Clarissa Shields Olympic Gold Medalist Talks about Her Abuse
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By Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu · Posted
I've been thinking about how to write about this. A few sketched out ideas. Sylvie's chosen path to fight a LOT - and as it turns out more than anyone documented along several criteria, but it wasn't really the ambition - was because when we came to Thailand we were pretty surprised by a few things. The first was that really there wasn't a huge gap between very experienced local circuit Thai female fighters, and nominal "World Champions". It was more a small question of degree, which meant that if you were a high practicing circuit fighter you already were not that far off from "World Champion" level. At the time - and maybe this has changed some, in part due to Sylvie's example, now fighters count and even probably exaggerate their fight totals - the goal was for foreigners to come to Thailand and win belts. As there was no substantive difference between belt and no-belt, and as Sylvie's actually goal was to just get increasingly proficient in Muay Thai, to come closer to it in its cultural form, pursuing belts really wasn't very interesting, especially because being booked for a belt fight at the time was largely in the hands of a few powerful gyms that were promoting their name to Westerners. She didn't really want to fight in the high profile Tourism layer of Muay Thai, the layer that was big gym steered. Instead it seemed that the best way forward was to just fight. And fight a ton. The Thai gambling social form of Muay Thai, and other cultural constraints, made it so that Sylvie would never really be given an easy match, once she became known, and as she increased the size of her opponents - a luxury she had because she was only a 100 lb fighter, and she could practically go up and up and up as long as her skill kept pace - there was a huge talent pool of Thai female fighters in the traditional Muay Thai scenes. She began detaching herself from gym control (extremely hard to do), in part because gyms have social obligations to specific promoters, and in part because gyms also have incentive to force matchups that (at times) unduly favor their Western fighter, and booking her fights in various regions of Thailand, moving from provincial fighting, to local tourist oriented scenes, to Bangkok big broadcast shows, from the North to the Northeast to the South. It really was profound, and uniquely freed fighting because all that mattered was that the fight was fair and challenging, the exact recipe for unique growth (a sign of this babybear match-making is that she really held a 70% or so win rate as her opponents went up in weight. It really was an ideal Milo's Calf condition), building-in increasing handicaps, one that I don't believe can ever be duplicated because of how much Thailand's Muay Thai has been infiltrated by the Soft Power economic imperative, digital image-making, and how female fighters themselves have come to be reinscribed in the Thai power dynamics of Entertainment Fighting. Promotions and gyms now value and control Western (and Thai) female fighters in much more restrictive ways that produce a limitation of opportunity and experience. Restrictions indeed existed before, but today female fighters have been woven into other more hierarchical interests that are unlikely to recede. It really was that she didn't want to be fighting for belts that were politically arranged (even if great opportunities), or to have people controlling her matchups to produce regular advantages so to secure an image of dominance. Images of dominance in Thailand's Muay Thai actually often close down opportunities, and it was our feeling that as traditional Muay Thai itself is undergoing widespread deskilling, the one sure fire way to continue to grow was to fight, climbing an increasingly steep grade. The fight, if the thumb is not unnaturally on the scale in your favor, is the one (fairly) unblemished experience that grew knowledge and capacity in the sport. Thais fought a lot in their development, Sylvie would just take this principle and maximize it as an adult who came to the sport later in life, detouring the various prestige honey-pots and power imbalances that could trap you, cut you off from what was possible in you. Key was working at Thailand's talent-rich margins, and creating a vast network of promoter and gym relationships so that you never became too advantaged in the ring...advantage that came as bias to all Westerners who have been part of Thailand's embrace. Sylvie was setting a path on the edges of the sport, a sport which had a quite vast provincial base, much of which Westerners did not really encounter. The result of all this, of literally 100s of fights of increasing size difficulty, in the traditional - nuanced - mode of the sport is an extremely grounded - she hasn't been knocked down in over 1,000 rounds - defensively robust (a gep awut 4th round imperative) fighting style, that is very, very attuned to narrative scoring (it has to be, because that's how trad scoring works), all built around Muay Khao and clinch dominance in a very small, 100 lb body, quite in contrast with the more common body types and size around which Muay Khao usually is ascribed. An absolutely unique fighting capacity, that was made out of its fight path...along with the continuous influence of really unparalleled documentary work, which also has been no small part of the story. But it really came from shunning advantage, and false pictures of mastery. It came from just doing. And it came from a certain kind of invisibleness, the ability to slide across power barriers that can capture many others, at a different time in Thailand's Muay Thai history, a time of a perfect relationship between connectivity and tradition, in a sweet spot that no longer exists, before Muay Thai was given over to the foreigner in more programmatic, economic, sport-changing ways. -
By Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu · Posted
Fighting is just such an incredibly compressive experience. Even one fight, or five. As Sylvie's husband it just boggles my mind that she has fought nearly 300 documented fights, even at the human level, stepping into the ring that many times, in a sport and culture she was not raised in, was not acclimated to in her youth, but rather came to love and grow into, earning her physical and emotional compassry, day by day, year by year. Just the sheer numbers of that compression spins my mind. Over and over and over. Stepping into conflict fire to learn the art of shaping under duress. This week Sylvie had one of her more typical matchups. Refusing to fight in tourism's Entertainment Muay Thai, especially since COVID, she's positioned herself at the margins of where the Internet light usually shines, in provincial festival fights and in local city scenes where traditional Muay Thai is still trained for and fought. And giving up substantive weight so matchups that test her, grow her, can be had. This time it was in Hua Hin vs Linping who is a 53-54 kg fighter who often faces significantly bigger Westerners. She's tested herself. But Sylvie is giving up 6-7 kgs going in. Not all that unusual for her, in fact about half her fights have been 3 or more weight classes up. What I'm writing about here is something much more simple, something more elemental. Sylvie - by far - has fought up more than any female fighter in documented history, likely by a very, very large margin. Speaking of the compressiveness of fighting there is something that is even more intensely compressive when fighting someone larger than you, and even distinctly quite bigger. The body itself seems to experience the danger, the risk, at a very base level. You stand there, they stand there, the size can just be felt. She's very experienced in this, and has developed any number of tools, both technical and psychological, to mitigate that, but just as a witness, there is some level at which nothing can be done. It just is going to compress you. And that she has done this for such an enormous number of fights is kind of insane and unknowable. She looks at large opponents and her mind now sizes them down. They don't seem that big, but at a real and substantive level the emotional body knows. And I stand in awe at this mountain she is climbing. She has made an art of the duress. -
By Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu · Posted
from the same: from "Introduction: commodities and the politics of value" ARJUN APPADURAI The above is really a very productive lens through which to read the commodification of Muay Thai, through two sorts of technical knowledge. Today's Muay Thai is undergoing a radical re-configuring of BOTH types of knowledge as the Thai economy of knowledges is inundated with Western and global interests. Which, actually results in the loss of knowledge. Its erasure.
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That sounds promising if you've already moved, how are things going for you now? -
By Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu · Posted
I'm sorry I don't really know. Sylvie is in touch with a collector and this person is where she buys hers, but there are not multiple copies available. Maybe someone else would know of a larger source. -
Where can I find some physical old Muay Thai magazines? I am located in Bangkok. Thanks -
By Snack Payback · Posted
I can only comment on Perth. There's a very active Muay Thai scene here - regular shows. Plenty of gyms across the city with Thai trainers. All gyms offer trial classes so you can try a few out before committing . Direct flights to Bangkok and Phuket as well. Would you be coming over on a working holiday visa? Loads of work around Western Australia at the moment. -
By kkadzielna · Posted
Hi, I'm considering moving to Australia from the UK and I'm curious what is the scene like? Is it easy to fight frequently (proam/pro level), especially as a female? How does it compare to the UK? Any gym recommendations? I'll be grateful for any insights.
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