Calisthenics or Conventional Weights?

As I peruse the endless array of fitness videos created by some such amazing people as "Hannibal for King" and other well know body weight culturalists, one thing which I always come across in the comments sections are people stating such things as "I bet he can barely bench anything," or "Yeah he's got a strong upper body by pencil legs", to list a few. I'm sure that similar, yet opposite remarks have been made by calisthenics enthusiasts to powerlifters in much the same manner.

This kind of talk is often met with harsh words between parties, and a mine's bigger contest often ensues shortly afterward. One amusing confrontation arose from one of the leaders of the calisthenics crew "Bar-Barians" and some random powerlifter. By arose I don't actually mean that the Bar-Barians crew member, known as "Zef" was one of the people doing the arguing, but rather the powerlifter was as usual boasting about his lifts and stating that someone who only did calisthenics couldn't come close to achieving his lifts any day. The sad reality is that on Zef's page on the Bar-Barians website he stated that he benched 285 for 7 reps, which is an impressive amount for anyone aside from a professional athlete (by professional I mean paid), especially considering his bodyweight. The moral-well, morals rather-of this little fable are as follows: Don't always assume that because someone is very well versed in a particular discipline, whether it be calisthenics, bodybuilding, or powerlifting, that they aren't well versed in the others.

Also-and more importantly-don't try to state that one particular discipline is better than the other. These type of statements create circular and annoying arguments, and end up achieving nothing. They all have their benefits, and they all have their caveats. I find calisthenics extremely convenient in some ways, but being a person who works out with heavy weights for 3-5 reps, I am always having to pack weight on, take it off, peform endless drop sets, and so forth. Powerlifting allows me to very accurately tune the amount of weight I'm lifting, track my progress very easily, and end up sore the next day almost every workout session, which doesn't always happen when I perform a calisthenics workout. I personally find the concept of exercising purely for esthetic appeal as just plane silly, but that doesn't give me the right to defaecate on it because of my personal bias.

Having a negative attitude about people doing things differently is the root of a large majority of our troubles, so don't sour up other peoples passions and achievements just because their outlook is different.
Thanks for reading. My next blog will be a practical one, so stay tuned.
Ryan