On May 12, one day before informing everybody that the proposed date of Canelo Alvarez vs. Terence Crawford might for some reason change, Turki Alalshikh’s Ring Magazine asked its social media followers the following question: “Do you think boxing should be taught in schools?”
Apropos of seemingly nothing, the question found itself sandwiched between fight news and “Turki tells…” updates and attracted a whopping 304 replies, more than any other post in and around it. Maybe, in the end, that was the point – the only point. Or maybe Alalshikh’s plans for boxing’s future extend beyond merely putting on events in Times Square and Alcatraz Prison. Who knows these days.
Regardless of the motive, the question posed by The Ring is one long debated by those inside and outside boxing alike and one to which there is no clear answer, much less a right one. Those involved in the sport will naturally point to its virtues and all it can offer to ill-disciplined and disillusioned youngsters, yet those on the outside will see only the damage done and ask, “Do we really need more of this?”
Only to a young boxer it is never just violence. Boxing, to them, is salvation and the gym is their sanctuary. It is somewhere they can go after school and somewhere they can find both their calling and their crowd. It teaches them lessons they cannot learn elsewhere, including at school, and it slowly drains them of any anger and bitterness, or even just the excess energy apt to turn creative kids into troublemakers. Now, should a fight break out on the playground, they are more likely to stand back and watch; perhaps analyse the form and technique of the two students involved. Seldom are they the ones starting it. After all, they have a gym for that. They also have hands to protect.
Often for kids the strengthening they experience in a boxing gym is about more than just the physical. It is instead as much about character and personality. It prepares them for certain situations they might encounter either at school or later in life.
“Every night I would feel sick just thinking about what classes I had the next day,” said former two-weight world champion Joe Calzaghe of his time at Oakdale Comprehensive. “Things that in themselves might seem petty were massively destructive when taken as a whole. It was constant, boring into me day after day. It took me to breaking point.
“I kept it all to myself and my only release was boxing. At school I just disappeared. I was a scrawny kid, which might have had something to do with it. But at the gym I could punch the hell out of the bags and feel proud of what I could achieve. The year the bullying started was the year I won my first amateur boxing title. On Saturday I was raising my ABA trophy above my head in Derby Assembly Hall. The next night I was sick and crying at the thought of going to school the next day.”
Through boxing Calzaghe was able to find not only refuge but also the courage and confidence to stand up for himself. Even if he was too shy to say what he wanted to say, or do what he wanted to do, the lessons learned in the boxing gym allowed him to walk the school corridors with his head held high, his chest puffed out, and his hand balled into a fist, ready if ever required.
The same was true for Dmitriy Salita, who moved from Odessa, Ukraine to Brooklyn, New York at the age of nine and endured years of cruel bullying at school on account of his differences. If it wasn’t sparked by the way he spoke, it was the way he dressed.
“When I first came to the United States and went to school, I had no idea what kind of sneakers you were supposed to wear and that this makes you either cool or not cool,” Salita said. “We went to the store and there was this big rack of shoes and you just take one, find another, and you match them together. Then there’s this store called Payless. They made shoes that look like Jordans and Nikes but they’re ten or fifteen dollars. I used to wear Payless shoes and I would think they were really nice. They were the best shoes I had ever worn in my life, coming from Odessa. But when I wore them to school people used to make fun of me. People would then make fun of me for the way I would say, ‘How are you doing?’ I then realised I wasn’t wearing the right jeans. It’s kids being kids, but it was very hard going through it. I would go on school trips and not have any money in my pocket to buy even a bag of chips.
“At first, there were physical fights at school. But then when I started boxing, that stopped,” added Salita, who began boxing at 14. “There were one or two times when I stood up for myself and it ended.”
Of course, not every boy or girl introduced to boxing will use what they learn only in the name of protection and self-defence. Some will see the same lessons as a chance to accumulate tools they can use to later intimidate, exert control, and just hurt. What is more, the type of boys and girls who find their way to a boxing gym of their own volition have already exhibited a certain level of discipline and interest in the sport’s code by virtue of wanting to attend in the first place and then keep coming back. The same, however, cannot be said of the students forced to do boxing lessons at school. Even if it isn’t forced on them, having the sport as an extracurricular activity in a school is not the same as a boy or girl being taken to a boxing gym run by people who know what they are doing. For some, boxing is viewed as a lifestyle, a code by which to live, almost a religion. Yet, for others, boxing is and will forever be permission to do damage and cause pain.
If, in a gym, the distinction between those two viewpoints is clear and regularly asserted, a school cannot offer the same delineation. At school, where there are cliques and a hierarchy, kids do not experience the levelling out and equality they feel when first entering a gym. It’s perhaps why bullying tends to exist more on playgrounds than in boxing gyms and why violence, of the spiteful kind, is far more prevalent between kids wearing school uniforms than kids wearing vests and gloves.
Therein lies the danger of bringing boxing into a school, a place run by people unable to control or explain the different shades of violence. It seems okay to encourage it when aware of its many perks, but make no mistake, bringing boxing to children is not the same as bringing children to boxing. Just as not every child is cut out to be a boxer, nor is violence, which is what it is, something that should be forced on every child, especially against their will. Some see enough of it as it is and some need no reminders, never mind lessons on how it can be done better. Some can get all the things it purports to offer, including discipline, structure and fitness, from other things and in other places.
In fact, for all that boxing can offer youngsters, there are other battles to be fought and won in schools these days. Bigger ones. Tougher ones. Scarier ones. Ideally, you want more kids to be able to read a publication like The Ring, not simply aspire to appear in it.