FollowThis Saturday night will find many tuning into Pay-Per-View to watch the first women’s championship match in UFC history, featuring Ronda Rousey versus Liz Carmouche. Whether or not you’re a MMA fan, you’ve probably caught some of media excitement about the fight because this fight is HUGE not only for its historical significance, but for the fighters themselves. Rousey is a former Judo Olympian, the current UFC Women’s Bantamweight Champion, and the first woman officially signed onto UFC; Carmouche is the sixth best women’s bantamweight fighter and is also the first openly gay MMA fighter.
She Fights Like a Girl
Rousey won the Women’s Bantamweight Championship in Strikeforce (her title transferred with the absorption of Strikeforce into the UFC).
Ronda “Rowdy” Rousey is clearly the highlight and favorite of this match. And justifiably so – she took the women’s MMA by a storm, winning all six of her professional fights by submission within the first round. UFC owner Dana White admits that it was Rousey who changed his opinion of adding a women’s division from “never” to “it’s absolutely going to happen.”
He recently said at a news conference, “I’ve heard some flack about the girls. Their mitt work is better than half the (expletive) guys…I couldn’t be happier that I made the decision, and I couldn’t be happier with the fight.”
Of course there has been resistance to including women in the UFC, and not just from White. Maybe this is because people are uncomfortable seeing girls fight – like, really fight, not just cat fight. Rousey explained to Time magazine, “it’s women in a role that people aren’t used to seeing them. If you see a girl get popped in the face really hard, you’re like, Ooooooh. It’s so much more emotional.”
Women have only recently started to gain presence in the professional MMA sport. Until now there have been few major MMA organizations inviting women to compete, and there has been very little media coverage of women’s fights. They are certainly no less entertaining. Rousey told Time, “You never see a boring girl’s fight. Those girls have a chip on their shoulders. They have something to prove. They’re not in there to win matches. They’re in there to make a point. The point is that they deserve to be in there.”
The prospect of women in the UFC perhaps discomforts people also because it opens consideration of women fighting men. Though that hasn’t happened yet, Rousey could probably hold her ground. White said of Rousey, “I’d love to see guys go spar with her…She is tough, she is mean, and she is f—ing nasty.”
Rousey is not only the main attraction of this event for her talent, but also for her attractiveness. If people aren’t watching her fight to see her demonstrate Olympic-quality submission techniques, they’ll be watching because she’s a hot chick with a kick-ass body. She’s definitely not the waifishly thin, might-break-if-you-touch-her model type, nor is she the body-builder thick, pumped-up-on-steroids gym rat type. She is a normal but extraordinarily fit woman challenging the beauty standard.
In her Time interview, Rousey explains matter-a-factly, “if you’re a girl, f—ing looks help in every single industry out there. It’s just a f—ing fact of life.” As for her own popularity, Rousey tells HBO, “Ever since people started calling me a sex symbol, I haven’t had less sex in my life. It’s not really working out great for me. People bring that up all the time. I’m like, Look, you’re right. I probably get more attention fighting because of how I look, but if I didn’t know how to fight and I just looked the way I did, no one would know who I am.”
She’s Probably Lesbian – She IS Lesbian
The fighter who stepped up to challenge Rousey is no less remarkable. Liz “Girlrilla” Carmouche isn’t lit by a media spotlight as bright as Rousey’s, but she is content to let Rousey be the selling face of UFC 157 and spokesperson for women MMA fighters. On the other hand, she has received a lot of attention for her sexual orientation. As the first openly gay MMA fighter to enter the “octagon” (the UFC ring), she has unwittingly become a spokesperson for the LGBT community.
Previous to her MMA career, Carmouche served in the marines for five years under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. Once she was discharged it was a relief for her to be openly lesbian. “I’m the first ever openly lesbian UFC fighter and I never expected that it was gonna be a big deal,” Carmouche said to the Ultimate UFC Insider, “It’s just me; I was just trying to be myself and not hide anymore.”
Carmouche pursued and won her spot against Rousey through a campaign that involved her and her fans (who she termed “Lizbos”) bombarding White on Twitter. For Carmouche the fight is a opportunity to challenge herself, though she does appreciate the fight’s significance for sports history. For her viewers, though, she has inspired debate over which historic first is more important – a woman fighter or a gay fighter?
MMAJunkie.com writer Ben Fowlkes answers “They both represent pretty giant leaps for the UFC, but let’s be honest here and admit that in American sports culture – particularly in contact sports, like MMA – there’s a big difference between attitudes toward lesbian women and attitudes toward gay men…There just isn’t that same stigma attached to homosexuality in many women’s sports. If anything, a lot of people are ready to assume that a successful female athlete is a lesbian, whereas male athletes still use the mere accusation of homosexuality as a sort of nuclear option against each other.”
Though that may be the case, Carmouche is in herself a challenge to sexual discrimination and her fight will be a simultaneous step forward for both gays and women.
Place Your Bets
With all its cultural implications aside, the match should be a good one. Bets are on Rousey, also known as the “arm collector.” Rousey has won all six of her professional fights by arm-bar submission; it’s become her trademark move and so far none of her opponents have been able to escape it. Many wonder if Carmouche is simply cannon fodder for Rousey, just another arm to collect.
However, Carmouche doesn’t mind the 12-1 odds. “I like being the underdog,” USA Today quoted Carmouche, “It leaves room for surprises.”
Carmouche has won eight of her ten fights with a variety of finishes. She told Daily News, “I’m training for my fight. If I only trained for Ronda’s fight, whether I realize it or not, I’m giving her her fight and I’m just working on the defensive and that’s not my game. I’m working on implementing what I do, concentrating on everything that I’ve always done, instead of just becoming that person that only does arm-bar defense.”
Rousey doesn’t see Carmouche as an easy opponent. “She’s just a tough chick and very unpredictable,” she said to Daily News. Rousey is known for smack talking and psyching out her opponents, but this is not the case with Carmouche. Rousey told MMA Fighting, “I like Liz. She’s a Marine, I’m not going to be able to intimidate this girl…Because it’s a first-time event, because the first time for women to fight on a UFC card, and she’s the first openly gay fighter, it doesn’t need to be any squabbling or argument…It’s a positive event and I don’t mind there being no arguments. It sells itself. It’s history.”
And it’s true, no matter who wins, this fight will make history.
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