Overall, has boxing been good or bad for society?

Neither.
Boxing is entertainment, like all sports.
It's never cured a cancer or grew hair on a bald head.
It's just entertainment.

 

As civilized as society may appear, most people don't know what century it is.
People are still very primitive, as is boxing. However, as dangerous as boxing is
it has evolved out of the old gladiator days to bareknuckle brawl etc.
Boxing is good though , because we all love it right.

 

Your examples prove my point.
Entertainment has a neutral effect on society because it's perceived value is subjective.
I would rather go bear hunting than go to the theater.
For me bear hunting would be fun. An evening at the theater would be boring.
Some people will have the opposite reactions.

 

I look at things like boxing and prostitution as two raw, honest trades. The embodiment of human nature. In any job role you're partaking in aggressive, ruthless competition, whether for personal advancement or for your company. Everything we do, we do for wealth and ***. Anyone taking the moral high ground is full of ****ing ****.

And on the ethnic point i'd say it's a double edged sword. Sport is the racial equalizer...you go in there and the best man wins. Boxing has made a lot of minorities heroes. Just look at Joe Louis. In a time of racial inequalities, a black man championed the West against the Nazi's. Symbolic than a mother ****er

 

Good and thoughtful thread. Good stuff OP

 

Well if you go all the way back to when Louis fought Schmeling to see how that fight brought together all americans...black and white old and young its quit a feat!!

Then fast forward about 40 years you can see how Tyson losing to Douglas had everyone on earth in shock!! I remember for the next few weeks thats all anyone talked about.

So boxing has always had an impact on society..maybe not here lately tho!

 

It's a sports science

As opposed to something like mma which is legalised savagery

There is skill in Brazilian jujitsu

But watching two men roll around on the floor for ten minutes ain't my cup of tea thnx

I'd argue boxing is good for society and my example would be someone like Bernard Hopkins

Who used the discipline of boxing to better himself

 

Well if you go all the way back to when Louis fought Schmeling to see how that fight brought together all americans...black and white old and young its quit a feat!!

Then fast forward about 40 years you can see how Tyson losing to Douglas had everyone on earth in shock!! I remember for the next few weeks thats all anyone talked about.

So boxing has always had an impact on society..maybe not here lately tho!

 

.....

 

But bear baiting was a part of the society who's theater gave us Shakespeare, Marlowe and Johnson. Now we have no bear baiting and our theater produces... nothing much. So was bear baiting really bad for society?

It was bad for the bears.

 

This is kind of my take on it!

 

I'm more concerned with society's detrimental effects upon boxing.

**** society, give me boxing.