How hard is it to become proficient in weapons based arts compared to physical fighting ones?

And what do you think pharmaceutical companies put into vaccines?

I'd really like to know, call it your chance to make me an anti anti anti vaxxer!

 

Yeah, I'm ambivalent about it.

There are positives and negatives, but at the end of the day you're learning transferrable skills either way.

 

There's definitely an argument for that, as well as making the principles of leverage more obvious in takedowns and throws, and giving an easier way to see angles and openings.

But with good instruction you should be getting this stuff unarmed as well.

Also, depending on the weapon there might be things that don't translate so well to unarmed fighting, such as edge alignment, "dead" areas of a weapon etc.. I also think that going from unarmed to armed gives a better holistic perspective when it comes to clinch and grappling: seeing outside of weapon fixation, knowing when it is advantageous to drop your weapon etc..

Doing both seems like the ideal answer.

 

Absolutely should be getting it in regular instruction, but I find that working with weapons makes it much more obvious if you already understand the concept. A real sword gets heavy very quickly if you are swinging it with the arm and shoulder. But if you engage the body as a unit, you can keep on going for much longer before you tire. That’s a lesson you don’t forget.