The sport of ultimate fighting or mixed martial arts continues to grow in popularity, but not without its growing share of critics. The brutal sport is not for the faint of heart and those who wince at the mere sight of a drop of blood, but that doesn’t mean the sport is promoting violence for the sake of being violent. Not according to Ronda Rousey.
“I think a lot of people that are ignorant about [MMA] think that it promotes violence, when it really is the most responsible outlet for it,” Rousey said in a clip for the documentary titled The Hurt Business: A Deeper Look at MMA and detailed by ESPN. “It’s a human instinct to fight, and if you try to suppress it entirely and put everyone in a bubble-wrapped society, that’s when people end up going nuts and shooting movie theaters.”
Rousey makes a good point here suggesting that there is a level of ignorance by those who criticize the sport. It is routinely the case that the harshest of criticisms will tend to come from those without any real in-depth knowledge about a particular subject, in this case MMA combat.
“It’s not violence for the sake of violence,” Rousey said. “The word ‘art’ is in it for a reason. When I go in there, yeah, I’m fighting, but really what I’m trying to do is outsmart the other person. It’s a puzzle to be solved.
“I’m not going in there and spazzing out, swinging my hands — lifting weights so I can swing my hands even harder. It’s more mental and tactical than anything else, and I think it’s the purest, most beautiful sport in the world.”
Yeah, it’s certainly a bit brutal and a step up in viciousness seen in the sport of boxing, but there is also a skill set and an extreme amount of training involved in order to compete as well. The action inside the octagon is just a mere fraction of the sport as a whole, although certainly the most visible portion.
“If any of those people that had all of that aggression built up in them had some sort of outlet, I think that we would have a lot more societal health,” Rousey said. Sometimes you need to let it all out in a physical fashion. If you can’t do so in the ring, grab a pillow and go to town.
Rousey is one of the top names in the MMA world, even if she did take a fall earlier this season against Holly Holm. The loss hit Roussey hard, as she has taken time away from the sport following her unexpected defeat.
[ESPN]
