When I first started training I remember people winning medals and thinking ‘wow, that’s impressive’. I specifically remember thinking that competitions were some kind of grand prix event with 40 or so competitors in a single category. Whilst this is naive in hindsight, it’s not as odd as it sounds if you don’t know much about BJJ.
Culturally, we associate medals with winning. This sounds obvious but you can see this in the Olympics where medals mean success. For most people, you then go through adult life without much thought about medals and competitive sports culture. Then you begin BJJ and see there are medals everywhere.
However, whilst most medals are justified and hard-earned in BJJ, some are not. For some, they will make a conscious decision to pose on an empty podium with a medal on their neck. Or, they may say ‘silver’ which sounds great with a picture of the medal. If you do some digging, they may have turned up literally to earn a medal or had one fight and lost. This is deceptive and if done on purpose it is disingenuine and fools people.
Whilst little harm comes from fooling people, it’s just generally a stupid thing to do. Going back to the first paragraph, the average non-BJJ competitor will often assume the three standing on the podium have fought hard to get there. Often this isn’t the case, and there’s a chance the guy with bronze may have literally lost two out of two matches.
As said, this isn’t a crime and neither is it illegal. In the big scheme of things, it’s not hurting anyone either. But seriously, if you do this you need to look yourself in the mirror. Some people even argue that participation medals at kids sports day events go too far in creating a culture that celebrated mediocrity. However, at least there’s an excuse that there are children involved who are typically more ego-driven and sensitive compared to grown adults.
Perhaps the weirdest examples of this aren’t those who pose for the odd photo. Instead, it’s those who go further and call themselves ‘World Champion’, without mentioning that they literally turned up to some obscure weight category in master 6 to claim the prize. There’s nothing wrong with competing at masters level either, but you get the point.
Further, this is even worse when done at a belt below black belt. ‘World Champion’ literally implies being the champion of the world, beating the elite. However, you could technically be a white belt World Champion. Whilst this is true, it sounds far more impressive cutting off the ‘white belt’ bit at the start which is again deceptive.
Another common issue of fancy titles is the amount of small, unknown competitions which call themselves things like ‘World BJJ Live’ or ‘Euro Nationals’. To an outsider, these sound really impressive. Yet again, look under the surface and there’s a chance it’s just a small competition in a gym somewhere. This isn’t to be snooty towards small, local competitions as they can be awesome. But at least don’t pretend they’re some kind of massive institutional organization that has massive clout within the BJJ world.
In summary, there’s nothing wrong with getting a default medal if it isn’t intentional, nor should you be ashamed of it either. There’s also nothing wrong with winning a major competition at a lower belt either, in fact it’s very impressive.
However, you should refer to your belt color when mentioning this title. Lastly, there’s nothing wrong with winning local competitions…as long as you don’t brag about those which have intentionally misleading titles to sound more famed than they actually are. In short, the more you stick around BJJ, the more you will see this sort of behavior and sadly it’s surprisingly more common than you may think.
