Pugilism

“On 6 January 1681, the first recorded boxing match took place in Britain when Christopher Monck, 2nd Duke of Albemarle (and later Lieutenant Governor of Jamaica) engineered a bout between his butler and his butcher with the latter winning the prize.” Wikipedia

That about sums it up really, an upper class gent organising a bout of fighting presumably for the entertainment of his rich chums between a couple of the “servants” (read lower classes)

And it continues to be that way till this day. As a generally rule the backgrounds and education standards of a lot of boxers don’t appear to be that great. Sure some of them earn a lot of money but probably less than the promoters and they do it by putting themselves in harms way.


Does this look like a good time?

 I don’t understand boxing, amateur or professional. I do know the rules and I am not squeamish about it and I am not calling for it to be banned, (live and let die as always) but why anyone would participate and or be that interested in watching is beyond me. It is a version of the roman gladiators and I think as a society we should be over that by now. Boxing remains a signpost to the work we need to do to improve our thinking skills.

OK so boxing is not the only way to get injured at work and there are other dangerous jobs, bomb disposal springs to mind. But assuming you have a safe desk job etc why would you sign up for a spot of danger time?

So with that in mind what is with the current popularity of “celebrity” boxing matches. On the front page of the newspaper today are some pictures of some blokes from around the town punching each other in the face (well in truth one puncher one face owner per picture but you get the idea).

As a lawyer or CEO around town why would you sign up for this? It can’t possibly be a good time, it isn’t even dignified and surely in our modern society the promotion of generalised violence is not a good idea and these people should “know better”

The proceeds do go to charity but still a strange way to raise funds.

Now if one of the fighters was a local figure that I didn’t like and the opponent was a trained boxer now that might be interesting......