Boxing A Noble Art?

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Is Boxing compatible with socialism? Those socialists who saw the recent Marvin Hagler vs. Roberto Duran fight, in which both men picked up $10 million each, would certainly have pondered on this. Would Boxing as "an example of the aggressive import of capitalist relationships" wither away in a socialist society rather like the State itself is expected to?

My own view is that Boxing has nothing to do with the com. petitiveness of capitalism, but is in fact one of the oldest of sports - what Byron called the "Noble Art" - and is something that socialists can consistently support.

The usual reply to this view is that Boxing is about big capitalists, Mickey Duff for example, pitting working class boys against each other and picking up rich pickings in the process. Of course this is all true. But doesn't this hold for every mass institutional activity that takes place within capitalism? Racing, football, tennis, darts - you name it - they have all provided lucrative careers for participants and parasites alike.

over our own feminist movetoni has provided large profits tur certain publishing compenies who have soed market potentia! in i Indord, the recent Howell Hoper o Sporting Agents shows the wide net that tre Mart MeCornack's cover in making their corn.

Boxing is no exception to inis.

This does not, however deny the artistic and cultural importance of Boxing as a " a ativityry human sporting Maybe those hostile to the game could inform us which country won the most Boxing Olympic Goids in Moscow in 1980?

The answer is non-capitalist Cuba. A society not driven at all by the desire to market aggressive profit-making as a human value.

So is the popularity of the sport simply because it is good fun watching two guys (usually proletarian) bashing each other about? Is this Boxing's raison d'etre?

Nothing could be further from the truth. The real appeal of the game lies in the contraposition of two fundamental drives that have characterised all preceding human societies.

In short, the aggression of the barbarian who wishes to achieve his goal through the bludgeon (the fighter) and the skill of the scientist who displays his expertise and finesse (the boxer) in order to tame the animal (the fighter).

Surely those who A discussion piece by Gerry Hoffa second Ray Leonard vs. Roberto Duran battle saw a classic cameo of this type of struggle. Leonard, the artist displayng a whole panoply of boxing technique, conquering the brute who wished to succeed through sheer aggression alone.

Moreover, such epics have been fought throughout the history of the game, and socialists have been involved too! In 1884 during the bare-knuckle days a member of the newly-formed Social Democratic F'ederation, 'Rapier' Ray Attwell, challenged the then champion, John L. Sullivan, based in New York.

Before Attwell crossed the Atlantic, H.M. Hyndman wrote in 'The Social Democrat" -"It is typical of the abstemious Fabian lilies that they condemn 'the Noble Art'. . Our champion, Attwell, represents cultured athleticism that cannoi be matched by Sullivan' • thuggery.. All socialists should support his quest.

Too small

in tne event, the 5' 8" Attwell was too small for the American piani. But Hyndman was eertainly right to draw out the connection between the Fabians' hostility to Boxing with their later hypocritical class pacifism.

It seems that even today the notion of struggle, whether in a physical and sporting sense or in a social class sense, is just too unpalatable for those elements who have absorbed the dominant ethos of a hypocritical liberalism.

Finally, there is no reason to doubt at all that Boxing will flourish even more under a socialist society.

New issue now out!

Heffer and Kinnock

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The fight in Fatah.

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