Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu

This would be highly unusual from what little I've seen. But Thailand is also pretty unexpected. You can always ask.

Fair enough, my bad. I was just surprised that you felt that what Thais say out loud to you somehow would reflect their feelings about race. I've never heard any Thais talk about the skin color of well-known people - other than Master K making a joke about Buakaw's name - but I didn't think that was weird. I just assumed that because I don't speak Thai and don't engage in long conversations it was never something that would come up. And more than this, when I think about it, I'm not even sure I've heard Americans judge Michael Jordan for being black, and I'm American, which is really the point I should have done a better job expressing. I do wonder how he is viewed, and in fact how all people of some celebrity from Isaan are viewed.

I do wonder what Buakaw's image is among the core Thai Muay Thai community. He's a huge name in the west because of his K-1 success, and much of his media seems very western oriented - the face grimace, etc. Though he also puts up a lot of nationalist imagery too (flags, military). He hasn't fought a Thai in almost a decade, and I've been told by at least one person close to the fight game that if he fought a real Thai fighter now he wouldn't stand a chance. He's such an interesting case because of how he broke from his gym, isn't a Muay Thai fighter proper, and is ethnically so dark. Maybe he is like a kind of movie star, who doesn't make movies.

That would be like saying that America isn't racist because Michael Jordan and so many other major sports heroes are black. Or even because whites were pulling for Joe Louis against Max Schmeling in 1938.

To me it is done in the aesthetic of political cartoons. But I also think it has a political tinge in that westerners, and I am one, see all those constants and just give up, but it's asking for kind of humanization, treating her as a person. What is ironic about it is that she's depicted as a non-person, a robot, which is how UFC fans try to depict her, describing her in extra-human or sub-human terms: a force of nature, a beast, so technical, a machine. Fight fantasy has a whole sci-fi, geekdom feel about it, nerdy dudes buying PPV, and in video game mode mentally. It's funny, and meaningful, to ask that people spell your name right. But hey, that's what came to mind for me. I think it's brilliant.

A few western oriented gyms have Kru (trainer) certification, like Master Toddy's, but 99.999% of trainers in Thailand are not certified, and they aren't called Kru typically. "Kru" just means "teacher" in Thai, it isn't a special title like in other martial arts. It can be used, but in most circumstances it isn't. There are traditions and Kru formalities in older, Boran-type, circumstances, but gyms aren't really like that now, at least in the way that people think. I have no idea what your Italian friend did, but this isn't really the way that most of Thai gyms operate at all. Trainers are just ex-fighters, or Thai people with passion about the sport. There is nothing formal about it. They are paid a pretty low wage.

I've never seen someone train and also be paid to be a trainer, and I've seen both Petchruangrung and WKO. The first difficulty would be that pad holders aren't paid a lot of money generally, and tend to work long hours. But the bigger difficulty is that the few times I have seen westerners hold and train these were people who had been with the gym for very long time. They were part of the gym family. This takes a while. That being said, Master Toddy's in Bangkok does have a trainers program, and I do know that he was looking for trainers at one point for a new gym that he had opened. Maybe contact Emma at Under the Ropes for more on that?

Pretty awesome political cartoon of Jedrzejczyk from her FB page.

I think I had read that two things had happened. The first that Jojo had been in a romantic relationship with her trainer for a long time, and that this ended. And also that Jojo had experienced something that sounded inappropriate during her training camp just before Cracow. This is just from memory, not sure I got all that right.

Do completely agree, great to see. Everyone expected JoJo to be the Muay Thai breakthough fighter. I was really pulling for her, loved her attitude in the house, admittedly a highly edited version of reality. In a strange way Joanna has become the anti-JoJo, fulfilling the promise. I wonder if they will ever fight? Jojo's strength appears to be knee fighting and it's unsure if Joanna Champion can defend that. But Jojo seems a very forwards and back fighter, something Joanna might eat up. Still, a fight I've love to see one day, if only for the world of female Muay Thai.

I think Jack Slack is kind of awesome, some of the best MMA writing in general. He draws from lots of historical source, puts things in wide context, etc. But his treatment of Joanna is a little over the top. I think UFC people are kind of drunk on her success, a lot of it coming from her fighting somewhat physically smaller opponents without much striking skill. I'll completely agree that the Fedor kick analysis was an example of this over analysis: "Jedrzejczyk has to consider that a caught low kick, even perfectly landed, is bad news for her. Consequently she has opted for the Fedor Emelianenko kick, almost upwards and forwards more than it is about turning the hip over." The impression he gives is that she had some how adopted this kick as some kind of MMA compromise to avoid being taken down. But this is the same same kick she used, very ineffectively, against Duannapa in Thailand, in a Muay Thai fight. She's a low-kicker, she's not avoiding the takedown by adopting a special kick. I don't know, people get carried away.

All I can say is "wow" Emma. Very tough.

Emma, it means a lot to hear real world examples like this. I think it is very hard for us in the west to interpret Thai racism towards dark skin. Part of this is that it comes from a different set of social circumstances (the whiteness is the whiteness of Chinese skin much more than it is of Caucasian skin, for instance), but the symbols and concepts of derision seem straight out of some of the most backwards western racist thinking. I can't imagine what Tu experiences in Thailand.

As I pointed out, the woman's skin is turned black for a moment "enjoy your moment". And this ad is likely aimed at rebellious university students, it's attempting to shock, to reverse everything, to "break every rule". It would though be a big mistake to assume that black is generally desireable in Thai culture, or that Thais with darker skin are experiencing an social advantage in some way.

The article suggests that much of the protest came from international quarters, Dunkin' Donuts is a world wide brand. The Doughnut campaign seems a complicated issue of racism. Ironically enough, in the commercial the exact opposite thing happens than happens in the bear commercial. A very light skinned Thai woman eats the doughnut and turns black, and this is a positive. Maybe a way of saying this is: becomes Other...but only for a second..."enjoy your moment". She takes her walk on the wild side. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwvSb6x4a08 The campaign suggests that becoming black is "breaking every rule" and may be aimed at University students - we saw that Dunkin' Donuts is pretty popular with CMU students - perhaps mirroring the popularity and cutting edge of rap (just a guess). Progressive Thais did not see it that way though. It was just plain racism, using stereotypes to sell products. As to "charcoal", keep in mind this advertisement is in English for educated Thais most of whom are not fluent in English. The word "Charcoal" probably does not have the same connotations to Thais that it does to us. I would also say that a black comedian going "white face" is politically very different than a white, or light-skinned person donning "black face". They aren't analogous to me. One comes from a position of social disenfranchisement, the other from a position of power. The history of black face and racism is well documented and is generally offensive in the west. I do think that the younger generation that this seems aimed at makes the kind of racism implied complex.

Above is a jarring anti-blackness beauty advertisement for a product that promises to whiten skin, illustratively included in a new Asian Correspondent article on the esteem of white skin in Japan, Taiwan, Korea and of course Thailand. The Thai commercial is described: In one such ad...Verena L-Gluta Berry Plus advertises its so-called beauty drink by showing an unhappy black bear speaking to a pale-skinned female doctor who explains to the bear that it took millions of years for its kind to evolve into a white bear. Fortunately, she tells the sad bear, with the use of beauty drinks evolution can happen overnight. Proof of this is her father’s appearance in the office; he has dark skin, and is actually Negroid. Needless to say the ad proved to be lusterless among some of the critical Thai population, but that didn’t prevent many more ill-thought out ads containing ridiculous prejudicial notions following it. A few years ago Thai cultural critic Kaewmala also wrote a really good piece on this in her Thailand's Skin Whitening Crazy: How Far Will it Go? The commercial itself just shows how completely alien much of the Thai thinking about skin color is to most of western sensibilities, and it's a small secret that tourists and visitors to Thailand just don't know much about. If you don't speak Thai it may be hard to detect in the short term. The people of Isaan, the heart of Muay Thai, in the North East tend to have much darker skin (rural, often of Khmer or Lao decent) and are uniformly regarded as less through the signature of their skin color. It could be argued that Muay Thai (male) an prostitution (female) are generalized expressions of Thai conceptual blackness. Buakaw, whose skin is very dark, has a name which means "white lotus", almost a counter message ironic marketing joke. A female Thai fighter here in Pattaya is simply referred to as "the black one" at times, her father seems to be of Malay descent, and I've heard very nice Thais fall into very strong racist characterizations without thinking much about it at all. In so many ways Thailand can feel like a sci-fi trip down to a parallel universe of the 1950s in the west, and this is one additional dimension of it. And, as someone from western culture which has long struggled with the moral approbation of slavery, the same moral arguments against anti-blackness do not quite match up. They are only parallel, riding along only a similar track of ethic agrarian peoples vs urban modernization. But it is real, and striking when you run into it. This was another controversial campaign that ended up getting pulled, selling Dunkin' Donut chocolate donuts in blackface: You can read about that controversy here.

Reflecting back on Emma's article I include this video of the 2015 WMO World Championship Title fight at 51 kg - a category that apparently had only 2 people in it. A fight to become World Champion. [update, July 27, 2015: The winner of this fight Jade Sirisompan has changed the setting of the video to private]

Adding this Caley Reece vs Tiffany van Soest Lion Fight to the thread. Caley's use of the clinch strategically to neutralize a dynamic, moving fighter. Loved it.

Seems likely that is the same gym. We only got 20 seconds of that fight, missing maybe the first minute, Sylvie's working on the blog post now. Made a GIF of it because it's so short. may take a little bit to load. The fight here.

That is pretty amazing. It shows you that things we take to be socially and structurally ingrained, like the power of the male gaze, or the codification of spaces (gym = male), can be subverted rather fluidly. Just change the numbers and purposes of most of the people involved in a space and power and eyes function differently. We are always not far from reversals, and new things.

Few western fighters know truly how to clinch and female fighters even less so. Caley Reece is a big exception in that she trained clinch heavily for a long time,probably under the influence of her fighter husband despite not being in Thailand often. I agree that from what little we've seen what sets Joanna's Muay Thai apart is that she is not just a strait-ahead fighter. Many female Muay Thai fighters, and male too, are used to their opponent standing right in front of them, and struggle when their opponent isn't just moving forward and back. It's kind of crazy that Randamie did not have quick success in MMA. People talk a lot about fear of the takedown. But I think it is much more about the dimension they are used to moving in. She's also really comfortable in space keeping her opponent at the end of punches. She does not hit air a lot, the punch that lands 3 inches short. That being said, Joanna was undynamic against Duannapa. A lot of it is how your opponent makes you look. Even fighting someone bigger than you, and someone smaller than you can produce really different fights. You are never as bad as you look when you lose, or as good as you look when you win. I also think there is a big difference between westerners who fight in a "Thai" style, and Thais that fight in a Thai style.

That is pretty awesome use of manga/anime knowledge!

She told Sylvie that she's returning to Pattaya in August too. Yes, definitely seen how crazy that transliteration process is. You do a great job Charlie.

Sylvie just fought Superball Paladon Gym in Hua Hin (that is the fighter she facing, I believe). Is "443" a fighter's name?

How rural do you mean? Do you mean a gym in Isaan with a few bags hanging and maybe a ring? If so our brief time in deal with Isaan we found fights very difficult to manage. Even though Sylvie's an experienced and established fighter it was a very difficult process of getting fights at Giatbundit Gym (which now apparently is defunct). The reason for this is because in Isaan fights are bets. There would have to be an entire feeling out process by such a gym, where they figure out if you are worth putting in fights, and then there is the process of going to matchups where you literally stand next to other fighters about your same size and people haggle over the possibility of a fight. It is not easy to slide into an Isaan gym, train a bit, and start fighting. There are no tourist fights, fights are all ventures in gambling, and culturally gyms are pretty closed. Forgive me if you did not mean as rural as this, but it's what comes to mind. Not familiar with Son Vinpor. Or did you just mean a gym that isn't in an urban area?