BOXING COMPETITIONS.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 228, 19 June 1908, Page 6

BOXING COMPETITIONS.

The Wellington Boxing Association has just brought to a fairly successful conclusion a series of boxing Competitions, varied by a little wrestling, extending over two evenings, in the .local Opera House. From a financial point of view the result has been everything that can be desired, owing to very liberal patronage by the public. From the standpoint, however, of scientific boxing, which it should be the primary object of these Associations to foster and encourage, it is matter for regret that very few compliments can be paid to the competitors engaged in the display. There seems to be a well-grounded apprehension lest these periodical glove contests, so popular, and, if properly carried out, so helpful to a good manly pastime, and a fine physical - 'cxcrcise, shall degenerate into a mere exhibition of brute force, which, while kept strictly within the four corners of the law, may still appeal most strongly to the baser. impulses of human nature. Those who control these Associations cannot make it too plain, or too widely known, that mere " slogging " and the subordination of cleverness in boxing to the delivery, when possible, of the "■knockout.blow," is not boxing at all, and not the thing which the Associations exist to encourage. Of course, it is impossible to eliminate the " knock-out," but its practice should be distinctly discountenanced. It should not be difficult to bring this about by some re-arrangement of the method of ; awarding points by which the winner is decided, thus making it more advantageous for a contestant to acquit himself scientifically rather than brutally. If the Associations overlook their chief public usefulness, and their only claim to public consideration—the encouragement, by respectable rriethods, of the art of scientific self-defence—in their desire to secure good " gate " money, then they will have only themselves to blame if presently the more deccnt and respectable portion of the community revolts against mere " slogging ■" matches' and public opinion steps in to prevent exhibitions of the kind. Such a result would be regrettable, and it is to bo hoped that better regulation of, and saner methods in, these contests will, on the contrary, tend to give them an extended lifo, and an enhanced popularity with all classes.