How Many Grandmasters Does It Take to Screw In a Light Bulb?

It’s time to get rid of some of our titles and ranks.

Pictured: Not Royce Gracie.

"The belt only covers two inches of your ass, you have to cover the rest." - Royce Gracie, 7th degree black belt (coral belt). Gracie is said to have sometimes worn a dark blue belt in training out of respect to his father, who did the same thing despite having the highest rank in Brazilian Jiu-jutsu.

“I agree with Royce Gracie.” - Grandmaster Joe Notarealperson, 14th degree black belt (plaid belt), Great-Sifu-Sensei-Grandmaster (Senior), and creator of the Paramilitary Emu: Modern Defensive Art System (PEMDAS).

“Why is this guy wearing a Judo belt?” - The gang about to jump you and take your wallet.

So which is it? Do we keep the tradition of belts and titles, or change with the times and focus more on fighting and the art, since the color of your belt doesn’t matter anyway? Even Muay Thai, which has no formal ranking system, has schools that separate beginners from advanced students with in-house ranking systems. Not belts, per say, but still something like the combatives programs that offer “black belt certificates” without a belt. They just use armbands or shirts instead.

But hear me out: what if we keep the belts but change how we teach our students to look at them? Too many people accept belts (and titles) as status symbols, and that’s a problem. With our history and Kaju culture, belts should be something much more humble, and much more powerful.

The way it is now, too many people see a rank or hear a title and immediately give a person respect, despite all the fraudulent martial artists around. It should be the other way around though: An old Grandmaster should come out, drop knowledge, show they’re legit and have truly been around the Kaju block…then we start respecting them more than the average person. A yellow belt comes out on the floor, you hold mitts for each other, you bang, you roll, and then you respect them more.

That increase in respect, for the Grandmaster and the yellow belt, has nothing to do with that belt or title. When it’s all said and done, you can step back and acknowledge that belt and title, but the respect still comes after 1: interacting with them or 2: learning from instructors that studied under them.

Granted, big organizations need titles, and over 75 years Kajukenbo has become a big organization made up of big organizations. Still, in Kajukenbo we can do the organizational stuff with titles like “President”, “Chairman”, or whatever. We could even consider using the old “chief instructor” title for administration. We don’t need Japanese or Chinese titles for organizing Kajukenbo black belts.

“Master” and “Grandmaster”? They gotta go. The Grandmasters in Kaju that I respect the most hate having that title. It’s outdated.

The teaching titles though, are something different (if they’re used correctly, anyway). “Sifu”, “Sensei”, “Coach”. These have something familial with them that really goes well with the Kajukenbo ideals of 'ohana. If you use those titles correctly, they represent something between the student, the teacher, and nobody else. Those titles have nothing to do with a pecking order - you don’t become a “sifu” just because you reach third degree. One person’s sifu (“father”, no matter their rank) is another person’s sigung (“grandfather”, no matter their rank). And that makes the connection more powerful when you call your teachers these titles. “Coach” is something very similar - a person who hasn’t dedicated their time to your training isn’t your “coach”.

And belts work the same way. To people outside the arts, including trained military killers, your belt means nothing. To the student who is given the belt, however, it’s a gift acknowledging your work, from a specific instructor that you, specifically, trust. And that makes it powerful.

If we can focus less on the “pecking order” aspect of belts and titles, and look at them as something between nobody but you and your instructor…we’ll be more humble. If we acknowledge them as a gift of acknowledgement rather than a status symbol, it will also limit the politics and motivate people to just shut up and train. “I’m a Grandmaster 9th Degree” should no longer be a selling point for any Kajukenbo, because it’s starting to teach students around the world that titles are important for the wrong reasons.

Kajukenbo is meant to evolve. Will there come a day when we abandon the use of belts? Charles Gaylord would sometimes have all students in a class remove their belts to emphasize the meaning of your heart over a piece of cloth, and once said that everyone below black belt is a white belt anyway. Will there come a day when we change our titles, or at least stop giving antiquated titles out so they can slowly fade away? Maybe we should just separate teaching titles from organizational titles?

What does your belt and title mean to you, and who do you think it should matter to? To put it bluntly and rudely: who cares? The gang about to jump you and take your wallet doesn’t.

If there were a style-wide removal of “rank”, and my instructors suddenly lost their rank and belt, I would respect them the same as I do now: a lot. In my mind, their place among the Kajukenbo 'ohana wouldn’t change at all. Maybe it’s time we decide if we want to complicate or simplify things for the future. Do we still need belts and grandmasters, or should we change some things?

I like the belts, and the teaching titles like “Coach” and “Sifu”. But with the rank-titles at least, i.e. “3rd degree means you are now a sifu,” I say we go for it. Let’s push for change. It’s time for some things to evolve.

Stay tuned for Rob Rowland’s thoughts on abolishing titles and Angelo Ferrer’s interview of Kajukenbo black belts on the same topic, both coming later this month.