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Culture War Roundup for the week of November 24, 2025

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How have the martial arts faired over the progressive era in terms of participation and seriousness of effort?

The UFC happened, and all heritage martial arts have either converged on the same core set of practices, or they've retreated completely into dance-moves or esoteric but untested claims of "real" effectiveness. No other trend is even remotely relevant in comparison.

Twenty to thirty years ago, in the average American small city there was a karate gym that taught karate and a taekwondo gym that taught tkd and a judo gym that taught judo and maybe a Kung Fu gym that taught kungfu. Now, if they still think of themselves as fighters, they've all converged on standup built around boxing, and all of them spend effort to teach grappling techniques largely derived from wrestling and BJJ. Or they've gone the other route, removed all pretense of fighting, and converged towards taichi. A lot of the distinctiveness of different arts has been lost to optimization.