the thing about karate (and im sure youll agree with me) is its a crapshoot .... some schools turn out very skilled blackbelts, and other schools turn out chumps (i.e. they give em belts to keep em paying)
i never judge anyone by their belt, only by their performance
In the 40+ years I've been practicing the hard/soft martial-arts, I have only been repeatedly reminded of the comment credited to the great Bruce Lee (words to the effect), "all a belt is good for is to hold up your pants!"
I've often thought of a Shodan (first-degree black belt rank belt) as like getting bachelor's degree. It means you have scratched the surface of your particular art/discipline. Similarly, there is all the difference in the world between getting a bachelor's in a discipline like Physics from MIT, or an MBA from Harvard, vs. say, to getting similar degrees from Florida State! Uhhh...earning a bachelor's degree is no guarantee you aren't going to end up broke, or a bum!
Why, I recall one school that allowed you to get your Shodan rank training only 4 hours a week of verified training for two years-some 200+ odd hrs.(and passing the rank-belt exams, of course) vs. another school that required a bare minimum of 1000 hrs. of verified training and passing the requisite rank belt exams.
Even back in the old days ( '60's and 70's) when the "hard arts" were being glamorized in
Black Belt Magazine , there were companies advertising in the mag. that they would send you a black belt (and even your black belt certificate!) if you just sent them the $$$!
Of course, Robert Trias and his United States Karate' Association (USKA) was a dominant martial-arts organization in the U.S. for many decades, and as I recall, was the very first legitimate hard arts (Karate') martial-arts organization charted in this country (begun in 1946, I believe?). In the early-mid 60's, I was training under Harold Long in Isshinryu Karate' and Robert Trias and his students entered several point-contact Karate' tournaments in the southeast in competition with our school's students, plus even came to our own school/dojo for a few team matches.
As Vikiingpower said (words to the effect), there are SO MANY variables in reaching a truly worthwhile/legitimate/meaningful Shodan rank belt (or its equivalent in various hard/soft martial-arts) that I wouldn't know where to begin...e.g. your instructors make ALL the difference in the world (of course!!!)...who wouldn't like to have had Bruce Lee/Paul Vunak/Danny Inosanto, as your JKD instructor; or Joe Lewis/Mike Stone/Chuck Norris/Bill Wallace/Benny Urquidez as your Karate' instructor; or Ed Parker/Jeff Speakman as your Kenpo instructor, or Royce/Rickson/Renzo/Helio Gracie-in his prime as your Jiu-Jitsu instructor, etc., vs, say Joe Blow at the local dojo down the street, or in your neighborhood shopping center!???
Here are some humorous/interesting observations I have come across in my years in the hard and soft martial-arts related to the term "having a black belt"...
(1) students of various school used to brag about "my instructor has a higher rank belt than yours"...until it was pointed out to them that the highest rank belt you can attain, on skill alone, is 4th degree black belt...and every rank belt above that is strictly "honorary".
(2) Joe Lewis once stated (words to the effect) that if you could last three 2 min. rounds with him in a kickboxing match (under the old PKA rule, I guess), he would award you a black belt.
(3) In the 1960's, there used to be a Georgia State Karate' Championships (a point-Karate' championship tournament) and there were 4 divisions...white, green, brown, and black belt. The champions of each division then fought for the title "Tournament Grand Champion". On occasion, the white belt division's champion would beat the black belt division's champion!??
(4) Over the decades, the historically premier mag. in the world of martial-arts,
Black Belt Magazine (I believe their first issue was in '63 and I bought my first in '64-and have "mountains of back issues") has exposed legions of instructors/schools who were "bogus". If I recall, they have a listing of supposedly legitimate martial-arts schools (and even some of these may be suspect regarding their credentials).
In the end, I've come to feel that if you claim to be a "real black belt", then you could really prove your "black belt" knowledge/skill level of your particular hard/soft art by approaching a nationally/worldwide recognized expert in your particular art/field and ask him if you could spar him, or one of his top-level students, based upon a set of mutually agreed-upon sparring/fighting rules tailored to your particular art. Then, depending upon how long you lasted in-the-ring/on-the-mat/performed...up against these REAL black-belt experts...then this/these REAL expert(s) would then ACCURATELY determine what rank belt you REALLY deserve to claim/hold!
