Street fighting men

The latest fads have turned violence into entertainment, with the risk of permanent injury or death no deterrent. Aside from the lure of prize money, what’s driving people to compete?

- BY GREG BRUCE

Standing by the deck in Dan “Hangman” Hooker's Auckland backyard, the referee laid out the rules: no hammer fists, slaps, eye pokes or tackling.

No excessive clinching. Fights would last a maximum of one minute. “Basically,” he said, “just stand and bang in the circle.”

He said the judges’ decision would be final: “There's no fuckin’ arguing about the decision. What the judges say goes. I don't think many of the fights are going to go to decision.”

Hooker, who has become internationally famous as a fighter in the multibillion-dollar mixed martial arts (MMA) organisation UFC, added, “Don't tackle them into my bushes; don't tackle them into my bricks. We're all here for the same reason, to stand here and trade punches. Toe the line ... We're here cause we want to fight. We want to throw down.”

Hooker's backyard scraps are a cousin of new phenomenon “run it straight”. Seeded and promoted via social media, run it straight is a one-on-one tackle game that’s bubbled up from yards and school grounds.

The phenomenon has spawned multiple professional leagues with different names but the same basic idea: two men running directly at each other at full speed, each hoping to smash the other over in order to win cash prizes.

Run it straight’s popularity has renewed attention to the sport of men concussing each other for cash, although, of course, the genre is nothing new. From boxing and MMA fights, there’s long been money in pain - and an audience for it.

In Depression-era America, people would compete in dance marathons that could last weeks or sometimes even months, hoping to win cash prizes as high as the equivalent of a year’s wages. Richard Elli- ott, a promoter of such events, noted that although audiences didn’t turn up to “see ‘em die’, they did come “to see ‘em suffer”, and to watch them fall down.