I mentioned that you never should use a parallel stance in a real fight. I mentioned this in my article ‘Boxing in Karate (空手)’. I called it an expression of pure arrogance.

Karate (空手) comprises several stances with parallel feet and evenly distributed weight. Several martial arts and combat sports have a parallel stance. I know all of this and hence did always prefer a parallel stance. I all of the time stood in a parallel stance, when I made an experiment with a fellow martial artist. I stood in parallel stance, when I made an experiment together with a bully. A jūdōka (柔道家) once attacked me, while we were attending the same school. He tried to hip-toss me. I simply withstood. I was standing in a parallel stance, but what makes withstanding the throws and tosses of jūdō (柔道) possible is that jūdōka (柔道家), too, prefer parallel stances. If a jūdōka (柔道家) approaches you with what Ronda Rousey calls a “ballerina step”, then this is a perfect opportunity to escape the situation by tossing or simply pushing the jūdōka (柔道家), who needed superhuman powers for maintaining balance in this situation.

Tài-jí-quán (太極拳) knows the equal distribution of the body weight on both feet as double-weighting. Tài-jí-quán (太極拳) classifies this double-weighting as perilous and a cardinal mistake. Tài-jí-quán (太極拳) recommends to never commit this mistake. If I had known this earlier and if I had followed the wisdom of tài-jí-quán (太極拳), then I would have been victorious in many more cases. But karate (空手) seemed to teach the opposite. It meanwhile has proven wrong with this opposite. So I now have to recommend to avoid parallel stances because they are perilous and I have to wonder how the serious tactical mistakes found their way into karate (空手).