11 November 2011

Regulation of combat sports to be massively expanded?

| johnboy
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kickboxing

The Economic Development Directorate is asking for your thoughts on their draft policy paper: “The Regulation of Combat Sports in the ACT”.

It looks like they’re looking to massively expand the scope of regulation, going from just boxing and kickboxing to:

    – professional boxing;
    – amateur boxing;
    – kyokushin (ring karate);
    – kickboxing;
    – muaythai;
    – mixed martial arts;
    – kung fu (wu shu);
    – sanda;
    – ju Jitsu and Brazilian ju jitsu;
    – judo; and
    – shooto

And the Minister under these proposals will have the power to regulate pretty much anything he wants to.

Submissions close 23 December 2011.

[Photo by KellBailey CC BY]

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Waiting For Godot10:47 am 14 Nov 11

Actually, the ACT government tried to ban kickboxing and other combat sports in the early 1990s. It was the Follett Labor Government, and it came just after circuses and rodeos were banned. A local entrepeneur, Greg Hinton advertised a kickboxing tournament and the minister – Terry Connolly – brought in legislation trying to ban it. Greg and the local boxing/bodybuilding community gained an injunction, the law was thrown out and the tournament went ahead.

Looks like the Labor left and their buddies in The Greens will finally be getting their revenge.

devils_advocate said :

Pre-HIH insurance catastrophe, it was possible to have a decent contest and people realised that, being based on martial arts, contests sometimes involved blood and broken bones. I still maintain the injuries were far less frequent or serious than rugby.

I agree 100% with this, also being someone who likes to put on a uniform and then punch \ kick people as a form of recreation and training the number injuries I have seen would be far less than the average number of injuries which happen in any other “softer” sports and there is a damn fine reasons for it.

I won’t claim to know how other martial art schools teach, but at the one I go too people are always paired up against others of a similar skill level. Because people are at a similar level they know how to properly defend themselves against their opponent. Furthermore a person doing a martial art usually know (through training) how to take a blow or a fall in a way which doesn’t injure themselves, for example through tensing certain muscles if a strike is going to make contact or twisting themselves around whilst falling to absorb the force of the fall.

When we spar, every person is doing so by choice. Any person could ask to leave at any time. If one side does get injured the fight stops.

Why is this even being considered by the government? What need is there? It’s almost like the ACT government is just looking for things regulate for the sake of it.

devils_advocate9:47 am 14 Nov 11

poetix said :

Although the idea of cardiganed ACT bureaucrats working their way through the rules of all these martial arts is quite funny.

LOL, as someone who has both a cardigan and a black belt, I find that comment overly judgmental!

Seriously, granting the inept chief minister powers in this area is ridiculous. It’s just going to lead to more and more ridiculous policies that achieve the exact opposite of what they were intended to do.

To a large extent, the private market has already stepped in and intervened to ruin ‘martial arts’ and turn it into a sport. Pre-HIH insurance catastrophe, it was possible to have a decent contest and people realised that, being based on martial arts, contests sometimes involved blood and broken bones. I still maintain the injuries were far less frequent or serious than rugby. Now, many of the contests are basically no-contact, and pretty pointless, like a game of tag, due mainly to insurance reasons.

It is in everybody’s best interests for martial arts training AND competitions – however defined – to occur in supervised settings with people who have some idea of what they’re doing, and who are required (by virtue of insurance) to have basic first aid training. No regulation will stop people getting together consensually to beat the p–s out of each other. Imposing stupid regulations (and coming from the cheif minister, they WILL be stupid) will give rise to unsupervised and unofficial training/fighting which will by definition be uninsured and more dangerous.

I would be sad to see this.

I understand there’s a new game gaining popularity in parts of west Africa which involves men standing naked with sjamboks trying to whip either other in the genitals.

Would probably be best if we didn’t have that here.

Stevian said :

Mixed Martial Art cage matches to the death.

I’d pay to see that

How about MMA cage fights with Tasers in the fighters’ gloves?

http://www.totalprosports.com/2011/09/14/shockfights-introduces-tasers-to-mma-video/

Mixed Martial Art cage matches to the death.

I’d pay to see that

Henry82 said :

Deref said :

I don’t care what consenting adults do – as long as they have enough insurance to make sure I don’t have to pay to clean up the mess.

exactly.

1

Although the idea of cardiganed ACT bureaucrats working their way through the rules of all these martial arts is quite funny.

Deref said :

I don’t care what consenting adults do – as long as they have enough insurance to make sure I don’t have to pay to clean up the mess.

exactly.

Nanny Katy strikes again!

Does anyone else think that this is leading to our progressive government banning sports like boxing, etc?

If consenting adults aren’t allowed to exchange plastic bags in public, what chance is there that people will be allowed to punch and kick each other for recreational purposes. It doesn’t matter that everybody involved in these sports is a responsible adult who has agreed to be involved, or an appropriately supervised junior.

The world is full of people who will, with the best of intentions, do everything they can to enforce their point of view on everybody else. Smug, superior, asinine buffoons who think they are the smartest people in the room , with a mantra of “Just relax and comply…I know what is best for you…”

I don’t care what consenting adults do – as long as they have enough insurance to make sure I don’t have to pay to clean up the mess.

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