BY WADE KELLER

This special republishing of a vintage article from PWTorch Newsletter archives features my cover story from 15 years ago this week in issue #364 looking at the attempts - some successful - to ban UFC. It's a very different moment in time for what was then a sport in its infancy but now has become a staple of the sports culture among young men. For those unaware of how close UFC came to not existing at all, this article puts in perspective how lucky MMA fans are that it overcame such obstacles and made the necessary changes to gain acceptance.

HEADLINE: Politicians, media attempting to ban UFC
SUBHEADLINE: Ultimate Ultimate banned from scheduled arena, may face worse problems next year

On the verge of becoming the nation's most profitable pay-per-view commodity, the ultimate fight style events have been backed against the ropes by the press and politicians across the country. The damaging blows thrown the past three weeks could lead to an all-out ban of UFC style events on pay-per-view television.

TCI, the biggest cable power in the country, says it is considering banning ultimate fight style events from their cable systems starting Jan. 1, 1996. The P.R. pressure could lead other cable companies to follow.

In a story that headlined the Dec. 2 Denver Post and was the lead story on Denver late night news broadcasts over the weekend, Denver Mayor Wellington Webb found a loophole in its contract with the National Western Events Center. It says that Denver must approve all events ahead of time that run in the building. Although never previously enforced, the mayor used that clause to prevent the Dec. 16 Ultimate Ultimate event from emanating from that arena. Colorado governor Roy Romer praised Mayor Wellington for his decision. Wellington was originally turned on to the perceived problem of ultimate fighting when Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. and Ben Nighthorse Campbell, R-Colo. sent him a letter Nov. 21 urging him to ban the event.

Ultimate Fight Championship (UFC) officials now must scramble to override the mayor's decision on legal grounds or find a new arena from which to broadcast their event.

Even so, the problem could get even more serious if TCI and other cable companies refuse to carry no-rules "ultimate" fights next year.

UFC, Extreme Fighting Championship (EFC), and World Combat Championship (WCC) promoters have had to contend with opponents of their events for a while, but nothing yet compared to the media barrage they faced in recent weeks which included everything from USA Today to Newsweek to the Rocky Mountain News.

"It looks vicious," UFC champ Ken Shamrock told Newsweek (Nov. 27). "But we're not out there to beat each other up. We're out there to compete." Responded Newsweek, "To compete at beating each other up, anyway."

Said columnist Phil Mushnick of the New York Post (Nov. 20): "Kicking a man when he is down - literally - is well within the rules... The winner is declared when an opponent surrenders or is knocked unconscious. Death counts as a loss."

Said sports columnist Woody Paige of the Denver Post (Dec. 1): "I have seen the "ultimate fighting championship' and the fact is there is a total disregard for the sport and the participants. Any lukewarm body will be thrown into the pile. The "ultimate fighting championship' is a modern day human sacrifice."

Said columnist Chuck Green of the Denver Post (Dec. 3): "The concept is disgusting, the entertainment is morbid, the audience is sick. In the meantime, the political reporters and talk show hosts and sports columnist are free to promote the event - and themselves - and wallow in the bloodshed."

Said Colorado Gov. Roy Romer to the Rocky Mountain News (Dec. 2): "I believe there is too much violence in our society, and I do not believe that we should condone events which glorify it."

New York State Sen. Roy Goodman, who worked to get Battlecade's Extreme Fighting Championship banned from the Brooklyn Armory last month told Newsweek (Nov. 27): "We have tapes in which one contestant is downed on the mat and another kneels on top of him and either kicks him in the head or punches him until he's virtually knocked senseless. This is a clear invitation to permanent injury, if not fatality."

Said Rep. Roy M. Goodman in a Nov. 26 editorial in the New York Daily News: "Ultimate fighting is animalistic and extremely dangerous to the contestants. It is no more than human cockfighting, and it has no place in a civilized society... As the contract between contestants and promoters says, ultimate fighting is not like boxing or martial arts. There is no form of protection that will make it safe and no form of regulation that will make it acceptable."

Said George Will in his Nov. 27 syndicated column: "(Paying customers) include slack- jawed children whose parents must be cretins, and raving adults whose ferocity away from the arena probably does not rise above muttering epithets at meter maids."

What is clear is that whether they are truly opponents, proponents, or neutral on the issue of banning UFC, this is regarded as an easy issue on which to score political points, sometimes hypocritically.

For instance, WCW event promoter Zane Bresloff criticized the events in his home town of Denver. "The very first match one guy got his teeth kicked out," Bresloff told the Rocky Mountain News (Dec. 3). "We thought these guys would have at least mouth guards. They didn't. It's real and it's violent. Probably about 15 minutes into the first fight, I decided, "Never again'... I originally thought, "Wow, martial arts, Jean-Claude Van Damme and that sort of thing.' But this isn't martial arts. It's whoever chokes the quickest and whoever knocks out the quickest. I'd rather see a fight at a bar."

Bresloff, though, twenty-four hours after UFC6 was in a hotel bar in Huntington Beach, Calif. enthusiastically introducing pro wrestling journalists to UFC6 finalist and arguably the most brutal, unhinged fighter to ever step foot in an ultimate fight, Tank Abbott. He offered to help set up interviews with Tank and had dinner with Abbott and several others involved with UFC6.

Campbell McLaren, programming vice president for the Semaphore Entertainment Group (promoters of the UFC) responds to his critics. "People tend to react to this emotionally and disregard the facts. The facts are, we have a tremendous safety record, we take exceptional procedures to safeguard our fighters, and it's something that goes on around the world under a variety of names. It's new only to America."

Donald Zuckerman, producer of Battlecade's EFC event, wrote in the New York Daily News editorial page: "Fact is, the grappling techniques of Greco-Roman wrestling, tae kwon do, judo, and Olympic free-style wrestling (all Olympic sports) do not lend themselves well to the handicap of stuffed gloves. Extreme fighting combines these sports and boxing, without gloves. Even boxers acknowledge that gloves do more to protect the hands of the fighter than the head of the opponent."

Newsweek also acknowledged that argument, saying: "Fighting without gloves is actually, safer, proponents claim. Striking with bare knuckles hurts an assailant's hands, thus skull-punching is a self-limiting proposition, or so the reasoning goes."

The skepticism at the end of that sentence along with the fact that many critics' arguments involve the "bare knuckles" nature of the fights are examples of how reactionary and limited many critics' knowledge base is.

At the same time, the ultimate fighters aren't doing themselves many favors.

Said UFC finalist Paul Varelands in the Rocky Mountain News (Dec. 3): "Look at boxing. There are padded things on the hands, but you're getting punched in the head all night long. With us, you get hit a couple of times and you're going to go out. The most humane way to end a battle is quickly and viciously... If they outlaw it here, it'll just go overseas. This is not going to stop. In Japan, they have stuff that makes this look like child's play."

Said UFC champion Steve Jennum: "It really opens people's eyes. It lets them know just what a realistic fight looks like."

This controversy, including the readiness of politicians and media moguls to ban these events and the kneejerk concurrence by journalists, some of whom have never seen an actual ultimate fight, should be of great concern to promoters of worked pro wrestling.

Extreme Championship Wrestling, considered a cutting-edge upstart promotion, is looking to pay-per-view as its long-term ticket to profitability, if not viability. Although character development, compelling interviews, creative post-production, and graceful highspot wrestling are among its strong points, its blood-letting, table-breaking, ultra-violent style is what most fans of ECW think of first. With this high profile debate over the glorification of violence, pay-per-view distributors might be more hesitant to draw attention to themselves by promoting an an ECW event.

The WWF and WCW also have to contend with the precedent-setting prospect of cable companies banning programs from pay-per-view that they see as too violent, no matter how profitable. Request TV attended the WWF's Survivor Series and reacted with outrage at the use of chairs at the end of the main event. Request TV's anti-violence policy has WWF officials feeling handcuffed as they tinker with the formula of their product.

One way or another, the Dec. 16 UFC event will take place on pay-per-view. With all of this publicity, it will do its best buyrate to date. If the consumers like what they see and believe the politicians are overreacting, it could help UFC's cause. UFC will certainly be on its best behavior Dec. 16. They will go out of their way to show the precautions they take to be sure their promotion is that of sport, not human cockfighting.

If people buy the event and like it, and proper safety precautions are taken by promoters, argues Battlecade's Zuckerman, then "it is certainly Sen. Goodman's right to deplore what we are doing, but not to deplore our right to do it."

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