Few humans box, yet few human activities have, over so many centuries and in so many civilizations, generated such intense interest, attention, and controversy as boxing. Its fans passionately celebrate what author A. J. Leibling called "the sweet science,"while its detractors relentlessly vilify it as a brutal undertaking. What is clear is that many people are passionately attracted to the ring, its rituals, and its results. Many writers have embracedboxing as a subject, sometimes to extol its benefits, sometimes to bemoan its consequences,sometimes to tell its stories. Boxing presents its audiencewith contradictions. Some celebrate its graceful, majestic appeal while denying its bitter, brutal truths. Others decry its dangers and destructiveness.In truth, boxing involves commitment, conditioning, endurance of pain, and an understanding of defeat. An ancient enterprise, boxing is an extreme athletic undertaking. Such extremity makes boxing a particularly exceptional subject of study, even now as its popularity fades.What accounts for its attraction? Why, despite its well-documented dangers, doesboxing continue to captivate?What accounts for its special character? Why are representations of and arguments about boxing so compelling and powerful? What about boxing moves us so profoundly to view, read, think, and write about it? Preparation: The following task is basedon the Plecedingthree textsby Gordon Marino, GeorgeWill, and Hugh Mcllvanney. Beforeyou begin to plan your own essay/ rereadthese texts. Then take sometime to carefully compareand contrastthe texts in light of eachother. Introduction: In the aftermathof thel962death of Benny Paretin a boxing match with Emile Griffith, Norman Cousins wrote: "The crowd wants the knockouU it wants to see a man hurt." Assignment: After carefulconsideration of the introduction, write an essayin which you either defend or questionthe socialmores that give rise to sporting eventsthat featurethe possibility of grievousinjury or sudden death. Cite Marino, Will and Mcllvanney in your essayin ways that serveyour argument. In addition,ryoumight" alsowant to use two other sources(Hazlitt and Mailer)' : Source A (Vlarino) Source B (Wiii) Source C (Mcllvanney) SourceD (Hazlitt) SourceE (Mailer) Gordon Marino Boxing and the Cool Halls of Academe A formerboxer, Gordon Marino is a professorof philosophy,curator of the KierkegaardLibrary, and assistantfootball coach at St.Olaf Colleqe. He also trains amateur boxers. Marino published this articlein 2004. "Know thyself" was the Socratic dictum, but of making myself an object lessonby noting that I Tyler Durden, the protagonist in the movie Fight had boxed for years and still seemedto be able to Club, asks,"How much can you know about your- put my thoughts together.That earned me a smile self if you've never been in a fight?" Although and a pat on the wrist. trainers of the bruising art wince at the notion that If I were thrown in the ring today and had to boxing equals fighting, there can be no doubt that defend the art of self-defenseagainst the sneering boxing throws you up against yourself in reveal- attitude of some academicians,I would have at ing ways. Take a left hook to the body or a trip to leasttwo colleaguesi^ my corner.InBody €t SouI: the canvas, and you soon find out whether you Notes of an ApprenticeBoxer (Oxford University 10 are the kind of person who will ever get up. Press,2004) the MacArthur-award-winning Loic For a decade, I have been teaching both box- Wacquant,a sociology professorat New School ing and philosophy. My academic colleagues University, described the sentimental education have sometimesreacted to my involvement with that he received training for three years at a box- the sweet sciencewith intellectual jabs and con- ing gym in Chicago's South Side. ProfessorWac- tf, descension.A few years ago at a philosophy con- quant, who earned his red badge of courageby ference,I mentioned that I had to leave early to competing in the famous Chicago Golden Gloves go back to the campus to work with three of my tournament, insists that boxing clubs are sanctu- boxers from the Virginia Military Institute who aries of order, peace,and tranquility in a helter- were competing in the National Collegiate Box- skelter world. According to Wacquant, whose 20 ing Association championships. Shockedto learn ring name was "Busy Louie," the gym is "a school that there was such a college tournament, one of moralityin Durkheim's senseof the term, that is professor scolded, "How can someone commit- to say a machinery designedto fabricate the spirit ted to developing minds be involved in a sport of discipline, group attachment, respect for oth- in which studentsbeat one another's brains out?" ers as for self, and autonomy of the will that are 25 I explained that the competitors wore protective indispensable to the blossoming of the pugilistic headgear and used heavily padded L6-ounce vocation." The machinery often works so well gloves in competition as well as in practice, but that it forges a kind of mutual affection that is ab- shewas having none of it. "Headgearor not," she sentfrom the cool halls of academe.When he left replied, "your brain is still getting rattled. Worse Chicago for a postdoctoralposition at Harvard, yet, you're teaching violence." Wacquant fell into a terrible funk about leaving I countered that if violence is defined as pur- his fistic family. He writes, "In the intoxication posefully hurting another person, then I had of my immersion, I even thought for a while of seenenough of that in the philosophical arena to aborting my academiccareer to 'turn pro' and last a lifetime. At the university where I did my thereby remain with my friends from the gym 35 graduate studies,colloquia were nothing lessthan and its coach,DeeDee Armour, who had become academicgunfights in which the goal was to fire a secondfather to me." off a question that would sink the lecturer low. I Carlo Rotella,an associateprofessor of English pointed out, "I've even seenphilosophers have to and director of American studies at Boston"Col- restrain themselvesfrom clapping at a comment legeand the author of CutTime:AnEducation st the that knocked a speakeroff his pins and made him Fights(Houghton Mifflin,2003), spent a year tak- feel stupid." I followed up by arguing that get- ing notes in the gym of the former heavy'weight ting and taking punches makes you feel safer in champion Larry Holmes. Rotella contends that the world, and that people who do not feel eas- life is all about hurting and getting hurt, and that ily threatened are generally less threatening. She there are few coursesin life that prepare you for wasn't buying any of it. Then I made the mistake the whirring blades outside your door like box- Chapter7 Boxing rz7 ing. In the introduction to one of the best boxing someonewho has experienceddanger only vicari- books ever written, Rotella rernarks: ously, on the couch watching videos. "The deeper you get into the fights, the more br fact, boxing was a popular intercollegiate and you may discover about things that would seemat 145 sport until the early 1960s,when a fatality first blush to have nothing to do with boxing. Les- problems with semiprofessionals'posing as stu- sons in spacing and leverage, ot in holding part dents connted the sport out' In 1976collegeboxing of oneself in reserve even when hotly engaged, was resurrectedas a club sport, and now, under the are lessons not only in how one boxer reckons umbrella of USA Boxing (the governing body for with anotherbut also in how one personreckons 150 amateurboxing in the United States),the National 30 100 with another. The fights teach many such les- Collegiate Boxing Association includes about sons-about virtues and limits of ctaft, about the collegeteams. Every April sectional,regional, and need to impart meaning to hard factsby enfolding national championshipsare held. I recentlychatted them in stories and spectacle,about getting hurt with Maja Cavlovic, a female boxer from Estonia and getting old, about distanceand intimacy, and 155 who graduated from the Virginia Military Institute reflect- 105 especiallyabout education itself: Boxing conducts this spring. Apower puncher,Ms. Cavlovic an endlessworkshop in the teaching and leaming ed, "Boxing helped me learn how to control my of knowledge with consequences." emotions.You get in there and you are very afuaid, Still, I think the best defenseof boxing is Aristo- and then all of your training takesover." telian. In his NlchomacheanEthics, Aristotle offers 160 The two-time heavyweight champion George 110 his famous catalog of the moral virtues. When- Foreman concurs with Ms. Cavlovic' In addition ever I teach this section of the EthicsI always be- to being an immensely successfulbusinessman, gin by asking students what they think are the Mr. Foreman directs a large youth club outside ingredients of moral virtue. Respect,compassion, of Houston with a vibrant boxing program. Since honesty,justice, and tolerance always fly quickly 165 Mr. Foremanalso is a preacherI askedhim, "How 115 up onto the board, often'followed by creativify do you reconcileteaching kids to deliver a knock- and a senseof humor. I usually need to prod to out blow with jesus' injunction that we should elicit "courage." And so I hector,"How can you turn the other cheek?"Mr. Foremanchuckled and be consistentlyhonest or just if you don't have the explained, "To be successfulin the ring you have mettle to take ahit?" 170 to get control of your emotions-that includes an- 120 Aristotle writes that developing a moral vir- ger.And the kids who stick with it in the gym are tue requires practicing the choices and feelings much lessviolent than when they camein through appropriate to that virtue. Accordingly, colleges the door." today often offer a smorgasbord of workshop- Americans for the most part live in a culture like events to help develop the virtue of tolerance, 175 of releasein which passion and spontaneity are 125 for example, by making students more comfort- worshipped.