Closed Guard as the "main" guard?

We discussed this and I think in the hierarchical of guards it’s one of the bear, especially arm across side closed guard

It's perfectly fine to use as a main guard in my opinion as long as you also have a good open guard as well.

I think closed guard tends to be associated with White Belts and Black Belts and everyone else in the middle thinks they know better. White belts because it's simple, has clear conditions, and is available. Wrap your legs around someone and you don't need timing and dexterity, or large amount of skill to make it difficult for someone to escape the situation. Black belts because it's efficient, unforgiving, and deep. The black belts understand the layers of complexity and the dilemmas you can create from the closed guard, it transforms to a trap rather than a white belt shelter. But the way of the open guard is a seductive one. The middle belts tend to think closed guard is too "basic" or simple and the "fancier" open guards seem more fun to play with.

In essence you obviously need both to be a good jiu jitsu player but to use closed guard as a main guard to play off of is 100% legitimate. In my opinion.

Thanks for everyone's opinion. Lately, I've been gravitating towards closed guard and deep diving into various variations.

It's a bit of a pain to get into sometimes, cause anyone that knows better tries to avoid it.

Closed guard or its variants is great when I'm matched against someone close to my size. I'm 138lbs and having a much bigger and stronger person attached to my hips and that close to me is never good!

One strategy is to use your best guards for attacking and learn escapes from every position. If you are better attacking from closed guard compared to your opponent is escaping from it ...you have an advantage.

I think context matters, when you go back to the roots of vale tudo and jiu jitsu the closed guard is a reverse mount and gives you connection and if done correctly the ability to reduce damage/avoid strikes if posture is broken etc etc. so from a self defense application it is key so it should be a big part of the game. Goals matter are you training for sport or self defence/MMA/strikes