BREAKING NEWS
August 1, 2006
Illegal, Violent Teen Fight Clubs Face Crackdown
The video shows two bare-knuckle brawlers brutally punching each other until one slumps, beaten, to the ground. The fight doesn't end there: The victor straddles the chest of his fallen opponent, firing rights and lefts into his face.
This is not a scene from the Brad Pitt movie Fight Club. Instead, it involves real teenagers in an underground video called Agg Townz Fights 2. Their ring: the grassy schoolyard of Seguin High School here. They're engaged in a disturbing extreme sport that has popped up across the nation: teen fight clubs.
These illegal, violent, often bloody bouts pit boys and girls, some as young as 12, in hand-to-hand combat. Some bouts are more like bare-knuckle boxing matches, with the opponents shaking hands before and after they fight. Others are gang assaults out of ultra-violent films such as A Clockwork Orange, with packs of youths stomping helpless victims who clearly don't want to fight.
"When you watch the video, you're appalled by the savagery, the callousness, the lack of morality," says James Hawthorne, deputy police chief of Arlington's West District, who's leading a crackdown on fight clubs. "This is an indictment of us as a society. It's not a race issue or a class issue. It's a kids issue. Many fight-club brawlers are suburban high school kids, not gang members or juvenile criminals."
Fight clubs tap into a dark, nihilistic "part of the American psyche fascinated by the spectacle of blood and violence," says Orin Starn, cultural anthropology professor at Duke University who teaches about sports in American society.
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Main Page
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Fight Club Brawls Reflect a Growing Global Aggression
By: Pete Kendall, August 1, 2006 |
The violent events of this month have occurred in rapid succession and in unrelated areas of the world. Because they represent a larger and stronger wave degree than the prvious waves of the 1970s and 1930s, they are occurring sooner in the decline and will ultimately be more destructive.
The Elliott Wave Theorist, August 2006
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Fight clubs appear to be a street-level manifestation of the geopolitical confrontations The Elliott Wave Theorist covered in this month’s “Socionomics and the Sudden Wave of Violence.” The collage on page 17 offers a sampling of the negative mood expressions, ranging from ‘North Korea Launches Five Missles” to “’Jihad’ on Ethiopia.” Criminal expressions of the same violent streak were first discussed here on July 16 when we pointed to a rash of homicides and an emerging crime wave among juveniles in various parts of the U.S. and the world. According to recent accounts, Memphis, (Commercial Appeal, July 30), Philadelphia (Philadelphia Daily News, July 26) and Sacromento (Sacramento Bee, July 25) can be added to the lengthening list of cities where crime is on the rise after a long period of decline. In Orlando, the Associated Press reports that the 2006 total is already within three victims of the 1982 record. So, a new mark beyond the one that was established at the end of the last bear market is all but assured.
The “fight club” phenomenon speaks for itself. It’s “nihilistic.” It’s spontaneous, youth oriented and shockingly anti-social, social behavior. Put simply, it’s a bear market, one that is still giving birth to whole new bear market mediums. |
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