Quote:
Originally Posted by Derek Sutton
So you would classify MMA fighters, Boxers, Hockey players, football players etc... as suicidal? Not a "bang on" comment.
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Let's break this down a bit.
First of all, there is a difference between identifying a person as suicidal, and judging his actions as suicidal. The first meaning is plain, while the second is metaphoric. I maintain that while no MMA fighters, boxers, hockey or football players have a death wish, their participation in activities that appear more and more to be detrimental to their long-term well being and mortality
is suicidal. In other words: it is [metaphorically]
suicidal to subject oneself to the vulnerability of devastating head trauma by his participation in professional fighting. That does not mean that these people are literally suicidal.
Second, let's look at what Cox in fact tweeted:
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Damien Cox
"Brian McGrattan wants to seem brave, accepting the consequences of his 'craft.' Unfortunately, he mostly seems oblivious. Or suicidal."
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Poorly worded? Yes. Inflammatory? Yes. Responsible? No.
But, did Cox actually accuse McGrattan of
being suicidal?
No. The meaning of his tweet was that McGrattan's willingness to subject himself to a potentially mortally dangerous activity is so outrageous that it
looks suicidal. Cox does not actually believe that McGrattan is suicidal. It's hyperbole. The problem with what he said has a lot to do with the character limit of twitter, combined with Cox's inability to exercise tact, but at no point is he purporting that McGrattan has an actual wish to die.
Furthermore, the point of the tweet is perfectly obvious from the first two sentences, which have been virtually ignored to this point: Cox insinuates pretty clearly that McGrattan's nonchalant dismissal of the incident is incredibly foolhardy and shortsighted. His cavalier disregard for the danger, and his insistence that the fight and the result were "no big deal" is—to be blunt—somewhat ignorant, given the current levels of alarm about professional fighting. The point is not that McGrattan is suicidal, rather that he is
oblivious about the danger, because the only alternative is that he would have an actual death wish, and there is no good reason to think that he does.
This is not an apology for Cox. I think the tweet was stupid, and he deserves criticism for making it. This is an attempt to show that while it was ill advised and inappropriate, there is a real kernel of truth behind what he has attempted to say.