A NON RACIST Observation - The Super Athlete

[apeman]

[QUOTE=Matt Glach;49485]Ok, so I wanted to post this right after Bones won the title but I didn't because it seemed too dangerously close to racist, but I heard Eddie touch on it on the Rogan podcast so I figured I'd go for it now.

So to me, it seems that the sport of MMA is going to go the way of football and basketball in that the giant super athletic black man will eventually dominate the sport. I'm not saying that because I'm racist (im not), it's just a fact that black people have the genes and the background to be able to become those super athletes. We saw it in football and basketball, two speed/size/strength centric sports... at first it was mixed whites and blacks, and slowly the black people realized their potential and took over. We see the same thing happening in MMA with the rise of Jon Jones, Phil Davis, Anthony Johnson, Melvin Guillard, Alistair Overeem, Melvin Manhoef, and even Anderson Silva and Rashad Evans to some extent.

Im sorry, but this observation seems a bit strange as there tons of sports where black athletes do not dominate. Soccer is dominated, well the majority by white athletes if you wish to look at an athlete just for the purposes of speed and power take a look at Christiano Ronaldo. Rugby is just as tough as American Football, one of the biggest and strongest players in rugby is Sebastian Chabal, go on youtube and you will realise what i mean. Boxing, Wladimir and Vitali, even though people will disagree at how good they are and i truly believe it is bias because they are eastern European. Vitali beat Lennox Lewis for six rounds on the judges score cards before the cut, Lewis who was seen as the last great heavyweight was dominated in that fight. The greatest wrestler in the world is Aleksandr Karelin, who was an a freak of an athlete. InJiu Jitsu most of the greatest practitioners are white, well not white in the sense of American white nevertheless their skin colour is not black and can be considered white in the generality as most are from European lineage, they seem to dominate jiu jitsu. I do not think mixed martial arts will follow the same trend, as American sports, i personally think this a new type of fighter in the light heavyweight division, as most light heavyweights seem to be undersized compared to Jones, but now there are the likes of Bader, Davis, Gustaffson and Kingsbury. This is just an evolutionary step it has nothing to do with race but with the size of the light heavyweights.

[AJ Camacho]

So to me, it seems that the sport of MMA is going to go the way of football and basketball in that the giant super athletic black man will eventually dominate the sport. I'm not saying that because I'm racist (im not), it's just a fact that black people have the genes and the background to be able to become those super athletes.

The notion is inherently racist.

That is not a slight on you and your character, I'm sure you are an awesome dude but to arbitrarily use race as a categorical factor is racist in of itself. No negative statement has to be made. A racially based observation is just inherently racist.

Here's the deal. As of now, no geneticist can physically look at your DNA and tell what race you are. The physical attributes that we attribute to race are a small if not meaningless percentage of genetic information that defines who we are. Genealogy and genetic distributions are for more complex than the tone of someone's skin.

[Enrique "Kiko"]

Genealogy and genetic distributions are for more complex than the tone of someone's skin.

+1

[Mathew Schuck]

We can agree that the sport is constantly evolving right? Well I believe we as people are always evolving too. Right now it seems to be that the "giant super athletic black man" is ruling or will rule the sport world, but look in histories past, the opposite is true because they weren't given the tools or oppurtunity to do so. But in the last 30 or 40 years they have been given the right tools and opportunities to do so. And some of them have worked 10 times harder to be where they are. It has a little genetics but alot to do with opportunity. And remember there will always be some other races that will work harder or even be genetic freaks (Brock Lesner). As the "giant super athletic black man" gets better now, in 50 or 60 years the asians might adapt and become incredibly fast. And before you know it we are back to where Royce Gracie was in the first UFCs fighting 300lbs guys and quickly getting to their backs and choking them out.

[AJ Camacho]

The predilection for physically impressive people to gravitate towards sports isn't necessarily a genetically superior trait. Genetically superior traits are traits that allow you to have more kids than the other guy. If I'm the UFC Champ but I never have any kids then all of my genetic superiority just hit a genetic dead and went down the shitter. Yes, fame puts a man in a position to draw more women but how many guys will actually capitalize on that for the sake of maximizing their offspring?

That dude down the street in the trailer park pounding out water headed babies every 10 months through his fat wife's guts.. now that's the dude that's evolving the species.

Personally, I do believe that we will see more people of diverse cultural backgrounds in MMA. Fighting exists in all cultures, in some shape or form and the accessibility of the sport is immense. It takes no money to practice beating up your friends in the backyard and highschool wrestling programs are relatively cheap.

The only racial notion that I'll concede is that, on average, white and black people are larger than asian/indian racial groups. This potentially limits the talent pool for larger weight classes restricting it to large ass people. Generally speaking you could say that black and white guys have the size advantage for Heavyweight, but it could only be a generality since there are always exceptions to generalities (Cain). So why use an noneffective somewhat accurate racial generality when you can just say that only genetically larger people have the potential to be Heavyweights?

[Randy Butler]

I dont believe it has anything to do with race. I dont believe there will be many people that will be just one race as we evolve. I just think whoever works the hardest to be the best, will have the advantage. You could take the best athlete out there and put them up against someone no where near as good and they could win if the best athlete didnt train hard. Thats what i think matters the most when your talking about top athletes.

[Ryan_B]

I feel the reason so many African americans are athletic is due to selective breeding. I could be very wrong though, but when I was is high school, I remeber some of my black friends being in really treamdous shape and had never really worked out or played any sport. It always made me jealous.

[AJ Camacho]

Any pigeon breeders around? How many generations does it take to successfully breed in or out, desired genetic traits? I mean as a slave owner you would only be able to see 2 generations of your selective efforts before you died. I guess there could be a long collective effort by successive slave owners of each subsequent offspring but were the breeding habits of slaves that well recorded by most slave owners?

Clearly selective breeding of slaves was practiced, per Thomas Jefferson's writing on the topic, however I wonder how successful their efforts ultimately were. And I'd imagine that all that white man raping would kind of skew their efforts a bit too. I mean it doesn't seem like the genealogy of the super slave was really that well maintained or preserved. Personally I find the premise more interesting than the super athlete question.

[Derrick Johnson]

lol bones did whoop on both Bader and Hamill. Athletic ability is gonna be genetic but like bruva said above its about what kind of work you put in, what will one has to succeed. Its not that these guys are better athletes cause theyre black, im black and this shit makes me chuckle, comeon guy its 2011. Anderson Silva being heel hooked a prime example of masterful technique against a more athletic, and skilled oppenent.

[Derrick Johnson]

All i got to say is Bruce Lee......Waaaa taaaaah!!!!