Cobra Kai, the now-infamous Karate school from the Karate Kid movie franchise and the recent Netflix reboot (which is excellent, by the way) were seen as the bad guys.
Johnny, the villain in the first Karate Kid movie, was egged on by his sensei to fight dirty and do whatever it takes to win. Daniel, the hero of the movie who taught by Mr Miyagi
agy, was taught that honour and discipline is what matters.

Funnily enough, in all of the recent takes on the movies we now realise that – much like in life – there’s a little bit of black and a little bit of white, with a ton of grey in the middle.
Daniel is now often portrayed as the bully, the instigator of the now famous rivalry.

Despite the fact that Johnny was often the one to throw the first punch, he understood the lessons of Cobra Kai and how they apply to real self-defence.

Cobra Kai’s infamous motto is ‘strike first, strike hard, no mercy’. While it sounds violent, it actually has a lot of wisdom in it.

So, what is it that Cobra Kai understood so well about self-defence, and why is it that a large portion of today’s martial arts and self defence community don’t get it?