Slap Fights – The Weird Side of the Internet – by Liam Sweeny.
MMA and Mixed Martial Arts is hot, and organizations like the UFC have taken off to tremendous success and visibility, not just the brand, but the sport itself. But some think that the fighting style is too dangerous, resulting in medical trauma that follow fighters the rest of their lives. But meet the new trend, complete with it’s own hype and it’s own concerns.
Slap fighting. It’s simple. Two people slap the sh*t out of each other. We’re talking power slaps here. Nuclear-tipped, depleted Uranium, tactical slaps. If you went down to Arkansas, and came from there, and let your hand ride the stratosphere and land on a face in Albany, that’s what we’re talking about here.
One of the cool, or maybe not-so-cool, things about slap fights is how much they’re just made for viral. I know for fact I could slack off work just being on my phone watching two guys slap the hell out of each other. To me, boxing is boring. Too much dancing, blocking shots; I mean they get in what, three good shots a round? A guy slaps a guy, and that guy just takes the slap, and then he gives one. At least that’s how I think it works. Yeah theoretically they could block. But then it’s boxing with fewer steps.
So yes, the doctors are concerned. They say it can cause CTE (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy), which is neurodegenerative, what you get from repeated blows to the head. This is also boxing, football, and anything where something hits your dome.
The people that host slap fights say that there are medical staff around. But is it enough?
I think that this is going to be huge because it’s spectacle. Also because literally anyone could do it on the street corner and someone pulls out a phone. No one needs production values when you got slaps.