Society is …

Blog Article/Post Caveat (Read First Please: Click the Link)

Society is about a collective of people that through communications and cooperation survive. Marc MacYoung wrote something about three years ago about moving parts. Society, the tribe, the clan and the family all band together for various reasons but none as important as both survival and procreation. The issues rise up when people come together because physics of psychology enter the dojo and it is called friction.

When I rub two sticks together in an environment that has a potential of flammability you get … “Fire!” Now, you might automatically jump to the thought that fire is bad and in a lot of cases it is, it burns. But there are times when fires are good such as controlled burning to combat forrest fires during dry fire seasons, etc., (you firefighters out there let me know if I got that right?). 

Human Conditions dictate the type and intensity of that friction and survival is all about how each individual and the collective groups cope with that to the benefit of the entire family to tribe to clan to the larger social structure (the larger social structure is a new modern thing). This is where the shift in the article comes in toward martial arts, karate and self-defense of conflict and violence. 

Unless an individual lives alone and in isolation assuming they can get food, shelter and provide a safe and secure environment, there is always going to be friction when encountering others even when direct blood family. There are and must be rules and those rules along with the group dynamics and rules both written and unwritten (mostly unwritten), are to be understood and followed or there are repercussions necessary to keep the group strong, safe and capable of survival and all that goes with it. Our species has this entire spectrum of things related to this in order to keep the species alive, productive and procreating. 

From the moment of birth, if each generation is passing along all those rules, requirements and other stuff, the person is exposed to all sorts of stimuli from parents, to brothers, to sisters and to the tribe or clan in which the family is a member. This social order and structure makes a society work and in the mirror of that we have micro-social groups the foster this social coping skill set in a system that transcends an individuals needs, rights and requirements. Survival and Procreation trumps them all and makes the foundation of the why our species does things.

Karate and martial arts dojo are micro-social groups where folks of like-mind gather for a singular purpose as is the case here to train, practice and apply proficient skills, multiple methods with appropriate force levels principled based, etc., to accomplish that objective. The objective is often referred to as self-defense or combatives in certain professions but in reality it connects silently to the core of species survival. 

The dojo has rules that bind with a hierarchal system demonstrating status and required services both given and received in a spirit of cooperation that teaches each individual the very social coping skills necessary for survival outside the dojo. We see similar objectives in other disciplines like the various sports such as football and so on. Without this, nothing works for long and often spells out doom to the group involved unless …

The one caveat is that the dojo environment and its teachings must adhere to certain social human needs and requirements that are sometimes symbolized by the dojo kun, things like bushido codes of honor, integrity, etc., that are positive in nature and create a level of harmony within the groups, etc.

The group dynamics of species survival has limitations imposed by nature herself that fit the current evolutionary stage of modern times. An example is a teacher to student ratio that if exceeded degrades and destroys the objective of teaching and learning. Society and its coping skills of survival and procreation requires cooperation and that comes from the moment of birth where that environment and its stimuli are input through sensory systems to our brains that teach each of us as individual how to survive - in a group. The ratio I am talking about in the teaching example has been found to be about four to one, i.e., four students to one teacher. In modern society it has come to be believed that the massive size of the entire society, the entire United States Population in this case, must and should and will adhere to rules and requirements that go way beyond the ratio’s of a family to group to clan where maybe in the clan/tribe one hundred and fifty would work. Our modern society consists of millions!

Like the teaching environment in schools everyone admits that once the ratio of students to teachers reaches a certain level it degrades the quality and productivity of that teaching environment but our current level of society population of students as related to that of teachers has taken that ratio and turned it into an ineffective, degraded and unproductive one where teachers today still accomplish much good but have to fight that ratio disparity because we lost control of our population and all that entails. 

Going back to the dojo, commercialism has driven the ratio out of kilter. To have a large dojo environment means it has to remain true to the ratio’s, i.e., one sensei for four practitioners so if the membership is up to sixteen then you really need  FOUR qualified and experienced sensei to make that work. In all honesty three to one works best. One Sensei cannot adequately pass along their knowledge, experiences and understanding of such a system or discipline without help and support. 

Consider this, in the military it takes four men (one of the four the leader while the other three qualify as leader just in case) to make one team that we call a, “Fire Team” in the Marines. Then you have a combination of thirteen where you have three fire-teams and the one squad leader. That squad leader leads the three fire team leaders who lead the three team members - the ratio over many centuries works and is why it continues. 

Four squads makes a platoon with a platoon leader and so on. In this environment and professions, as in life itself, it involves survival and can result in grave harm or death of the individual, his or her team members, the team leader, the other fire-teams who can and do work together to the squads and platoon. One major chink unfilled and corrected when broken in that chain spells doom for the entire platoon.

So, in that configuration and collective two factors are required to make it work. One, cooperation that is taught, trained, practiced and experienced with full understanding that further requires to make that work, communications. Communications requires understanding words, etc., and a cooperative endeavor to communicate and learn and teach one another when developing plans, implementing plans and then after the event discussing the plans in what some pro’s call the, “After Action Report, etc.!”

If those involved don’t know and understand the groups dynamics, hierarchal and status requirements, etc., then they cannot effectively communicate and therefore will fail in the cooperative effort to perform the mission, the plan. It is, a big example, like pulling tougher people of vastly different culture, beliefs and especially language and expecting them to survive. Yes, its possible and it can be done but not before working through obstacles and achieving certain objectives such as finding a common language, etc.!

Here is a dojo example: There are styles of karate; everyone believes wholeheartedly in their style and its superiority; everyone is acting in a species human way and is expected and natural; each has its own way along with culture, i.e., one is a hard style while the other is not, etc. and in that model it creates individual groups and dynamics that will not match with other styles. I know of one style that has become such a belief system that the style actually creates a state of entitled elitism where only students and members of certain groups are allowed to benefit from the teachings. 

If we wanted to remove the styles and create one system or group the only way to accomplish that mission is to teach a principled based multiple method realty-based system that actually lies under all the styles regardless of there individualized belief structures. 

Bibliography (Click the link)