Hyun-derrated: Martial arts don’t get the attention they deserve

Growing up, my grandfather taught me simple Taekwondo techniques. From closed-hand strikes to open-hand techniques, I remember how he instructed my cousins and me how to block and punch correctly.

Considering my grandfather was an eighth-degree black belt, it made sense that he knew all this. As a matter of fact, he moved to the United States when my mother was 9 years old to establish a Taekwondo business in Pennsylvania. Unfortunately, the business did not do as well as he had hoped. But despite his hardships, martial arts remained an integral part of my family’s identity.

Growing up, I barely participated in martial arts myself, but I remember attending my younger brother’s Taekwondo competitions and practices, wondering exactly how his developing skills would actually help him if he were to get into a physical fight.

I occasionally experienced different types of martial arts as well — mostly on televised world competitions such as the Summer Olympics, which include boxing, judo, Taekwondo and wrestling. Nonetheless, these were the only times I ever got exposure to these sports.

I can’t recall a single time that I’ve watched a karate competition on ESPN, and I never bothered to attend my high school’s wrestling matches. Maybe it was because I never understood the enjoyment of watching people perform the same routine over and over again, but it was also the fact that I was just not interested. This makes me wonder just how prominent martial arts — karate, Taekwondo, judo, etc. — are in the United States.

The one highly viewed sport that consists of two people physically fighting each other is World Wrestling Entertainment. The WWE has been gaining popularity since Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson announced his return to WWE: Smackdown in September. 

Even though most WWE events are pay-per-view, the sport still brings in millions of viewers. In The Rock’s return to the ring last Friday, just under 4 million people tuned into the event on Fox Premiere. 

I personally don’t even consider the WWE a real martial art. Most of the time, the WWE consists of well-trained actors who fight each other for pure entertainment. There is no skill involved, yet WWE fighters are among the wealthiest athletes in the nation.

As for the traditional martial arts, the number of participants around the nation has been dwindling. According to statista.com, 6.87 million people participated in martial arts in 2006 compared to just 3.42 million in 2017. The fact that the number of participants in martial arts has decreased by half is a clear sign that the sport is losing popularity.

Compared to the 3.42 million people who participated in martial arts, 5.22 million played tackle football in 2017. This is shocking because martial arts seem like they should be much easier to join than football; martial arts programs are widely available, and fewer parents are willing to allow their children to play tackle football.

The question for many families is, “Are martial arts even worth it?” The average price of karate is $40 per hour and may go as high as $100 for 30-minute private lessons. Martial arts training is not the cheapest, but many parents send their children to martial arts dojos with the hope that martial arts will prepare their children if they need to defend themselves.

There are many benefits to martial arts. They allow a person to gain confidence, a sense of responsibility and values including respect, honor and integrity. 

Nonetheless, there are doubts as to the actual self-defense value of martial arts. According to functionalselfdefense.org, “Many [martial arts programs] were not made for self defense in the first place, most provide no education in or understanding of real violence or how to prevent it and a very large number of them utilize training methods that do not and cannot lead to real skills.”

Most martial arts are not so much about the actual “fighting” component but instead focus on bolstering confidence and diligence. It could be said that parents invest the $40 each month partially to teach them self-defense, but mainly to teach them valuable life lessons. 

Furthermore, there are no martial arts varsity teams at USC or in the Pac-12. As a result, there is not a martial arts team on the same level as, say, football and basketball. There are club teams that participate in martial arts, but even then not many people know of their existence.

Martial arts are a great activity for children to get involved in at a young age. They help a person become more physically fit while instilling important values that last beyond one’s time in the sport. Though the programs’ costs may be daunting, martial arts should be embraced and utilized in every way.

Nathan Hyun is a sophomore writing about underrepresented sports. His column, “Hyun-derrated,” runs every other Wednesday.