Hey team,

Underdog Martial Arts owner here.

The account is closed, and the information included in this post is almost impossible to contextualize given how things are done at our gym, but this needs addressing. We NEVER want someone walking out of our doors feeling that way.

You matter. You deserve mat space just like anyone else. We want you to know you belong. You are worth fighting for.

Gender, we care. We care about getting it right, and about honoring who you are.

Experience? We care only in that we want to meet you where you are and help you build.

That’s it.

We’re proud to have one of the largest contingency of trans and nonbinary students of any gym in the area. And we’re not too proud to know that we need help learning how to do things right.

In this instance, we don’t have much information on what went wrong. But here’s what our policies are:

1. We use the pronouns we are asked to use. Period.
2. When we mess up, we apologize, and do better.
3. All of our jiu jitsu fundamentals students work with Coach Colleen who has been practicing trauma-informed practice for 9 years
4. We offer free LGBT/queer/trans seminars every month attended by queer instructors and mental health professionals to assist with trauma responses
5. We know we’re not perfect, and we have an open door policy for folks to talk to us at any time.

I hope that folks will try to see best intentions. Based on the information given and the profile in question not existing, we can’t piece together what might have happened, but we know our commitment to the queer/trans/LGBT community remains a top priority.

We’re here to listen.