Question 099: Certificate mills

I am confused! In the topic, I stated that a legitimate rank issuing organization was one that issues rank to students who have been:

• Trained by a certified instructor of the organization.
• Tested in person by a certified instructor, or a group of certified instructors, of the organization.
• Recommended for rank by a certified instructor, or a group of instructors, of the organization as having met or exceeded the organizations requirements for the rank

You state that my stated requirement that legitimate ranks must come from "pure lineage" and in person has just about devaluated 95% of all martial artists. And yet you also state that you believe that one should look for a teacher who received his or her black belt from a black belt teacher in person who received there black belt in person from their teacher, etc. Instead of differing, are you not agreeing with my statement?

There are over 2500 pages of information in TKDTutor.com written over the last ten years. Even I do not remember all that I wrote years ago about a particular subject; however, my basic philosophy has not changed over the years so I can say with reasonable certainty that I did not write certain things. I have not written that all ranks rank must come down from some pure linage. What I have said is that orange trees bear sweet oranges and that lemon trees bears sour lemons. If an instructor is legitimate, any rank he or she awards to students is also legitimate. If an instructor is illegitimate, then all rank issued by him or her is illegitimate. If a person’s rank is from a legitimate linage, the rank is legitimate; if it is from an illegitimate linage, it is illegitimate.