Tag: athletic commissions

(Damn it, Hickey…why can’t you guys be more like Montana?)

The latest political firestorm over MMA is happening right now in South Dakota, as a proposal to create a South Dakota Athletic Commission — which would regulate sports such as boxing, kick-boxing and mixed martial arts, making them safer and more accessible for fighters in the state — was submitted in a State Senate hearing today, amid protests that MMA is a dangerous, violent enterprise, and unfit for the good people of the Mount Rushmore State. You can listen to audio of the hearing right here.

Leading the charge to create the athletic commission is Republican State Senator Mark Johnston, who is currently being cockblocked by Governor Dennis Daugaard. Daugaard had this to say about MMA last month:

“I’m offended that the state would legitimize cage-fighting and the bloody violence that those kinds of spectacles create. I think it’s interesting that we declare that it is a crime for one human being to strike another, and yet the state now proceeds to legitimize, and label a sport, cage-fighting.”

One of Daugaard’s main allies in the anti-MMA crusade is State Representative Steve Hickey (booooooooo!), who has offered an amendment to the proposal that would ban MMA, while still allowing boxing and traditional martial arts. “The conversation on violence in society needs to start somewhere — why not with our most violent entertainment, and that’s mixed martial arts,” Hickey wrote on Saturday. Yep. Let’s start the conversation by banning MMA. It’s not like parenting or our approach to mental health has any influence on this sort of thing. But wait, it gets worse — so much worse:

“Decent and civil societies have to draw the line somewhere; with smoking we draw the line after tobacco and before pot*; with ‘adult entertainment’ we draw the line at child porn. With violent combative ‘sports’ I suggest we draw the line at cage fighting. The line should be drawn after boxing, wrestling and legitimate martial arts. They are violent too but the line needs to be drawn somewhere. Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) or ‘cage fighting’ is over that line — in fact, even the martial arts people I talk to tell me they hate cage fighting because it is a smear on legitimate martial arts.**

MMA Cage Fighting is the child porn of sports.*** The psychological community will tell you that desensitization to violence works exactly like desensitization to porn. You know how porn progresses****… a peek at topless isn’t enough, it all has to come off, then a pic is not enough… it goes to video then to virtual***** and then to the devaluation and mistreatment of women, human trafficking and sex crimes against women. Violence works the same way. Boxing wasn’t enough so they took the gloves off, then they allowed kicking, kneeing people in the head, then elbows to the face, then they put a cage around it. The point is to knock the other guy unconscious while pay per view crowds cheer it on. Why not nunchucks? In Rome they’d gather in colosseums and bring out prisoners and entertain themselves by making them fight to the death. That wasn’t enough so they brought out the helpless and the hated and brought in the hungry lions. Crowds cheered…

If we want to attract dirty and bloody money why not legalize prostitution or bring back the gladiators?…Proponents say it’s going on here already so we need to regulate it to make it safe. Meth use is going on here too, should we regulate Meth labs?******…

When people get hurt and die in extreme sports I’ll confess I sometimes have trouble mustering up sympathy and compassion (even as we should comfort their families and guys like me officiate these funerals). At some point we can’t call these things “accidents” as they are more the product of our carefully thought out decisions. I have to bite my tongue because instead of the passages that comfort the grieving I feel like quoting the great philosopher Forrest Gump: Stupid is as stupid does*******…

In a restaurant the other day I heard a lady say about the MMA match on the television… Oh my, when did they take the gloves off?  I wanted to say… Madam, they took the gloves off when we weren’t watching.******** Folks, it’s time to start paying attention because we are creating today the world our grandkids will live in tomorrow.

[MY FOOTNOTES BELOW]

* In other words, completely arbitrarily.

** Also, because MMA is making traditional martial arts obsolete, which is hurting their strip-mall dojo businesses. Keep in mind that some people consider this to be a “legitimate martial art.”

*** If you’ve lived on the Internet long enough, you’re probably aware of Godwin’s Law (“As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1″) and its corollary which states that once such a comparison is made, the discussion is finished and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost the debate. I think that invocations of “child porn” — especially in relation to a combat sport that has existed for decades, is popular worldwide, and has resulted in a surprisingly low amount of deaths and serious injuries compared to other contact sports — should be viewed with the same rhetorical disregard as Hitler-comparisons. Hickey’s ghastly hyperbole does nothing except make him look illogical, reactionary, and emotional to a fault. In short, he’s the last kind of person that should be influencing decisions affecting athletes and sports fans. Let’s hope there are enough passionate pro-MMA voices in the state to drown out his half-evolved gurgles.

**** No, why don’t you tell me, pastor.

***** Oh man, that reference to “virtual” porn just gave me a pretty gnarly flashback to 1994. Man, Alicia Silverstone. Good times.

****** Yep, prostitution and drugs. We’ve officially hit the jackass trifecta.

******* As Jesus once said, “that X-Gamer had it coming, LOL.” At this point, it might be a good idea to revisit the story of the South Dakota amateur MMA fighter whose death might have been prevented if the state had an athletic commission. That’s the kind of person who Hickey can’t muster sympathy for.

******** If you put your bifocals back on, you’ll notice that THEY ARE WEARING GLOVES YOU DUMB FUCK. Is it okay if we disregard your argument entirely now?

(BG)

Update: The Senate Commerce and Energy committee voted unanimously to pass Senate Bill 84, which would mandate the creation of a state athletic commission. The bill is now headed to the state’s house of representatives. If it passes the house, the bill would make its final stop at the governor’s desk to be signed into law or vetoed. Keep in mind that Governor Daugaard is not a fan of MMA. We’ll keep you posted.