About two months ago, a producer for Comedy Central’s ‘The Daily Show’ reached out to me. She said they were working on a project with Jordan Klepper about younger right-leaning voters (especially men) and - as it pertained to me - the role mixed martial arts (MMA) plays into that political alignment. The piece wouldn’t be for the show, but as an extra part of what Klepper does for the brand.
Sure enough, it debuted today.
Klepper and I spoke for about two hours, although one learns from doing these sorts of things that only a tiny fraction of it ever makes it into the final product. Still, for the uninitiated, it’s a window into the world the right has built for the next youth movement. Depressing as that may be, it’s important to inventory knowing what’s been lost or no longer the same.
Let me leave you with two takeaways from this experience and more recent mainstream media opportunities I’ve had. These thoughts have stayed with me through every conversation and I believe it’s because they’re either urgent or real or both:
Some sports or activities are right coded. Like NASCAR, they signal the participants and fans are right leaning, but it isn’t quite explicit. With UFC and MMA more broadly, it is explicit. There is no longer daylight between them. I’ve done interviews about the UFC’s relationship to Donald Trump for numerous mainstream media outlets since the election. A key lesson I take from the experience is the UFC has made MMA deeply unpopular and even radioactive to those not avowedly dedicated to MAGA causes. It is difficult to know what, if any, long-term consequences are for a once-neutral sports brand electing to veer so far in a political direction, but if there is a good test case to find out, it’s the UFC.
Candidly, I don’t have good ideas about how to convince young men to repudidate some of the ideas that seem to animate their existences. I’m not sure how to helpfully explain mysoginy is a vector for their own misery. I don’t know how to make them understand a political worldview built on cooperation across identities rather than retreat within them builds better futures. What I do know is allowing imbecilic frauds to shape their views without substantive challenge can only mean disaster. As far as we’re concerned, many important debates are settled. As far as the young right are, many are not. By hook or by crook, these battles still have to be waged. It’s exhausting and dispiriting, but it is where we are.
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