females in traditional chinese martial arts

[Jian]

hi folks,

the times are changing and as we've seen at the recent tiger claw
tournament in san jose.. a strong presence of female martial artists. i also have a question about how supportive this space is for gay/lesbian folks.

two questions:
1. what do you think is the role of female martial artists in traditional
chinese martial arts?

2. is this a community open to gay/lesbian martial artists?

various opinions i've heard and inferred through observation:

- women are welcome but really it's the men that authentically carry on the lineage of our ancestors
- female martial artists are appreciated because they are feminine and sexy
- women are warriors just like men- take them seriously and promote them if they qualify
- ooh, lesbians with swords. hot.
- gay is fine as long as they stay away from me.
- wish we had more female participants
- who cares about gender and sexual orientation. this is a new era and as long as they care about the art that's all that matters.

any thoughts?

thanks,
jian

[goju]

[QUOTE=Jian;1104740]
- who cares about gender and sexual orientation. this is a new era and as long as they care about the art that's all that matters./QUOTE]

I generally have this attitude. The few female students ive encountered were treated like everyone else by me. If we sparred i hit them but i keep the level of contact appropriate for my sparring partners skill level. If they are at my level we both go hard . If im better than them i ease back but still challenge them with out injuring them, this applied to women or men.

As far as sexual orientation goes its not important.I never knew any of my class mates orientation nor was i interested in discovering it.

[bawang]

in modern times women can train martial arts alongside men. in modern times you can also fuk another man up the ass , legally commit adultery, and abort fetuses, so what.

[taai gihk yahn]

in modern times women can train martial arts alongside men. in modern times you can also fuk another man up the ass , legally commit adultery, and abort fetuses, so what.

it IS a beautiful time to be alive, isn't it?

[ShortBridge]

So, I'm learning through this forum that I don't think I know or understand this "TCMA" community that we keep talking about. With respect to our club and the clubs we're related to in other cities that I've visited, we have a tradition of strong women. We put them through the same thing as we do men. It's hard, some of them break, some of the men break. Some of the women who do not, can and will hurt you and it makes me proud.

I completely disagree with segregating men and women in training. As for culture, I grew up a chivalrous southerner, but I smack the women in our club around every week and they smack me. I think from a self defense standpoint, women are much more likely to need to defend themselves against men than another women, so, they need to train that way. I can't speak for all styles, but if it really just comes down to who is bigger and stronger, why are we doing this? Your fate is written, no need to train.

As for cheating, yeah, absolutely, always cheat in a fight, man or woman. It's a fight, you're trying to win and not get hurt. We are expert cheaters.

Gays? Sadly I think rather than a question for the TCMA Community, it's a question of time and geography. I live on the west coast of the US in the year 2011 and almost no one has a hangup about ****sexuality here. I know it's not that way everywhere. I think some day it might be, but it's going to take a long time in some places. Again, women need to be able to defend themselves, sadly so do gays, especially gay men, who still are subject of bashing sometimes, even on the west coast. Why wouldn't you want to train them if they and you thought it might help? I realize we could argue about that, but those are my views and it's not worth trying to convince me otherwise.

- women are welcome but really it's the men that authentically carry on the lineage of our ancestors

I don't see that glass ceiling in my circles.

- female martial artists are appreciated because they are feminine and sexy

Well....yeah. Was that in question?

gay is fine as long as they stay away from me.

You know, I don't know if this is a martial arts question or not. I'm a married, straight male and before I knew gay men and women personally, I had some fears associated with them. Now that I do, I understand how unfounded they are. Gay men like gay men, they don't feel attraction to women or straight men. Same with gay women, it's got nothing to do with me. I have plenty of friends/coworkers etc in each camp and my relationship with them is exactly the same as it is with straight men and women. Certainly reason not to train with someone on this point. My personal views, probably not that uncommon on the west coast, I realize it's not that way everywhere.

There is no telling how many closeted football/baseball/basketball players, actors, politicians, pop stars etc there are or for that matter friends and family members we each have. Someday they won't be and we'll have to deal with the fact that people we like, were comfortable with yesterday, who are good at their jobs and maybe even great UFC fighters have a fondness for members of their own gender.

So, i was just lamenting that I get attacked on this forum for posting things about kung fu training that I don't think should be controversial and here I am posting something that I know some people will take strong exception to. Flame on if you must.

I'm sorry about your friend's negative experience.

[Razaunida]

One time I did a full contact rape prevention class.

I invited some ex cons to teach how they would rape so that the women would know how real rapists go about it.

Then came the partner work.

One guy did get hurt and the woman got away. The rest didn't. Needless to say that things really didn't go as planned.


I had to change my name and move.

[Jian]

thanks! i appreciate your sentiments (below)... i also train in the west coast and have found folks here very open-minded. i personally prefer training at schools with mixed genders too. i've read some comments in other threads and actually expected folks to be more conservative, and have been surprised to find support for both women and gay folks.

So, I'm learning through this forum that I don't think I know or understand this "TCMA" community that we keep talking about. With respect to our club and the clubs we're related to in other cities that I've visited, we have a tradition of strong women. We put them through the same thing as we do men. It's hard, some of them break, some of the men break. Some of the women who do not, can and will hurt you and it makes me proud.

I completely disagree with segregating men and women in training. As for culture, I grew up a chivalrous southerner, but I smack the women in our club around every week and they smack me. I think from a self defense standpoint, women are much more likely to need to defend themselves against men than another women, so, they need to train that way. I can't speak for all styles, but if it really just comes down to who is bigger and stronger, why are we doing this? Your fate is written, no need to train.

As for cheating, yeah, absolutely, always cheat in a fight, man or woman. It's a fight, you're trying to win and not get hurt. We are expert cheaters.

Gays? Sadly I think rather than a question for the TCMA Community, it's a question of time and geography. I live on the west coast of the US in the year 2011 and almost no one has a hangup about ****sexuality here. I know it's not that way everywhere. I think some day it might be, but it's going to take a long time in some places. Again, women need to be able to defend themselves, sadly so do gays, especially gay men, who still are subject of bashing sometimes, even on the west coast. Why wouldn't you want to train them if they and you thought it might help? I realize we could argue about that, but those are my views and it's not worth trying to convince me otherwise.



I don't see that glass ceiling in my circles.



Well....yeah. Was that in question?



You know, I don't know if this is a martial arts question or not. I'm a married, straight male and before I knew gay men and women personally, I had some fears associated with them. Now that I do, I understand how unfounded they are. Gay men like gay men, they don't feel attraction to women or straight men. Same with gay women, it's got nothing to do with me. I have plenty of friends/coworkers etc in each camp and my relationship with them is exactly the same as it is with straight men and women. Certainly reason not to train with someone on this point. My personal views, probably not that uncommon on the west coast, I realize it's not that way everywhere.

There is no telling how many closeted football/baseball/basketball players, actors, politicians, pop stars etc there are or for that matter friends and family members we each have. Someday they won't be and we'll have to deal with the fact that people we like, were comfortable with yesterday, who are good at their jobs and maybe even great UFC fighters have a fondness for members of their own gender.

So, i was just lamenting that I get attacked on this forum for posting things about kung fu training that I don't think should be controversial and here I am posting something that I know some people will take strong exception to. Flame on if you must.

I'm sorry about your friend's negative experience.

[David Jamieson]

1. to be martial artists

2. sexual orientation doesn't come into play in martial arts

[Lucas]

i think the answer will vary depending on who you pose the question to.

here is my answer:

In a martial art training center, the focus is on training your martial art. There is no sexual atmosphere involved (this is how i view things of how i work and how i believe they should be in an environment that i participate in, and of course not how everyone else views or does things). Unless someone is quite very obviously gay or is in the habbit of advertising such, you would never know what sexual orientation your training partners hold. We do not go to the gym to have sexual relations.

Women do indeed have their place within the martial arts world. There have always been females interested in martial arts. Granted the vast majority of practitioners have been and currently are men, you do see a rising amount of women becoming interested in various forms of martial arts. I can share with you one aspect of insight our female counterparts can give us men; When a woman is practicing skill along side men who generally will outweight and out muscle her, she will be required to fall back on proper technique more than men will. And even as such, many times men will 'cheat' when working with a woman, because we can. There is a certain degree of refinement you see in women that is the product of this, often times required, element of training to succeed against a male counterpart in a competative training environment.

[Jian]

thanks for sharing.. i had heard from an acquaintance that she was kicked out of her chinese martial arts school when she "came out" as gay- that was 10 years ago.

that it's a non-issue and that the prime focus is on the art and training is what i thought, as well.

i agree that women (and smaller framed/sized martial artists) do have to rely more on technique as we can't really muscle our way through

[-N-]

it's a non-issue and that the prime focus is on the art and training [...]

There you go.

[Razaunida]

Women are great for training kung fu, but men should train with men and women should train with women.

I don't care if this isn't PC or fair, the fact is that a man who is raised as a gentleman won't want to hit the woman. Women rarely have the intention to really train for combat. If they do, then great tremendous respect, but for the most part they weaken the training environment and they cause injuries.

Women don't know they have power and every time I have seen an injury in martial arts it has been from a woman. They overpower because they perceive themselves as weak compared to men.

A woman should train with men only after lots and lots of advanced training. Again..its not fair, but life isn't fair and that is my experience after being in martial arts since I was 5.

[Jian]

razaunida, thanks for sharing. no worries about political correctness.

in my experience, injuries seem to happen more readily when there's not enough monitoring or students forget to "check themselves". also, a beginner or white belt that doesn't know control when executing strikes.. that is also much physically stronger and does not know their own power.. can be quite dangerous. i've seen injuries from training caused by all genders. i find it helpful, when paired up with someone that does not use good control, to communicate what my boundaries are.. and remind them often.

i'm not sure how women, as a whole, weaken the training environment. that seems to be a matter of personal preference and more about the individual.