Staging fights for bragging rights?

[Carol]

Over the past couple of weeks there have been several stories on CNN and Fox about fights, particularly girls fighting, that hae been staged stricly to be posted for bragging rights on the internet. The fights started out as 2 girls fistfighting and then escalated to include more people, people throwing cinderblocks.

MySpace is mentioned in one of the stories below. Another web site I found offered tips for how to make a good video and states that they will pay up to $1000.00 for a really good clip of girls fighting. (The site wasn't interested in paying for guys fighting)

Anyone find this to be disturbing?

http://www.local6.com/news/10872337/detail.html#

http://www.local6.com/news/10861012/detail.html

 

[Steel Tiger]

This is so wrong it is frightening. Somewhere along the line these kids have gotten the message that any problem, however slight, can be solved with violence. To compound this, some lowlife has decided to make money from the behaviour of these kids.

The first thought that struck me when I read the stories was how much like ancient Rome our society had become. Here we are entertaining each other with actual, uncontrolled fighting. It is no longer enough that we have plenty of brutal sports to entertain. They, afterall, have rules and people only get seriously hurt by accident. That's just not good enough anymore.

The second thought was a bit less angry. It was this. How does this impact on the martial world that we live and interact in? Will such behaviour, especially since it is being encouraged for nothing more than entertainment, have a detrimental affect on the practice of martial arts?

How do others feel about this?

 

[Kacey]

I think it is abominable.

 

[Jade Tigress]

It's very disturbing and criminal charges should be brought against anyone who attacks and videotapes these types of "set ups", regardless of age.

 

[Bigshadow]

It is all over the news here. However, I have seen quite a few of these on the internet, it has been going on for quite sometime, girls and boys recording their fights. Seems that now that someone is pressing charges, has brought it into the media spotlight. I have always found those sorts of videos quite disturbing.

 

[Infinite]

This all falls back to a lack of quality role models.

Parents have stepped out and celeberities have stepped in. Celebs are getting younger and younger and thus what they portray becomes less and less mature.

Media has been for quite a while breaking down to primary and base impulses. The news is a perfect example:

Tonight see why your next salad could be your last. Coming up next on Fox TV's channel x news.

They also tend to not show the consequences and neither does the net. Kids see these stagged fights and don't see any of the aftermath. Not on the news not on the net and not at all from their parents.

Moral and social breakdown baby! Lucky for us this happens all the time and children who survive this will be sure not to let their children repeat it and so on and so forth.

Eventually the whole thing will swing too far to the right and we will have 1920's era prohabition. Then it will break down again ala 1960's free love.

Ah cycles.

--Infy

 

[Carol]

This is so wrong it is frightening. Somewhere along the line these kids have gotten the message that any problem, however slight, can be solved with violence. To compound this, some lowlife has decided to make money from the behaviour of these kids.

The first thought that struck me when I read the stories was how much like ancient Rome our society had become. Here we are entertaining each other with actual, uncontrolled fighting. It is no longer enough that we have plenty of brutal sports to entertain. They, afterall, have rules and people only get seriously hurt by accident. That's just not good enough anymore.

Thats an interesting thought I didn't really think about ancient Rome, my thoughts were a bit more pessimistic. Our education standards are slipping and fine arts programs are being cut...all while entertainment standards are getting lower and lower. But...I have a music degree so I'm probably biased as to that regard.

The second thought was a bit less angry. It was this. How does this impact on the martial world that we live and interact in? Will such behaviour, especially since it is being encouraged for nothing more than entertainment, have a detrimental affect on the practice of martial arts?

How do others feel about this?

Possibly. There was some feedback that I saw on a couple of sites that indicates that a couple of folks that share out these videos of shared fights are folks that train in martial arts themselves.

Will it have a detrimental effect? I'm not sure. I think there were, there are, and there will be people that think that Martial Arts training is all about busting heads and flexing beer muscles. I don't see this as having a really negative impact on MA training unless it starts getting spun that way in the mass media. But...I may be wrong, and there may be folks that disagree. I'd be curious to hear other opinions as well.

 

[jks9199]

Y'know what, though...

In reality, kids have been staging fights for years (probably as long as there have been kids). And often for not much more than bragging rights.

What's different today is that they're videotaping it and sharing it over the internet, instead of keeping it to the school yard or alley.

I'm not agreeing with it, and I'm not suggesting that those exploiting it are not wrong, but the truth is that kids are going to fight. The other thing that's scary today is that it no longer ENDS at the fight, and they're bringing weapons into it more & more.

 

[matt.m]

Hey, everyone....the circus is always in town. I think it is stupid, I mean really stupid. Not only that but it is the absolute pontification of enablers who enable the weak and ridiculous.

They watch the UFC and figure oh, if I am tough I can get to do that to. Movies like Lionheart, Unleashed, stuff like that are purely intended for fiction and entertainment.

Ridiculous, sorry. Just a rant.:soapbox:

 

[Xue Sheng]

First let me say this activity is rather disturbing and just plain wrong

This is so wrong it is frightening. Somewhere along the line these kids have gotten the message that any problem, however slight, can be solved with violence. To compound this, some lowlife has decided to make money from the behaviour of these kids.

Sad but true

The first thought that struck me when I read the stories was how much like ancient Rome our society had become. Here we are entertaining each other with actual, uncontrolled fighting. It is no longer enough that we have plenty of brutal sports to entertain. They, afterall, have rules and people only get seriously hurt by accident. That's just not good enough anymore.

This is a good point, I had much the same thoughts about reality TV to be honest but it certainly is not as violent as what this post is about and it is a bit scary to think that we may be heading in this direction.

For some reason I am thinking the movies Roller Ball and Running man

The second thought was a bit less angry. It was this. How does this impact on the martial world that we live and interact in? Will such behavior, especially since it is being encouraged for nothing more than entertainment, have a detrimental affect on the practice of martial arts?

How do others feel about this?

I would say yes and no.

Yes because those that do not understand martial arts will simply assume it encourages this type of behavior

Yes because those that engage in this type of activity may go decide to train it in order to be more effective or those that fear it may go train in hopes of defending themselves against it

No in that we as martial artists do not generally advocate this sort of thing nor would we generally train those we suspected of doing it.

 

[CoryKS]

The peasants have always been revolting!

 

[FearlessFreep]

The peasants have always been revolting!

Hey, we bathe more often now!!

 

[Carol]

Hey, we bathe more often now!!

BWAAAAHAAAAAHAAAAAHAAAAAA

:roflmao: :roflmao: :roflmao:

 

[tellner]

[I expect most people here will say "Man, you gotta stop smoking that Mexican rope." But I've been reading too much evolutionary biology lately and am looking at things in a very different way.]

On one level it's perfectly understandable and absolutely natural. People compete for status. Fighting has always been one of the ways they do it. It has always been more about young men than anyone else. Young women traditionally have other ways of competing. Older people are supposed to have gotten past that and only fight over important things. And they are supposed to control the hormone-fueled excesses of the young.

One of the problems is that we don't have any sane method of channeling this very natural tendency. Young me don't go on cattle raids. This isn't Berber country where even the grandmothers wrestle. Ritualized combat like American football is expensive and practiced only by a few elite gorillas with money and entertainment being the point of the exercise. The masses only compete vicariously.

Throughout most of human history you couldn't afford to get seriously hurt. If you get hurt, you can't hunt or farm. If you can't hunt or farm your family starves. Many of the socially acceptable forms of combat had safeguards designed to keep people from getting too badly hurt. The widespread use of alcohol, urbanization, the long childhood and YouTube with its promises of instant worldwide fame have all distorted this beyond anything natural.

The expression is destructive, wasteful and bad. What it represents is a part of our deep emotional structures for better or worse. Fame. Status. Breeding rights. The things that make the world go 'round.