Shoshinkan Dojo in Boston is viewed by many as one of the worst martial arts schools in the Boston area. Located in Chinatown district, this school is run by a guy many see as a narcissistic nutball commonly known as "Little Shafty". We share the opinions and views of former students and people have had direct experience.
Many feel this dojo sucks, and you should check out the yelp reviews or do a Google search.
We did a martial arts “Year in Review “ discussion at one of the get together of former Boston Shinkendo students and asked the what they thought of the future of that place?
* Here is just some of what they had to say:
-"Other than old farts, his lame kids, and the occasional loser, who would knowingly join that dojo since we all dumped it?"
- "I heard he wants to test students again, he must be broke, or he has to kick money up to Honbu, what a joke!"
- "He actually thinks his kids are good at sword, lmao what a joke! His wimpy daughter can barely lift a shinken and his fruity son is a halfwit!"
-"We are so glad we have the new dojo, our group stayed together and we left the riff raff behind"
-" Screw that lame ISF, that dude Mike Mason was just as useless as Yuki!"
Well as you can see, the Pandemic may be defeated soon with the new vaccines, but what these former students believe about BS, is there is no vaccine for "stupid".
Have you ever had an experience with individuals so wretched, so devoid of any worthwhile moral character and self respect that it made you want to puke? Well we asked this question of several of the former Boston Shinkendo students, who ditched the infamous wannabee sensei "Little Shafty" and they had this to say:
"Talk about wretched, that loon makes gollem seem like an angel from heaven"
"Shafftee ruined my entire outlook on martial arts instructors"
"Total nutball!"
"I wouldn't let my dog train with that jerk"
"I learned more by taking a crap this morning than I ever did at Boston Shinkendo"
WOW! Now thats some serious critique of an International Shinkendo Federation instructor!
Hey Yukishiro Obata, whats the deal? You ok with this guy?
#shinkendo #yukishiro obata #kaiso Obata #boston martial arts #shinkendo boston #tameshigiri #international shinkendo federation #BringIT #kaizen #jinsei shinkendo
Is this guy an idiot? He clearly lost all his students and the feedback we got from one of his inner circle is he felt all distraught and devastated that almost ALL of his students dumped his dumb ass!
Maybe little Shafty should have simply tried apologizing for being a Buffon? Perhaps that might have gone a long way towards self realization?
Nah... this guy is too much of an idiot for that!
Yukishiro Obata, what the heck are doing with this guy?
On a recent "hot mic" incident in one of the extremely lame Boston Shinkendo zoom classes, it was reported to us that one of the students overheard him say that he doesn't care if everyone quits!
This is good news, then no one needs to feel sorry for Little Shafty as he is totally fine with being dumped and his dojo dwindled down to a couple of senior citizens and his kids.
Reports are in that as young skilled Boston Shinkendo students fled that dojo in droves to escape the idiotic behavior and crappy teaching of despised Sensei "Little Shafty", there is only a handful of students left, 2-3 junior students and some OLD people.
At a recent "super secret" outdoor training session in the park before Shafty reopened his geriatric dojo, one of the over the hill buffons, the boot licker that was praised by Shafty as exemplary because he kissed his butt, attempted to do a work out and lasted only minutes!
This dude could barely make it through a single set of suburi without giving up.
You will recall this is also the buffoon that was laughed at by the good students because he whined about how tough the Keiko Hajime was back in early 2020. (The real students said they barely broke out in a sweat).
Since Shafty has been exposed for REALLY LAME zoom classes that he barely teaches, he has been sensitive to being scrutinized by the ISF, so he is trying to get students to stream videos of him actually teaching, and he posts these to his crappy FB page as evidence.
I think its a bit late for that now shafty.
Man or man is this the lamest dojo that ever existed or what??
I bet people are just dying to train there lmao!
Poor shafty, your family friendly dojo is fiction.
It seems to be more of a dysfunctional house or retards, but hey, to each their own and we wish all students who wish to be part of such an experience, the best of luck.
The crazy exploits that have occurred at one of the nations most despised dojos are well known to many who are interested in Japanese sword arts, but it was recently reported to us that Little Shafty, aka the "weasel" has taken it even further.
During the lame virtual class Shafty decided to dedicated time to ranting and raving (as usual) about current and former students.
In this particular case, he was spewing hate towards a former student he expelled from Boston Shinkendo for having the audacity to have an opinion of his own.
That student was always respectful in the dojo and trained hard, but outside of the dojo was not a boundary for little shafty the weasel, apparently he feels that he can control all aspects of students lives.
Well the student who was expelled flat out told the wimpy and frail weasel sensei to stick it up his ass, when Shafty tried to pull his overbearing BS.
This led Shafty to declare that student his SWORN ENEMY and any of the dojo students who associated with him in their personal lives would never get promoted in Shinkendo.
WHAT A FREAKING LOON!
This guy is the worst!
I bet our readers are all salivating over the opportunity of training at this family friendly dojo hahahaa.
The recent Tameshigiri party that got shit for brains Shafty in such an uproar and forced the soke of the ISF to issue an overbearing (antifa) style declaration on Face Book about what people are allowed to do in their personal lives made me remember a story that one of the former Boston Shinkendo student told me on one of the monthly calls.
The student donated a few boxes of brand new tatami mats for a planned dojo event that never materialized. When he brought the mats to the dojo, rather than leaving them their and putting them in the storage closet till.needed, Shafty brought the mats home, and the proposed event where they would be cutting these mats was delayed, and week after week it was delayed again with some new excuse, the class new it was all bullShit, and that Shafty used these mats at home to probably teach his kids how to cut after their absolutely miserable performance last time they did Tameshigiri.
The mats were valued at about $200, not a huge amount of money, and since Shafty proclaimed to the students on many occasions how “well off “ he is, you would think this cheap ass jerk would spend his own money to train his brats, rather than using materials donated by the students for the students.
A few months later and after never holding the event the student, Shafty picked an argument with the student who donated the mats and they parted company.
To this day, those mats never appeared in the dojo, and no Boston Shinkendo ever got to practice with them.
Nice huh?
This is the guy who promotes a family friendly dojo...
Most students attend a dojo where the Sensei/Instructor is liked and respected by all of his students. Certainly there will be mismatched personalities from time to time between teacher/student but those situations are usually identified early on and if problematic, then dealt with.
At Boston Shinkendo there were students who attended the dojo for over a year whom paranoid Little Shafty kept feeling were "disrespecting him".
Why in the world is this guy so hung up on being respected, one time he even made a female student write a letter of apology to him and forced her to sit on the bench for a week watching but not training because he said she rolled her eyes.
He never took into account that no one attended that dojo to listen to him drone on about his silly snowflake political beliefs, or stories about his goofy kids, or his how Kaiso Obata once said hello to him.
One student reported that at Birthday lunch for a fellow student, Shafty attended, kept sticking his two cents in a friendly political discussion several other students at the far end of the table were having as they enjoyed their sake and meal, and he kept pushing his opinion and after the lunch, pulled the main student aside and chastised him about his political beliefs.
However that student was not a Shafty worshipper and didn't give two craps about Shafy's whiny snowflake viewpoints and pretty much told him so, as well as exiting the silly "WHATSAPP" chat group Shafty forced all his students to be part of.
This put the wimpy mealy mouthed Shafty into a rage and he began a campaign to ostracize that student and try to get other students to black list him.
Ummmm I thought people attended this dojo to learn Shinkendo, not play a half baked and retarded version of Dojo Game Of Thrones with a neurotic nut ball.
Great dojo you're running their Shafty, keep up the good work.
Yukishiro Obata is an absolute moron to put up with you in my humble opinion.
People need to be aware of the Boston Shinkendo dojo so you can determine for yourselves if this is a place to invest you time and money.
Based upon how many of the actual good students who split you may want to look elsewhere.
Look , why would you seek to train under a Sensei with barely any skill, this guys sucks!
LMAO the worst dojo I’m New England in our view is Boston Shinkendo and we believe the Sensei aka Little Shafty sucks at all martial arts. What a broken down wimpy sack of crap!
Well the rumors are that the infamous and troubled dojo "Boston Shinkendo" is on the social media outs with the Soke of the ISF.
So many Shinkendo instructors have privately expressed their embarrassment over the way the Boston Shinkendo interactions with students (current and former) occurred.
Examples are some article posted on the well respected website
Seriously folks, if the instructor at your dojo sucked, like many feel about the turd bucket Sensei at Boston Shinkendo, would you volunteer to waste your time and money? In the base of this crappy Shinkendo dojo, there are a few facts to consider.
1.) Shinkendo is not a traditional Japanese sword style, its rehashed Toyama Ryu with a few other techniques stolen from Yagyu Shinkage ryu and (done poorly).
2.) The Boston Shinkendo Dojo is probably the worst of the schools teaching this mediocre style.
3.) The Instructor aka "Little Shaffee" is a total moron, just read this article from a well respected website: Boston Shinkendo Toxic Sensei
There is really no more fitting set of initials for the Boston Shinkendo Dojo other than BS!
BS is absolutely what you get when you are sold his bill of goods that it’s a traditional Japanese Dojo.
If you read articles all over the Internet and reviews about Boston Shinkendo you’ll see people describing what a nut ball and megalomaniac the Sensei is.
Especially when he starts spouting his fake ass Tanren philosophy!
You have to be a middle-aged goofball with no prospects in life, posting fake dojo images on a green screen behind on zoom calls, to buy into that load of crap!
It is strongly suggested that you do a little bit of homework Before you sign up for classes at Boston Shinkendo unless Bull-Shido is really your thing!
Welcome to part 3 and the final chapter in our Boston Shinkendo series.
In this post I share the story of my final months as a student of Boston Shinkendo, and the events leading to my departure, and the rational for choosing to tell my story.
So after the Honbu visit, there was still a weird vibe in the dojo, This lasted through the fall until the around the Holiday season, at that point perhaps everyone was just in a jolly mood because things did appear to get better.
We had a crop of new students join and we did our best to welcome them in and help them along. Little shaffee seemed to have fewer anxiety attacks and even stopped yelling at his kids every five minutes.
The Holidays came and went and things looked like they might improve for good. In fact many of us recommitted ourselves to Shinkendo in general, (I know I did so publicly).
Keiko Hajime
In the new year, we had planned a Suburi exercise known as keiko hajime, where we would do 2020 practice cuts for each year.
This event was billed to be the "workout of the century" and all the students seemed motivated.
The only trouble on the horizon was with a few of the new students, one was a younger kid with serious personal hygiene issues, and the other was middle aged guy with a seriously "clingy" need to belong.
These two students were added to little shaffees mandatory WhatsAPP chat group that I mentioned earlier in part 2 of this series, and at least one of them seemed more willing to participate in this chatgroup, and Facebook contributions than any actual Shinkendo training.
Everyday it was some silly fist bump emoji, or ass kissing post about how thankful someone was to be part of the dojo, and of course little shaffee would eat this praise up, which most of us felt was detrimental to the overall mood in the dojo.
Too much BULLSHIT is never a good thing!
It got so bad that one day one of the new students, a guy who loved to post chat group nonsense, with very little historical or cultural knowledge on the topics he shared, decided to pontificate about the virtues of Bushido, (a topic dear to my heart), well it was at that point when I finally had enough, and exited little shaffees silly dojo chat group.
I did so because I feel it’s belittling to the art of Shinkendo and any martial arts dojo for that matter, with with a history steeped in the traditions of the Samurai code, to descend into such utter social media nonsense.
Especially in our case when we have little shaffee drumming it into our head that we are part of a traditional Japanese dojo.
Well, I have been to Japan several times and been to many dojos, I have never witnessed stupidity such as this in any form.
...But I digres back to keiko hajime!
So after weeks of more stupid chat group posts about how everyone was out running and doing extensive cardio exercises, including endless nutritional advice on what to eat for energy, the day finally came.
It was a cluster fuck straight from the get go.
Apparently little shaffee gave no thought to any of the logistics; a small physical space, swinging bokkens, and "air freshener" to assist with those lacking in personal hygiene skills.
He had us switching positions every 10 cuts trying to get his act together, finally we settled on a student positioning that would allow for some foot movement as well as bokken swings.
Then we get to the count and curriculum chaos... He kept reassigning people to take the count, apparently simple math isn't his strong suit.
Students were bickering over whether we were on 200 or 201 cuts, and the agenda was all over the place. There was no set pattern, the whole thing was chaotic and silly.
Yet still we persevered, and after 30 minutes we got into a groove, and managed to complete the goal of 2020 cuts.
Well so much for the strenuous exercise and hype, I'm in my 50's and yes I broke out in a sweat but that was more from the heat being cranked up then the workout.
Little shaffee was proudly commenting that HE had us all out of breathe, when in reality these were mostly "sighs of frustration".
Private Chat group insanity
So the days following, the core group of students who were friends and spent time outside of dojo, were discussing how disappointing and disorganized the event was.
This got back to little shaffee from one of the two previously mentioned newbie students, and unleashed a whole torrent of rehashed resentment, a lot of it directed towards me this time, as I was the guy who had setup the private non-dojo related chatgroup.
As previously mentioned, I left his formal dojo chat group because I grew tired of the nonsense, and he pulled me to the side one day after class and asked me to rejoin it.
I explained to him the group was a distraction for me, and I'd rather just come to class to train, and not be part of social media crap.
He kept pushing the issue, and so out of respect I acquiesced.
So now I'm back in his chatroom and its the same stupidity over and over.
No one discussing anything about martial arts, Shinkendo, or even cultural matters.
I decided maybe I could change the dynamic in the group (since I was stuck in there anyway), by posting threads about Japanese swords, famous Daimyo, and articles about varying Koryu styles.
Strangely this had little impact on the group, most students didn't actually care about these topics and little shaffee seemed to resent that I was posting things that he hadn't thought to do himself.
When I posted an article I found on the internet about Toyama Ryu, he got really annoyed and things went downhill from there.
He started to counsel me in these weird roundabout ways, explaining how topics of Toyama Ryu are of great importance to the dojo, although I still have no clue what context he was making these statements about...
From my perspective I simply shared an article, that's all...
So I said nothing and acquiesced.
Then class became nothing but endless suburi for weeks on end, apparently we all surmised this was punishment for us critiquing the keiko hajime. We we’re cool with it though, because after all training is still training!
But the real Shinkendo curriculum was suffering. Students were never even taught anything in their rank for months, one student, who was Santen rank hadn't been trained on a single Santen waza, so she decided to ask some of the senpai students if they would teach her before or after class, and they did.
When little shaffee got wind of this he seemed to get resentful and shut it down. Stating it was too perilous for students to do simple tachiuchi (partnered drills) even with Anzento (padded shinai) without him there to lead it.
LMAO traditional Japanese dojo my ass!
Blog
Probably the most key contributor to my departure from the dojo was the introduction of this blog www.wayofbushido.com.
I posted a few of the articles about ancient Japanese swords and trips to Japan I had undertaken.
For some reason this seemed to bug him. He reached out to me with a load of what was clearly fake praise for my blog, and then had his two kids pull me to the side and explain to me that I needed to put a disclaimer stating that my blog had nothing to do with Shinkendo. I thought this was weird and nonsensical but yet gain, I acquiesced.
The disclaimer:
Disclaimer: The authors assessment section of this blog article is the sole opinion of the author, and does not reflect the view points of the ISF, or any regional Shinkendo dojo.
This appeared to placate them for the moment...
Then the corona pandemic hit, and before social distancing activities were put into place officially, the dojo was discussing the impact, and how to deal with things.
After class I made a comment that yes, we should abide by all prescribed cautionary advice from health officials, but in perspective, the the data shows that more people die from falling out of their bathtubs every year then from this virus.
Now my point was not to minimize the pandemic, but rather to impart the view of caution but not craze, wisdom but not fear.
This DID NOT SIT well with little shaffee, he snapped at me and my comments, stating that I was flat out wrong.
Apparently his view of the pandemic was whatever Yuki decided to post on Facebook about it.
I was like "ok fine, no problem" I kept my mouth shut as he's entitled to his opinion.
However what clearly became apparent to me was that more and more, anything I did or said was being viewed in some way as a challenge to his authority.
It was CLEAR AS A BELL.
A week or so later I posted a question about some aspects the historical origins of Toyama ryu, and asked if he might run that up to Honbu to Kaiso, since he had always told us any questions we had, if he didn't know he would ask Kaiso.
This really put him into a rage, not sure why, I could only surmise from previous comments I made that he felt only Kaiso was qualified to comment on Toyama Ryu.... hmmm so I guess there was no such thing as "doing research" allowed in this dojo.
That same day, we got word that a fellow student was exposed to someone with the Corona virus, and I was out drinking with that person the night before, so I was like great, now I may have the corona... (tuned out not to be the case thankfully).
But right around when he announced that the dojo would be closed for a month for social distancing purposes, he then states that we can't write any articles about Shinkendo or Toyama Ryu.
This now put me in a tizzy, I was like “seriously”...
I am a veteran, who defended my country in two wars, defended the American constitution and the rights it provides, and now I have this guy, this shit for brains, this wannabee spiritual guru, telling me I can't post my blog article!
I posted in his dojo chat group that I would not be abiding by this new out of the blue policy he created.
(in actuality I had already posted the article back on March 10)
I also stated that his censorship policy is an affront to my principals, and my first amendment rights blah blah blah, and I abruptly exited that stupid chat group for a second time.
That move was clearly the last straw for him as well.
How dare I defy his directive and not fall into line like one of his boot-lickers.
So he reached out to the two senior students in private and began convincing them that I should be expelled. I don't know the full details of these discussions, I got tidbits from each of them and as I can't validate them 100%, I won't go into deep detail.
The most senor student and instructor, reached out to me in txt msg stating little shaffee wanted to have a call with me, him and these two senior students.
I asked the nature of the call and was told by the senior student that he didn't know;
I stated look; if the call is about blogs, or chat rooms or anything that is not dojo related, then I wasn't interested in having the discussion, as what I do outside of the dojo is my own business and not subject to his overreaching authority.
Important to note that a couple of days after I left the chat group for the second time, he ordered a senior student to publish what many perceived as a ”Nazi, Soviet Era styled" proclamation that under no circumstances were we to post any opinions or articles about Shinkendo, Toyama Ryu, or Bujitsu in general.. unless they first went through his new censorship approval process.
(but posting stupid emojis and praise about him was apparently acceptable, lol)
I politely reiterated to the senior student that I study Shinkendo to learn a martial art. and such proclamations are diametrically opposed to my constitutional principals.
I did not sign up to join some sort of religious cult!
These txt chats went back and forth for a few days where my fellow students urged me to talk to him and I said "fine" that I would, but in a call just him and I, as I did not understand the need for a group discussion.
After all we are both two middle aged men in our 50's and should be able to have an adult conversation in a civil way.
The student instructor, told me that little shaffee was uneasy about having a one on one call and that he wanted witnesses?
I laughed when I read this txt msg...
Here we have a grown man, a martial arts instructor who claims to teach the spirit of Budo, and hes too cowardly to have a phone conversation with someone.
What a total joke of a man was my view of him.
The student instructor agreed with this point and went back to little shaffee, and in someway convinced him to do a one on one.
At this point I was fully aware that he was planning on kicking me out of the Shinkendo dojo and had already made arrangements for student friends to pick up my gear once the pandemic was over, but agreed to the call.
I got a txt from the little guy asking me to call him that evening, I said "yes sir" and called him at 6:30 pm as requested.
The call began in a friendly way, he asked me to start, I gave him my feedback that I was shocked that he felt some mistrust of me in such a way that he was hesitant to have a one on one. (he brushed over this concern and went on to his comments)
First he began blowing smoke up my ass about how much respect he had for me and how we had so much in common, (meanwhile I'm thinking to myself, no we don't you are an egotistical ahole, and lol, I'm just an annoying ball buster). then he continued with his long list of pseudo crimes I allegedly committed, and all his personal grievances.
He was trying to build a narrative to justify why he was expelling me, I told him flat out, "Sensei, if you want to kick me out, you don't need to make up this plethora of excuses, I am fully aware that you have some type of issues with me, and my recent defiance around my blog was the final straw".
He denied it was the blog, that it was all these alleged other things like I practice tachiuchi too hard, and that once I walked in front of a student when he was training, and a bunch of other innocuous things that seemingly rubbed him the wrong way, and that in all honestly I had no recollection or knowledge of. (However if I did, I most certainly would have apologized for any error or lack of judgement on my part).
In reality, all his accusations were nothing more then the usual little shaffee "blah blah blah manipulative bullshit"... when I heard his issues, I was like "what" ???
Then the truth finally came out when he started to rant about the private chat group I created for several of the serious minded students who were friends outside of the dojo,
His attitude and words were along the lines of "how dare I setup a chat group with people from his dojo", and that he also didn’t appreciate that we discuss him in this chat group, as if all we do is talk about him all day long.
...jeez, what a psycho this guy is!
I responded: "Sensei what business is the chat group of yours, what business is my blog of yours" ....seriously, as if we didn't have similar conversations when we are out at a bar or restaurant? That somehow having such conversations in our own private chat group is a sacrilege?
The dialogue descended into further bickering, and my logical defense and exposure of his megalomania was not what he expected, he became even more flustered and resorted to name dropping and he said/she said about other students.
Ranting and raving, accusing me of having said such and such, about so and so...
Reminiscent of a child in a playground spat.
I laughed, and made him aware that I say those things to so and so to their faces all the time, and they say funny things about me as well.
It's called being friends.
(a concept he clearly doesn't grasp, and I'm not shocked by that fact).
Then it got really weird, he started some type of maniacal chanting:
"You're out of the dojo" "You're out of the dojo" with what sounded like crazed laughter in between breathes.
I was like "What the fuck" is this guy totally out of his mind???
I respond saying "look sensei, clearly we are not compatible, lets just part ways amicably and I can pursue my Shinkendo training elsewhere"
Oh no, that wasn't good enough, he then says that he plans to write a long letter to the ISF telling them I am expelled and banned from Shinkendo, so I won't be permitted to join another school.
I advised him that would be unwise and he shouldn't do that and just part ways, but he continued with those words.
I hung up the phone.
This was the official ending of my journey in Shinkendo to date.
Thanks little shaffee for allowing me to waste time and money for the past 18 months under your insane tutelage.
Wow, what a journey!
I realize the series was a lengthy one, and I apologize for any repetitiveness or convoluted descriptions.
In the first part of this series I stated that I shared culpability for the outcome of these events, and clearly I do.
I am guilty of not standing up for whats right earlier on, for sacrificing principals and my own personal code, or the "way', in return for convenient access to a local dojo.
To me the pursuit of the sword is a journey and requires sacrifice, you put in, and you take out.
The way of the sword is anything but convenient.
Again, I would like to say that these articles are from my own view point, my own assessments, and interpretations of behavior I have experienced, witnessed first hand, discussed with fellow student etc.
I don't believe these stories reflect on ISF, rather they reflect my interactions.
Your interactions may be different.
I leave it to you the reader to determine what you agree or don't agree with.
In closing, I will offer this advice:
NO ONE LIKES A BOOT-LICKER!
DON'T BE A BOOT-LICKER!
I have said my peace.
Boston Shinkendo, Boston Iaido, Kenjdo, Tachi Uchi, Jinsei Shinkendo, Tameshigiri, Yukishiro Obata, Tyler St, Shinkendo Boston, Boston Kendo, Boston Martial Arts, Boston Budo, Katana, Iaijutsu, Bujitisu, Boston Self Defense, Boston Japanese Sword
