Martial arts are about honor, which makes lying about one’s education, prowess, or accomplishments an unforgivable sin. Real martial artists detest this kind of behavior, and actively condemn it. So what motivates anyone to attempt it? Especially in our Google-able times?
With this in mind, we took a look back at some of the most famous embellishers, frauds, and nutjobs in martial arts history. It didn’t give us many answers, but it at least offered us plenty of stories of no-touch knockouts, mail order black belts, fake Russian boxing matches, and melting babies.
Ashida Kim, ninja author and YouTube personality, has a completely untraceable history in martial arts. There is no record of where he trained, or who trained him. But he did tell The Believer that he first trained with Count Dante in 1968 and became involved with Dante’s Black Dragon Fighting Society, which potentially makes him a second generation martial arts fraud. Ashida Kim also offers mail order black belts.