about the past and its heroic virtues is one of the hazards of our profession, I suppose. Usually I just get ambushed at parties by people who want to tell me all about the Maya and how they were in touch with the ancient astronauts; Germanists surely have it much, much worse, as do those poor souls who study the US in the Civil War era.

And yes, now is not the time for him to be telling me precisely the kind of scumbag he is.

*hugs back*
*clings*

[cordelia_v]

Oh. I never thought about Civil War specialists, but yes, they must have to listen to as many nut jobs as I do.

You know, I had a fantasy this morning in the subway, on the way to work. A very detailed and compelling one. In this fantasy, you and I and all the historians I know and cherish on LJ were all in the same department. I mean, a department that consisted entirely of historians from my flist. And we had the most amazing dept meetings, of course. And it was such a joy to work with all of you. And we offered a wonderful program to our students.

I may have to write a meta piece on that. LJ as a screening mechanism for potential colleagues. Way, way better than AHA interviews, I'd say.

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

And I just had lunch today with a friend who studies (among other things) the student movements of 1968 globally -- another topic which brings out the headcases, it turns out.

Your fantasy is brilliant. Oh, wouldn't it be cool to have a department of just us? it would! hell, a whole university! I know lots of lit types on lj, and at least one astrophysics grad student, and a marine biologist, and a meteorologist, and some anthropologists, and and and. They would all be great colleagues, I bet.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I wasn't there. I didn't hear. I can't judge how he meant it.

But you don't want to go back and that's all you can go on. It's okay to grieve for what you had--the convenience of it and all, but you don't have to second-guess yourself. (Except, okay, maybe I've misread this and you're not looking for validation, you may just be sharing, secure in your decision. If so, sorry to babble at you.)

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

No, no, validation is good!

Actually, though, I have made up my mind about what to do, which is to go back to bad sensei's class one more time, tomorrow, for a belt test. Then I can return to the good teacher's regular class at my gym for a couple of months while I look around for another dojo -- and, yeah, grieve.

I hate that it's taken up so much valuable space in my head, this stupid problem.

[norah.livejournal.com]

God, men who are obsessed with warrior cultures and their horrible history skillz. It's a whole personality type. I'm sorry! I'm glad you at least have a few months with the good teacher...

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Yep. It sucks that the chief hazard of my day job (other than long, long hours and the not enough jobs to go around and everything else I love to complain about) has followed me into my Happy Place. But yes, I have a few more months anyway with the teacher I like, and then we'll see.

[ellen-fremedon.livejournal.com]

Oh, he did not.

Eesh. I don't blame you one bit for not wanting to go back.

[stillwell.livejournal.com]

Wow. Unfuckingbelievable. (And I was just wishing you a poop-free day in response to your earlier post!)

I support you in talking to your teacher (the good guy) about it, and avoiding the asshole.

I also really admire your ability to take care of yourself under these circumstances, and give yourself the space to consider what the right response is for you.

Sending a hug, courtesy, and an "Osh."

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Thank you. Yeah, I'm trying not to be too ashamed of myself for not reacting right in the moment, making a big fuss right as this was happening. That would, perhaps, have been the most ethical way to behave.

I'm also mad at myself for not noticing before this event made it obvious that this dojo is awfully white, compared to other dojos I have known. The Good Dojo in Brooklyn works at being a good space for everyone, but even without those kinds of efforts the martial arts in North America usually attract an ethnically/racially mixed crowd (I know you know all this, forgive me, I'm just writing it down as an aide in thinking about it ...) This school's students are gender-mixed and age-mixed but mainly white folks, and it had kind of puzzled me considering how not-white Toronto is, but I hadn't put that together with the various ways in which the sensei is a jerk. And I should have.

Fishwhistle said, when I told him the story last week, "Holy cow! You've been training with the Michigan Militia for a year and not even noticed!" And that's a bit exaggerated, but not wrong. So I am mad at myself and feel foolish too.

[stillwell.livejournal.com]

It's a hard thing to measure a choice from retrospect, not exactly fair to you, either. In a weird way I'm glad that you've been able to get some valuable training out of it, whatever you decide to do - and I'm glad you can take that with you.

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

It's definitely a good lesson in how to learn from a bad teacher -- which will feed right back into my own work as a teacher, so that truly is valuable. And it's a great lesson in why institutions like BWMA are so important, too. And, okay, this is crazy, but I feel a bit as though I am going to *steal* those kata from this bad school, smuggle them away with me to where-ever I go next ... yeah, nutty, but it's cheering me up to think that, so.

[stillwell.livejournal.com]

Yes! Liberate those katas *

[mincot.livejournal.com]

Do what you need to do. This man sounds like a jerk of the first water. What an appalling statement! No wonder you don't want to return.

If the convenience remains impiortant, and the trust you have built up with your teacher, and if the senseiis easier to avoid, you might work with his students and speak to them, and simply refuse to take part in any classes the sensei leads. IMHO, he has forfeited that title. However, I think that if you go back you do need to speak to your teacher: how can you trust HIM with the "sensei" in the background?

That does, however, leave the problem of tests. Sigh. (((((((((((((You))))))))))) I hate things like this where there is no good response. You are strong and capable and will do whatever the right thing is for you right now. (((You)))

[twotoedsloth.livejournal.com]

I'm tempted to say that it's time to shift to internal arts... not tai chi neither. But, gawd, I know what you mean. The balance between the body stuff and the spirit stuff and the twisted stuff is so fraught in martial arts. I mean, I miss it, but sometimes... I don't.

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Well, here's my reasoning: I really, really like karate.

Besides that, I'm experienced enough with karate that I can recognize certain kinds of bullshit when I hear it or see it, and also that I can learn from highly imperfect teachers (as all teachers are) without needing to idealize them or getting too fussed about most of their imperfections. So I think for me it makes sense to stick with it if I can. But I do see your point. Hmmm.

[twotoedsloth.livejournal.com]

Well, of course, you can RECOGNIZE bullshit, but it still smells funny and sticks to your shoes.

[jcalanthe]

Oh jeez, that's really terrible. I don't blame you for not wanting to go back. What a jerk.

How music is different from Karate

[fishwhistle.livejournal.com]

You know, we keep noticing ways in which music resembles martial arts. For example, the importance of breathing and lowering your shoulders. A physical activity that at its best leads into the spiritual. Lots of careful attention to detail and repetitive practice, yet it requires a paradoxical combination of attentiveness and not thinking. Crushes on fellow musicians because you're doing an intense physical and spiritual activity together. Slightly different types of possible injuries, but it's there.

But, I gotta say, I've never yet had a music teacher or conductor tell me how great the Nazis were.

Re: How music is different from Karate

[lolaraincoat.livejournal.com]

Don't make me bring up Wagner, now.

Re: How music is different from Karate

[twotoedsloth.livejournal.com]

You know, that explains alot.

[laughingrat.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's just dreadful. *boggle*

Liberate those katas, indeed! Sometimes noble objects need to be housed elsewhere.