MMA has been going before the early twenties, it was going in the nineties ( male and female MMA) The first MMA fight night in the UK was before 2000, the promoter had previously fought MMA in Japan. For many years both male and female fighters
I don't know if I completely understand. Are you saying the 1920's? That doesn't make sense.
But, isn't it also a huge stretch to claim that female MMA was "going" in the 1990s? I would welcome some evidence to the contrary, and I get that there were a few events in the 1990s, but they were oddities with a very thin field of female athletes and funky rule sets. It wasn't until Smackgirl came around that there was any even semi-legitimate and that was in 2001.
While I'm all for welcoming women's MMA into the limelight, there is still a problem with a very thin pool of well trained talent in the divisions. The lack of depth is largely a result of the divisions being so young compared to the men's combat sports. It's just still in its infancy compared to men's MMA.
The popularity of MMA has grown because of increased public awareness, more television time and yes some personalities who are put into the public eye but like the entertainment industry it isn't dependent on any one person, there is always the excitement of a new find and new face. It's the reason X Factor is so popular in so many countries. Again like the entertainment industry where you are only as good as your last film/song/tv programme, in MMA you are only as good as your last fight. This means WMMA will have brought in new viewers, for one thing for many home audiences and spectators the inclusion of women means that MMA is now mainstream rather than a fringe sport. Of course for those that don't like MMA for it's so called 'barbarism' bringing female fighters into a big show like UFC confirms their worst fears lol.
One thing to remember is that men's MMA didn't start before women's, they started at the same time, both popular in many parts of the world before MMA was chosen for the fledgling UFC ( after a stuttering start with the rules etc) The UFC could have easily started with women's fights alongside the men's as other promotions did. I think MMA might have been seen to be a legitimate sport sooner if they had but boxing at that time didn't want female fights either. Even athletics didn't want females being equal in things like pole vault, hammer and other events, women's ski jump hasn't been accepted by the Olympic committee as a sport even now.
I'd like to see some support for the assertion that they started at the same time. Men's MMA has been around for a long time, as you say. Going back to the contests in Asia and the Vale Tudo matches in Brazil, and elsewhere. Women's MMA had a couple of events as early as 1996, marketed largely as a novelty, to really getting started in the early 2000's with Smackgirl in Japan. Otherwise, it didn't really exist.
And suggesting that it could have been in the UFC as early as the first events isn't realistic, as even now the UFC struggles to locate well trained women who are ready for an elite level of competition. Getting better, for sure, but still pretty thin compared to the men's divisions.
To be clear, this isn't in any way a knock against women's MMA. Rather, it's an acknowledgement of how far it's come in such a short time.
But I think that the real history is an even better story than the exaggerated one you seem to be promoting.
