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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 April 2022
Pete Dexter once described boxing promoter Don King, asuccessfully rehabilitated ex-convict, as someonewho ‘for 15 cents will put boys in the ring andgirls on the street’ (cited in Johnson and Long,2008: 122).
More of this book has been about boxing than intended.I have participated in boxing training and enjoyedit, but I am uncomfortable about the sport ofboxing. This may be the result of queasiness, fear,or just knowledge of the medical evidence againstit. Sex work is not unproblematic either. Supportingthe right of people to do what they want with theirbodies applies equally to the bodywork of boxing andto prostitution. In an unequal society, the want of‘15 cents’ may put you in the ring or on your back.Thinking back to the gladiators in Chapter Two, arethose who take 15 cents infami or are they exercising theirlibertas?
Throughout the book, parallels have been noted betweensport and crime. We have discussed the links withmasculinity, the idea that sport is a cause of, orcure for, crime and the overlaps where crime occursin or near sport, or have nothing to do with sportbut simply feature sportspeople as victims,offenders, witnesses or even bystanders. Thereasoning in R v Brown(1975) shows how comments about boxing (andfootball, rugby and ice hockey) were deployed toargue about the lawfulness of the participants ingay sado-masochistic sex. Lord Jauncey ofTullichettle opined: ‘None of the appellants howeverhad any medical qualifications and there was, ofcourse, no referee present such as there would be ina boxing or football match.’ Lord Mustill, lookingat the decided cases, found that boxing ‘standsoutside the ordinary law of violence because societychooses to tolerate it’.
It is strongly argued that sport is not a thing initself that can cause or cure anything, but is apart of life that sociology is already, and forever,exploring and that criminology should explore. Herethe intention has been to encourage criminologistsof all stripes to add sport to their consideration,as sport and crime are the same – not just connectedor parallel, but the same. ‘Crime has no ontologicalreality’, said Hulsman (1986: 64).
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