In a move almost unheard of in modern sports leagues, Ultimate Fighting Championship president Dana White took a firm stand in favor of free speech and against the noxious trend of midwit, agenda-driven reporters attempting to bully someone into denouncing someone else. The scene was the post-fight press conference for an event in Toronto, Canada, where middleweight Sean Strickland headlined defending his title against Dricus du Plessis.
One might have expected the main topic to be controversial scoring by judges giving Du Plessis a 2-1 victory. But this was Canada, and the last thing the press were interested in was the fight because there was urgent virtue that needed signalling. The topic of interest was a robust exchange of views between Strickland and a fan on “X,” the social media platform formerly called Twitter two years ago.
It can’t be said to have started off at an intellectual level. If you aren’t familiar with the term “thot,” you can thank me later by signing up for the Townhall VIP program.
Strickland’s reply is what caused the outrage.
Strickland was challenged and then threw aside the “first rule of holes” and applied the “zero f***s left to give” principle.
When a Canadian reporter demanded an answer from Strickland in a pre-fight press conference, Strickland gave a master class in how to handle “gotcha” questions.
REPORTER: I did want to ask, you know, you’re in Toronto, welcome, glad to hear it’s been great.
STRICKLAND: Are you Canadian?
REPORTER: Of course I am.
STRICKLAND: Are you part of the f***ing opposition? Are you…
REPORTER: I don’t know how to phrase that?
STRICKLAND: I mean, you like…
REPORTER: I did want to ask
STRICKLAND: Did you vote for Trudeau?
REPORTER: I’m not going to say.
STRICKLAND: Let me tell you something right now. If a man says he’s not going to say, if you like ask him, f***. “Did you vote for Biden,” and he’s like, “I’m not going to say, that’s none of your business.” You voted for f***ing Biden. So, hey, this is what I’m talking about guys, the enemy. The enemy of Canada.
REPORTER: We’ve got a pretty supportive gay and lesbian community in this city. I wanted to ask you about something you wrote a couple of years ago. You said, “If I had a gay son I would think I…”
STRICKLAND: Oh, look, another…the swamp you guys, the swamp.
REPORTER: You’ve become a champ, you’ve become a star, and someone…”
STRICKLAND: Let me ask you something. Are you gay?
REPORTER: Can I get an answer?
STRICKLAND: This is the point, are you a gay man?
REPORTER: I’m an ally of the community.
STRICKLAND: Okay. If you had a son and he was like, you know, and he was gay, oh man, you don’t want a grandkid?
REPORTER: No problem with it.
STRICKLAND: Well, you’re a weak f**king man, dude. You’re part of the f**king problem. You elected Justin Trudeau when he seized the bank accounts. You’re just f**king pathetic. And the fact that you have no f**king backbone as he shut down your f**king country and seized bank accounts, you asked me some stupid sh*t like that?! Go f**k yourself! Move the f**k on, man. F*cking coward!
REPORTER: Doesn’t really answer the question, but I do want to ask, also, about those things you said about the trans community. You said this past October, when they announced the Bud Light sponsorship that you’d “go so hard on Bud Light in your next fight that they’ll have to accept me or denounce me when they know what I stand for.” Are you still going to use your fight time to [inaudible] on that?
STRICKLAND: Here’s the thing about Bud Light. Ten years ago, to be trans was a mental f**king illness. And now, all of a sudden, people like you have f**king weaseled your way in the world. You are an infection. You are the definition of weakness. Everything that is wrong with the world is because of f**king you. And the best thing is the world’s not buying it. The world’s not buying your f**king bullsh*t you’re f**king peddling. The world is not saying, “You know what? You’re right. F**king chicks have d*cks.” The world’s not saying that. The world’s saying, “No, there are two genders. I don’t want my kids being taught about who they could f**k in school. I don’t want my kids being taught about their sexual preference.”
This guy is the f**king enemy. You want to look at the f**king enemy to our world? It’s that motherf**ker right there asking these stupid f**king questions.
STRICKLAND: I mean, you like…
REPORTER: I did want to ask
STRICKLAND: Did you vote for Trudeau?
REPORTER: I’m not going to say.
STRICKLAND: Let me tell you something right now. If a man says he’s not going to say, if you like ask him, f***. “Did you vote for Biden,” and he’s like, “I’m not going to say, that’s none of your business.” You voted for f***ing Biden. So, hey, this is what I’m talking about guys, the enemy. The enemy of Canada.
REPORTER: We’ve got a pretty supportive gay and lesbian community in this city. I wanted to ask you about something you wrote a couple of years ago. You said, “If I had a gay son I would think I…”
STRICKLAND: Oh, look, another…the swamp you guys, the swamp.
REPORTER: You’ve become a champ, you’ve become a star, and someone…”
STRICKLAND: Let me ask you something. Are you gay?
REPORTER: Can I get an answer?
STRICKLAND: This is the point, are you a gay man?
REPORTER: I’m an ally of the community.
STRICKLAND: Okay. If you had a son and he was like, you know, and he was gay, oh man, you don’t want a grandkid?
REPORTER: No problem with it.
STRICKLAND: Well, you’re a weak f**king man, dude. You’re part of the f**king problem. You elected Justin Trudeau when he seized the bank accounts. You’re just f**king pathetic. And the fact that you have no f**king backbone as he shut down your f**king country and seized bank accounts, you asked me some stupid sh*t like that?! Go f**k yourself! Move the f**k on, man. F*cking coward!
REPORTER: Doesn’t really answer the question, but I do want to ask, also, about those things you said about the trans community. You said this past October, when they announced the Bud Light sponsorship that you’d “go so hard on Bud Light in your next fight that they’ll have to accept me or denounce me when they know what I stand for.” Are you still going to use your fight time to [inaudible] on that?
STRICKLAND: Here’s the thing about Bud Light. Ten years ago, to be trans was a mental f**king illness. And now, all of a sudden, people like you have f**king weaseled your way in the world. You are an infection. You are the definition of weakness. Everything that is wrong with the world is because of f**king you. And the best thing is the world’s not buying it. The world’s not buying your f**king bullsh*t you’re f**king peddling. The world is not saying, “You know what? You’re right. F**king chicks have d*cks.” The world’s not saying that. The world’s saying, “No, there are two genders. I don’t want my kids being taught about who they could f**k in school. I don’t want my kids being taught about their sexual preference.”
This guy is the f**king enemy. You want to look at the f**king enemy to our world? It’s that motherf**ker right there asking these stupid f**king questions.
The alphabet people got no satisfaction. When they went to ESPN to find out why they had allowed Strickland to speak in such a manner and whether ESPN would be denouncing the at-the-time UFC middleweight champion, ESPN basically told them to FOAD.
After reading about what Strickland said, I sent an email to one of the ESPN PR representatives who works with the UFC. I asked a simple question: Would ESPN be putting out any kind of statement denouncing what Strickland said?
The response: “I’d suggest you speak with UFC since Strickland is a UFC employee and they handle athlete relations.”
The reporter, who sounds remarkably like the guy who had the invigorating debate on the cause of the destruction of civilization — but he may just be another gender-questioning Canadian, started off by saying, “I just want to go back, you were talking about, you obviously give a long leash to your fighters about what they can say when they are up there with the UFC microphone, and you are getting into territory of homophobia, transphobia, like, is there…”
At that point White lowered the boom.
WHITE: I don’t give anybody a leash.
REPORTER: Well, I’m saying you..
WHITE: A leash?
REPORTER: Uh…
WHITE: Like free speech? To control what people say and to tell people what to believe – I don’t tell any other f—ing human being what to say, what to think and there’s no leashes on any of them. What’s your question?
REPORTER: I was asking that question but I’ll move on though.
WHITE: Yeah, that’s probably a good idea. That’s ridiculous to say I give somebody a leash. Free speech, brother. People can say whatever they want and they can believe whatever they want. We had two gay women who fought in the co-main event. They sat on the stage with Sean Strickland. They could give a s**t what Sean Strickland thinks or what he says or what his beliefs are or what his opinions are. You know what I mean?
This nonsense of demanding denunciations and letting whiny little brats who have nothing better to do with their time than try to silence people whom they dislike get away with their bullying has to stop. The best way to stop them is to tell them to STFU and go away. These people aren’t operating in anything approaching good faith. The sole purpose is to control language and control the social narrative.
White showed that you don’t have to endorse speech to protect it, as did Strickland’s colleagues. The people truly offended by Strickland can resort to the marketplace and refuse to watch UFC or consider the sage advice of David Chappelle.
Sports and business need more Dana White’s who won’t be pushed around by people who are only interested in collecting scalps for clicks or donations. The country, collectively and indivisually, would be better off.
