I had this great physical therapist this year. She worked with me to run again and set my own movement goals. I started checking out other online options for improvement and maintenance, being gym-less now in the end times 😉

I decided not to buy anything from any of these guys in the headline. The big turnoff? Macho, bootstrappy bios with no acknowledging of history, influences, or context.

I found a ‘history’ of physical fitness that never mentions women or anything non-European* and even it talks about the gymnasiums of the 19th century, and that as humans we were used to “running, balancing, jumping, crawling, climbing” in the distant past. ‘Crawling’ being that thing that the movement cultures adopt, slightly vary, re-name, and appropriate 😉

Imitation of animals is straight out of of ancient dances, sport, and rituals. Capoeira has a long-referenced history to African dance like Mohobelo, the “striding dance” of the Sotho with “leaping, kicking, sliding, and sinuous movements close to the ground.”

Capoeira is a geneological ancestor, according the dance community, including the b-boys that GMB and others will acknowledge. The backbend/wheel is 19th century yoga asana, that even then didn’t appear out of thin air.

Similarly this Tree of Dance – ahem – this Euro-American tree of dance (with its nod to capoeira) ignores Asia, Australia, Polynesia (the cultural appropriation of ‘hula’ and ‘belly dance’, pls?) and other combat arts everywhere.

My favorite beachbody guy didn’t claim to invent the abs exercises he put together in a sequence. I bought it anyway. The point wasn’t that he’d reinvented the wheel (ouch). Ido referenced capoeira in the past, but is now distancing himself, Mike F just avoids the question, and the GMB guys say they’ve never done it.

GMB posts videos of elderly martial arts gurus who they claim to respect. Gurus who likely teach their students the history and context of their art. They also have a ‘discussion’ page that is comment-free and focused on the argument that movements do not ‘belong’ to gymnastics, capoeira, or yoga.

True, but if you’re doing a downward dog, bro, just say it. There’s also a signature move, the downward dog of capoeira (not ginga) that Ido, GMB, and Animal Flow do, unmodified.
What else do these novo gurus have in common? Omitting history and influence, saying things like they’ve been ‘doing these movements for 30 years.’ Thinking they invented the alphabet after just writing a good essay.

So… I’ll take what I like and leave the rest. With a little help from my therapist 🙂

Yes, the article was written for a site called “the art of manliness” – but the article isn’t titled “the history of physical fitness in men in europe,” – it’s “The History of Physical Fitness.”