MMA has been quite overt about its political partisanship as of late, according to one of the most widely known analysts within mixed martial arts. This was discussed during a recent interview conducted by acclaimed MMA great Demetrious Johnson when he had Luke Thomas as a guest on his personal YouTube channel. On his channel Mighty, Luke Thomas got into which part of the political continuum the UFC is nestled in, Thomas said,
“Dude, like let’s just be honest, it’s become an aggressively right-wing sport. I bring this up to say, some people will like that, some people will not like that. I’m not trying to tell anybody they don’t have to like that if they, in fact do. In fact, what I’m quite aware of is even if I did, they wouldn’t listen. It’s not really about that.”
“It’s not just because someone has a separate set of politics. Believe it or not, I have actually just endless people in my orbit who don’t share my political opinions on a personal level, it’s not even that. It’s just that it has gotten to a point where they’ll espouse things and say things and then do things that I just don’t rock with.”
“It makes it a little bit harder for me to personally connect to their stories. But I want to be very clear about this, that’s different than me saying you shouldn’t do that. That’s not what I’m saying. I only live for myself. That’s what I mean.”
MMA discourse and what causes “a little bit of friction” for Thomas
To Thomas’ characterization of the politics that exist so prominently within mixed martial arts today, Demetrious Johnson responded,
“The beautiful thing about like you having your platform, I have my platform, somebody else has a platform, they can follow somebody’s story. If somebody does something that you don’t agree with, you’re like oh, f**k that guy. Like I’m not going to follow his story. I mean why the f**k? I mean sometimes I do it.”
Thomas further clarified his positioning by offering up an example as he retorted,
“Again, this is just living for me. This is not ‘this is how everybody needs to live.’ That’s not it. Ilia Topuria as an athlete is like, I mean can’t miss for me. Like when he’s fighting, it’s like let’s f***ing go, right. Because it’s going to be big stakes and more often than not, he’s going to do something that is probably going to be spectacular one way or the other.”
“He’s just important. Like I can’t wait for his next fight. However getting out there and praising the Nelk Boys for a disaster of an interview with a guy wanted for war crimes put a bad taste in my mouth. So that kind of thing, it makes it; a little bit of friction for me.”