In a recent appearance on Jake Shields’ Podcast, renowned grappler and MMA star Garry Tonon shared his observations on the evolving culture within the jiu-jitsu community, highlighting significant changes in attitudes and expectations among practitioners.
Tonon reflected on how the mentality of jiu-jitsu practitioners has transformed over the years.
“It’s interesting the way that different generations of people that are doing jiu-jitsu kind of treat martial arts these days,” Tonon noted. “When I got involved from the beginning till now, I didn’t look at it as like ‘oh this is like a fun little thing that I’m going to do and it’s just like this sport.’ I got involved in jiu-jitsu thinking that it was going to help prepare me to potentially have a fight against somebody at some point.”
Tonon believes that as jiu-jitsu has gained popularity and been marketed to the average person, the fundamental approach to the martial art has changed. While he doesn’t view this evolution as inherently negative, he observes that it has created a generation of athletes who are uncomfortable with aspects of physicality beyond regular jiu-jitsu practice.
“The mentality that people go into jiu-jitsu with now because it’s so much more popular and we’re marketing it to the average person… it’s created a generation of athletes who I think the idea of getting punched in the face or getting roughed up a little bit other than just regular jiu-jitsu is like they’re very uncomfortable with it,” Tonon explained.
He recalled how in the past, elements of rougher training and even occasional flare-ups between training partners were considered normal parts of the martial arts experience.
“Sometimes like even in regular jiu-jitsu, I’d just be pissed at somebody or somebody be pissed at me or we’d get in an argument or something would happen and we’d start slapping each other or something like this is normal, dude. This is like real normal stuff. But now the culture of jiu-jitsu is very not okay with something like that happening. It’s strange.”
Tonon also pointed out that this cultural shift extends to how practitioners view their relationship with their gyms. Many now approach training as strictly transactional rather than as joining a martial community or family.
“People want to treat jiu-jitsu gyms the way that they would just treat like the average business… ‘I paid my x amount of money a month, $200 a month or whatever the case may be. I get this in return, I get my jiu-jitsu training or whatever. And it’s a transactional relationship. If I want to train somewhere else, if I want to do this, if I want to do that, if I want to wear whatever color gi, I want to do like I’m allowed to do whatever I want to do cuz I’m paying my $200.’ And it’s like, dude, like this isn’t Burger King, bro.”
Tonon emphasized that the familial aspect of jiu-jitsu training is particularly important because of the trust required between training partners.
“When you add violence into what you do, you can’t just have a transactional relationship because the guy that you’re training with could break your arm, hurt you. You have to trust training partners. You have to be able to trust each other. You have to have some level of loyalty. So if everything’s transactional, it’s a disaster.”
Looking ahead, Tonon mentioned he will soon be opening a gym in northwest Austin with John Danaher and Gordon Ryan, expected to launch within approximately eight weeks.
