Boxing, Bimbos and Buffoons

By Harry Amana
SeeingBlack.com Media Critic

Talk about Fox TV's "Celebrity Boxing," Mike Tyson, and professional boxing! Click here.

Let's talk about boxing—the deadly serious endeavors of the professionals, and the seriously stupid shenanigans of the charlatans, buffoons and bimbos.

This comes on the heels of the stranger-than-fiction developments around professional pugilist Mike Tyson; buffoon sluggers Barry Williams, Danny Bonaduce, Robert Van Winkle, Todd Bridges; and bimbos-of-the-moment Amy Fisher, Paula Jones and Tonya Harding.

Actually, it's Tyson's episodic misbehaviors that got me started on this. I mean, don't you wonder how boxing regulators could allow a guy on medication for psychiatric disorders to earn his living as a fighter? Does it make sense that a boxer who takes meds to calm himself down would take them as he trains to demolish an upcoming opponent? And if he were taking his drugs, shouldn't he be declared ineligible to fight?

Is that why Iron Mike bit off a piece of Evander Holyfield's ear in the ring six years ago, and reportedly bit heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis' leg (or foot) in a raging-bull brawl during a January news conference? Could it be that this convicted rapist who makes the news every few months with his violent public outbursts is simply not taking his medicine? And if he were not, wouldn't this be injurious to his mental health? (Not to mention the physical health of his opponent.)

Well, meds or no meds, Maniac Mike has made news trying to find someone to let him fight Lewis in a championship match in 2002. He was denied a license or intimidated from seeking one in Colorado, Michigan, Nevada, Texas and Georgia. But the prospect of infusing $10 to $30 million into local economies had officials in several states and the District of Columbia bending over backward for the privilege of staging such a fight. (The District's boxing commission granted his license for a fight on March 12.)

Then there was the professional slugfest last summer between Laila Ali and Jacqui Frazier-Lyde, the daughters of former champions Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. Biting on their famous fathers' fame, these two statuesque females engaged in made-for-media hype to publicize an eight-round fight. Apparently, neither woman learned from their fight-damaged daddies that professional fighting could be fatal. Ali won in a majority decision.

Then came the March 13 "Celebrity Boxing" sham courtesy of the Fox network, where, "Six of the nation's most controversial and entertaining celebrities ... [were set to] slug it out in the boxing ring for athletic supremacy." So goes the hype at the network's Web site.

Enter the bimbos and buffoons.

First it was "the Long Island Lolita" Amy Fisher against former figure skater Tonya Harding. Fisher's notoriety came in 1992, when, as a teenager, she shot and wounded the wife of her adult lover. Harding's came two years later when she confessed that her ex-husband was involved in a plot to whack the kneecaps of Harding's skating rival Nancy Kerrigan.

Then, just before the scheduled fiasco, came the announcement that Paula Jones had replaced Fisher. Jones, remember, made her celebrity mark contending that Bill Clinton, as Arkansas governor, had sexually harassed her. Her federal lawsuit was dismissed after a reported $70,000 settlement. She was quoted just before the fight saying that her only concern was for her nose: "I just got (it) done, and I don't want to mess it up."

The buffoons? That would be former "Brady Bunch" actor Barry Williams against "Partridge Family" actor and bad-boy Danny Bonaduce; and one-rap-wonder Robert Van Winkle (aka Vanilla Ice) versus "Different Strokes" recidivist criminal Todd Bridges. All were supposed to wear headgear and fight three, two-minute rounds.

Of course, none of these fights would have been a reality were it not for money and the media. More than 300 media credentials were distributed for the fight between the daughters of Ali and Frazier. Pre-fight hype reached every medium, including the Internet. Without the media, the fight could not have occurred.

Ditto for "Celebrity Boxing." Neither Harding nor Jones is a trained fighter, yet they agreed to enter the ring because Fox, a media giant, guaranteed the purse and media mogul Dick Clark produced the event.

At the professional level, however, the media have been conspicuously absent when it comes to raising the hard questions regarding Tyson. Several writers have taken stands against Mad Mike's quest for a license, but there's been no outcry about his meds and how they relate to his metal health, or the role they should play in any commission granting him (or any fighter) a license to maim.

Professional fighting is the only sport whose ultimate goal is to give your opponent a concussion—to bounce the other guy's brain against his skull, to cause at least some minor brain damage so that the opponent looses consciousness. When a cut opens on the opponent's face—over the eye, for example—the fighter is told by his handlers to hit the cut, open it further, and close the eye. As a sport, professional boxing should be abolished.

I wish that no one would give Mike a license to fight, ever again. But I hope he does get competent psychiatric and counseling treatment.

I also wish that the Fox farce would not encourage imitators, and that none of the buffoons or bimbos suffers serious aftereffects of this mediafactured event.

Most importantly, I hope that neither the foolishness of amateurs Harding and Jones, nor the egoism of the Ali-Frazier daughters encourages other girls to try the fight game. Let's not get ready to rumble.

A version of this essay appeared in The Chapel Hill News.

Related Sites:

• http://www.fox.com/boxing

-- March 14, 2002

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