“He sawed off my hair with a dull knife”: The horrific misogyny of “Mixed Martial Arts” culture

[Daemonaquila]

5. It's not pervasive.

Scandal sells, but it's not the norm. I'm a woman who has done martial arts a long time, and I've trained with many of these dudes. They are not misogynists or brutal people as a rule. If anything, they love having a woman in the gym who can go toe to toe.

Obviously there are exceptions. There sometimes are whole schools of exceptions, thugs who train together, often being trained by other thugs. Let's not pretend that they represent most of these guys.

At a school I trained at for a long time, the Sifu would use a few of us to either knock sense into, or weed out, the overly cocky, aggressive newbie males who thought they knew everything and should be able to kick the ass of everyone but other overly cocky, aggressive, young males. One of the instructors, who looked like a sumo wrestler and whose power was utterly scary, used to have some of us demo with him in class, knowing he could safely kick us halfway across the room (flying is fun!). It was all about making it clear to the guys that they'd better put away their egos and work up to the women's abilities, and making it clear to newer women that they were fully able to rock and roll, and shouldn't feel at all intimidated due to gender.

There are idiots and jocks and thugs everywhere. Don't generalize the asshats to be the norm among genuinely great guys.