T. T. Binkley's Diary

Winter 2003

Reclining somewhere in the French Alps, winter 2002/3.

……nothing but beastly fury, extreme violence, whereof proceedeth hurt, and consequently, rancor and malice do remain with them that be wounded.

A Very Happy New Year to all of you!

I find as I get older that the supposedly family activities of skiing and playing tennis are riskier that supposedly dangerous activities such as karate. Apart from the odd minor bruise and blister I’ve not been injured doing karate for many years, however, talking to friends of mine who insist on including the former two pursuits in their “holiday” programs I find they’re always moaning about sprained wrists and pulled muscles. Naturally I’ve had my share of those too but they’ve long become distant memories of the days when I competed and we all know how exceptionally painful the day after a tournament is in relation to the hardest of dojo workouts. The opening passage, by the way, is a 16^th century comment on soccer and not an eyewitness account of a WTKO tournament.

Speaking of workouts makes me feel a touch of guilt, I have been a little slack of late due to the holiday season but did take the opportunity of closed dojos and forced rest to settle into a decent chair and watch a spate of karate videos, splashing out via the internet on several I thought might bring me some inspiration and fire up the spirit in these old bones for the new year.

Now I’m on a mission. Can anybody help?

 I really can’t believe how we are palmed off with these absolutely vacuous, vapid, vague and vainglorious (forgive me but this is a particularly good page in the dictionary) videos, not to mention them wholly lacking any hint of artistic direction or technical professionalism. 

I won’t mention names as my editor at Shotokan World might get upset at me again but to film all this nonsense out on the veldt with a soundtrack that’s a cross between the worst of Humpty Dumpty and P Diddy strikes me as having almost incomprehensibly and insultingly bad taste. I thought we of the pure-line shotokan karateka were a brotherhood because we could tell that pink bowties on a referee were naff or that plastering the gi with badges depicting animals or badly drawn fists was far from de rigueur. So then why is this sort of drivel all that’s available for cool us? Why after all these years are we offered no more insight than the early karate textbooks written in the sixties? It was good enough then but has there been no progress? I was also under the impression that the non-Japanese being unable to move as fluently and look as perfect in gis as the originators of the art had other erudite qualities and intelligences that justified their high ranking dan-grades, instead I find that regurgitated plagiarisms are the order of the day. There’s something jaded and, well I have to say it, boring about the whole sanctimonious approach to the basic techniques that they explain in the hushed tones of the true “master”. Gosh, darn and shucks, don’t they know we’ve ALL read and ingested Dynamic Karate! If anyone really needs an introduction to shotokan karate they should look no further than the books and tapes of Nakayama sensei that date back up to 40 years, they showed the greats in the 60’s such as Okazaki, Mikami and Enoeda and the icons of the 70’s and 80’s in the form of Tanaka, Yahara and Osaka explicitly showing how truly beautiful karate could be at its highest level. Trouble is that was then and this is now. It’s hopeless to rehash such excellent material badly by those who obviously have nothing to add. 

Imagine yourself in 1965 or, if you’re too young, in 1980. Are your views the same or have you evolved, become more sophisticated, grown, developed, matured? Of course you have. The entire world has. Mon Dieu! Back then there was still segregation in the deep South of the US; the Soviets were sending warheads to Cuba; apartheid was a reality; decent women did not cavort naked in public (sorry wrong list). Then why haven’t the views of the highest-ranking shotokan-ists evolved too? There lies the rub. Complacency, lack of imagination, call it what you will but it’s simply resting on the proverbial laurels that the Japanese system perpetuates. The 7^th and 8^th dans don’t get any more interesting because they don’t have to unless they’re challenged and they’re never challenged! Not outside the training at the headquarters in Japan anyway. This is because they’ve all been heading associations for donkey’s years. I’d really like to see some of the younger blood in Japan lay down their creed on video or even in the defunct book form but I doubt the seniors would give them half a chance to shine on a public and definitive fashion. Besides that the culture over there is such that all who live under a senior (read: the entire population) are in fear of either making a mistake or appearing too good or better than their sempai, in whatever field not just karate. It’s such a crime because there are a lot of young and young-ish middle ranking instructors (Japanese and otherwise) out there who have a lot to offer and I hate to see young talent lay un-nurtured and, God forbid, forced into regular employment.  

I intend to follow up with more research on this so those of you have written to me in the past (and I do appreciate your views) must join with me to hunt out the credible and learned, proving me wrong and list me up with the good stuff. My credit card is ready!