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BARBARIC.
DISTURBING.
VILE.
‘Legalised GBH for for Neanderthal Morons.’
These are all labels that have been placed on mixed martial arts (MMA), a sport that has been rapidly gaining popularity in this country in recent years.
Another take?
We can’t have people just coming out of nowhere, getting into a cage and bating the head off one another – that’s not how it works… I don’t think people understand that until they come here and see it and see how much people love it.
These are not the words of a seasoned fighter like the two-title-winning Irish champion Conor McGregor, they came from 17-year-old Tallaght boy Kian Tate who takes MMA classes and trains at Straight Blast Gym’s newest facility in his neighbourhood.
He was one of 46 teenagers at a class taught by former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) fighter Paddy Holohan.
Speaking to TheJournal.ie at his gym this week, he insists that the safety of his fighters is the number one priority.
“Even as a fighter against another fighter, it’s never really your idea to hurt the guy,” he says.
“Now maybe to sell the fight or whatever [you act like that], but at the end of it you have this certain bond with your partner, your opponent, that you’ll never get from something else.”
At his Monday afternoon class, with what he refers to as his “chimps” (children aged 7 to 9), he makes all of the children sit down on the mat so he can emphasise his point.
“Make sure your partner’s going to be alright and that nobody gets hurt, that’s the most important thing,” he tells them.
Criticism of the sport was particularly strong after the death of Portuguese fighter Joao Carvalho in April last year. He was critically injured at an MMA event in Dublin. Writing in The Guardian in the aftermath of Carcalho’s death, CEO of the UK brain injury non-profit Headway Peter McCabe said:
When the objective is to render opponents senseless by kicking and punching them in the head, it is no surprise when someone is seriously hurt and sustains fatal neurological damage.
For the young people who train weekly at SBG Tallaght, comments like these are a cause of frustration.
“People from the outside think it’s so dangerous. It’s kind of annoying where we’re coming from. We understand all the regulations and if it’s not sanctioned it is going to be dangerous,” Tate says.
He has been training in MMA for less than a year but his face lights up when he talks about it.
“I love every part of it, I can’t get enough. I train with the adults as well, I’m down here every day except Fridays. You learn so much.”
“People talk about it being really rough, but when you train in it you know it isn’t,” adds 15-year-old Jamie McCarthy who is also in the class.
He makes reference to a recent Premier League match during which Hull City midfielder Ryan Mason fractured his skull in a clash with a Chelsea defender: “He got injured but they’re not trying to put a ban on football.”
Fifteen-year-old Emma Yeats was looking for a new hobby that would challenge her when she heard about SBG Tallaght. She said before she started classes, no one in her family even thought about MMA.
“I was the one to introduce it to my house and my mam doesn’t like it at all, and neither does my dad. They’re still really supportive – my mam came to my first Jujitsu fight – so it’s not like they don’t approve, I think they’d just prefer I was doing something like football,” she said.
‘It can be easy to misinterpret it’
Holohan believes MMA is an easy target and describes many of the comments about it as “ill-informed”.
“If you don’t know what’s going on, you don’t understand the levels of respect that go on and the grassroots of it coming all the way up, it can be easy to misinterpret it,” he explains.
Not to attack the sport of boxing, I know a good bit about boxing, but if you look at Bernard Dunne, he fought for his world title and he was basically knocked out and then stood back up. I read his book and I remember reading about that moment and he was saying he didn’t really know what was going on so he got back up off the canvass and then he’s going back in to fight. In MMA, if you came close to anything like that and the ref is qualified and seeing that, the fight is over – stopped straight away.
The Irish Mixed Martial Arts Association (IMMAA), headed up by McGregor’s coach John Kavanagh, has been meeting with Sport Ireland in recent months to lobby for proper regulation of the sport.
The body was established in March last year and although it has no legal powers, Kavanagh told TheJournal.ie that “the vast majority” of active MMA clubs are now a part of the association.
“As a group, we’ve done things like we have an insurance policy that all clubs can avail of that’s specifically for MMA. We are also going through the process so we can do garda vetting for coaches of juniors and vulnerable adults,” he continued.
The problem now, he said, is that without recognition of the sport and the official regulations that would follow, “anybody can run an MMA event on a Saturday night and the could run it to whatever standard they see fit”.
‘I feel much calmer’
At amateur level, out of the spotlight and without promoters or pay-per-view figures, the young people who train in MMA speak openly about the positive changes they have seen in themselves since they started.
Kian Tate laughs as he recalls his “hothead” tendencies before he became involved in mixed martial arts. “I used to always get myself into little scraps, and I started watching UFC when I was about 12 and loved it. Since I started this I feel much calmer, it’s a good way to release stress or whatever.
I was never proper fighting with my ma and da, but there were silly things we’d argue about and it’s not like that really anymore. I still have focus on school and all but I think about this all the time, I just love it.
“Before, your ma would threaten to take your Playstation off you if you were acting up, now they’re threatening not to let you go training,” 15-year-old Jamie McCarthy jokes.
“The amount of kids here that have come in shy and literally this has changed their well-being, I think. A lot of teachers, the parent-teacher meetings have just gone and they came back and said: ‘Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it’,” Holohan says.
If you look at society today, kids communicate through headphones and computer games and texts and stuff like that. It’s very rare that you will see a group of kids actually just in a group without a ball, without any other accessories, just kinda playing and contacting with each other, you know?
“We do a lot to do with self-respect and honour and bravery and a lot of words are thrown around loosely these days so I make sure the kids understand what these words mean and when you do things that go against you, what you lose,” he adds.
That process is beginning at a young age for Holohan’s ‘chimps’.
Cian Warren is just nine years old and in conversation TheJournal.ie after his class, he speaks about having dreams for his future and wanting to achieve them.
What does he like about Conor McGregor? That the Irish fighter “never gives up”.
The kids all look up to McGregor, he is their idol (“an inspiration”, according to 17-year-old Tate).
And it’s not just the fame, the suits, the lifestyle.
“We all know that with money comes hard work,” 16-year-old Sarah Carney begins.
“He wouldn’t have got where he was without working hard, you don’t just wake up one day great at it.”
McGregor, who spent years out of the spotlight training while he collected the dole, has influenced and inspired them, according to 15-year-old McCarthy: “Look at the ages the others before us were when they started. We’re still young, so we’re years ahead. Imagine what we could do.”
Video by Nicky Ryan
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Two completely different issues. Aggressive begging is intimidating, and mostly organised, run by a cartel of Roma. Huge difference to homelessness. Anybody who can’t tell the difference is ignorant of the facts. I work in the hospitality industry in the city centre, and our hearts are broken keeping professional beggars from annoying and intimidating our customers. These, believe me, are professional beggars. They are dropped off en-masse and then spread out. In my area they arrive at 6.15pm every Thursday, Friday & Saturday. They co-ordinate their efforts to a T. They usually finish at 11.30pm and then all walk back to their car together. They also have a guy who walks up and down the street collect their money and bring it back to the ‘minder’ who sits in a car on Baggot Street. Monday to Friday another group works from 8am to 5pm, they again are all dropped off, and they take their positions at the parking metres and bank machines along the street. I have been physically threatened by these people when I tried to stop them harassing our customers. I had to call the guards another night to get walked to my own car, as the “money collecting guy” threatened to slit my throat for running them from outside the restaurant. Nasty nasty people. These are not homeless. Please be aware of the difference.
That’s racist. It is part their culture. You must tolerate. Resistance is futile.
Part of your culture to beg ? I would call it just to bloody lazy to work they came over here for two reasons one for the dole and another to peg we should chuck them out if that’s racists fine I can live with that tag
Spot on Timberdog. It’s organised Roma criminal begging gangs. Have seen how they set up on Baggott St and surrounding area. Can’t have a smoke in peace outside a bar in town without a gypsy coming up with their hands out. Parasites.
Just an interesting point here, gypsies from Central Europe, are for some reason terrified of rabbits ! So a rabbits foot dangling in front of there face will quickly get rid of them pestering you
Think you missed the point Marco, I’d say fair play to the restaurant owners, and aggressive begging has become a business for some needs to stop
I just ask them for money before they ask me. Just tell them I need money for beer. Keep on and on at them. Bit of their own medicine is good enough for them.
There should be big, un-missable neon signs warning people NOT to give to beggars. It’s an industry, run by Roma criminal predators. Plenty of charities out there to donate legit to, no need to pay the already State mollycoddled, PAYE funded, scroungers any more free, un-earned loot!!
Why not save all their time and money on stupid surveys and put it into a soup kitchen instead- I’m sure there is plenty of food waste among them all that could be put to practical use.
Do you own or run a restaurant Marko?
Not a regular restaurant runner these days. I find the spandex chaffs something awful.
Picture a tumbleweed Marko… seems I can’t send you a picture of one.
Don’t you all know, the homeless are the new gays, anything negative said about them will be met with a barrage of red thumbs.
I don’t know. I think it’s very possible to criticise the gays. Can’t think of anything right now but if I do think of one, I’ll be right back here. *~*
So now homeless people are meant to be polite and social at all times. As an experiment try sleeping rough for a week and deal with the HSE and see if your full of the joys of spring.
Some people just want to be outraged.
Why all the comments on Roma beggars? I work in the city centre and most of the aggressive begging I see is from Irish people.
I also work in the city. All the aggressive begging is from the Irish. The Roma just sit quietly
Homelessness and begging are two separate issues on planet moron and planet liars.
Stupid crusty.
Read the article properly before jumping on the SJW bandwagon.
The vast majority of homeless people in Ireland are Irish. Aggressive beggars on the other hand…..its their culture, they get state provided housing and such. Homeless people would be lucky to even get a sniff of that kind of government help.
Nicky, Nicky, nicky. The article, and the details provided today, explicitly make the difference between aggressive begging (what this action is about) and ‘regular’ begging (what this article is not about).
No harm done.
The original press release mentions “the interrelated areas of begging, homelessness and addiction”. It is obvious why people are making the connection between the topics and the press release is insensitive and poorly timed.
“Dublin accounts for 47% of national GDP and attracts almost four million visitors a year, that amount of visitors is at risk if this issue continues to be ignored.”
There are surely bigger issues that should be dealt with first “as a matter of urgency”, to use the words of the press release. Like people dying on the streets.
“Let them eat cake”
There’s a fair bit to be irked by in this report. One thing is the fact that it’s only when something affects tourism that the powers that be seem to pay attention. It seems if you’re a taxpayer you’re supposed to put up with it.
There may be merit in constructing a temporary block of container houses (prob in the Phoenix park) to get homeless people off the streets during the harsher weather. There’s obviously a cost, as well as insurance and staffing costs to that too.
Long term, addiction clinics need to be decentralized. How addiction is treated needs to be re-thought. Some people are on methadone for 10+ years. What sort of a system is that.
Controversially, IMO, a large % of social housing in Dublin cc should be sold and used to buy more social homes further out of the city for those who cannot / will not work.
have your say