Wtf is the minimum age to become a Thai prizefighter???

Phoobadin Yoohanngoh was victorious today, in his sophomore pro bout.

He is 14½ years old.

This child, who debuted exactly seven weeks ago (KO1ing his fellow debutant) was thrown in with a 22 year old with a 2-0 (2) record and fast-tracked into a 6-rounder after having amassed just 47 seconds worth of ring experience. It turned out fine, and Phoobadin took a UD (60-55, 60-54, and 59-55) but that is besides the point. On sheer principle, this is fucked up...and the fact that it was in the notorious Thailand (virtually youth exploitation capital of the combat sports world) is unsurprising.

We are nearly a century removed now from the cautionary tale of Nipper Pat Daly. HOW is this happening in 2018???

I have a 6 year old son. I have also boxed. So I have doubly keen perspective into this. If eight years (or a bit less even) down the road Lil Butt wanted to pick up the craft, maybe do some light sparring under supervision - and then if and only if he showed ample prowess and capability to defend himself - compete in the youth division of the amateurs, that is one thing. That said, I'd have serious trepidations about him, even upon reaching the legal delineation of young adulthood in the US, namely 18, paralleling the full extent of my own experience (gym wars/smokers)... and I wouldn't ever in a million years even dream of letting him so much as SPAR a grown-up twenty-something pro boxer while still in early adolescence. 14 is too fucking young for professional fighting, end of story, period. To hell with cultural sensitivity. To hell with moral relativism. This is wrong.

 

At least the Mexicans have the common decency to wait until their boys turn 16 before chucking them into the meat grinder of pro boxing.

(and Mexico is considered an outlier in the acceptability of pushing young people into the violence biz)

 

Even if his story doesn't end in that kind of immediately-tangible-results tragedy, mirroring the career of Nipper would be pretty goddamn sad in and of itself (though some idiots would probably consider that a good and desirable outcome).

Phoobadin might have all the natural talent in the world and be a strapping precocious specimen, but he needs to undergo at least few more years of psychological and physiological development before he is handed the enormous responsibility of defending himself from adults in a prize ring, and everyone culpable for rushing him and kids like him into the game too soon and profits off him deserves to have a few years shaved off THEIR life, IMO...

 

The biological difference between 14 & 18 is orders of ****ing magnitude beyond the same chronological difference between 18 & 22, can't stress that enough.

Just to nip ignorant comments in the bud preemptively, in case anyone feels like coming in here to rationalize this garbage.

 

Sex =/= sanctioned violence.

I'm not religious and don't have a daughter (and even had I one, I wouldn't have backwards-minded Puritanical views about her "chastity" or whatever...she would have the same agency to make her own choices with informed consent sexually as would a son once they reach an appropriate age developmentally) so to me precision on legal ages for sex varying from 16 to 18 or whatever are MUCH less of an issue than what age we begin to exploit kids by having them inflict CTE upon each other for our entertainment and profit.

 

It's ****ing butchery. It's awful.

And while I may find that distasteful (reprehensible even) as well, that is less my place to speak on as that is long established tradition, in that sport (originally insularly) endemic to Siam and its culture, but with Marquess of Queensbury boxing, hell no. This is a global sport and has standards, or it ougbt to, and if anything when in doubt the default ethical standards ought to be those of its own birthplace, the UK, which has long since realized the error of its ways in the days of Nipper Pat Daly.

 

Doesn't matter how good or prodigious they are, shouldn't be happening

 

Cool, you don't have kids.