Doctors are worried a combat sport called slap fighting, watched by millions online and gaining in popularity, is causing serious brain damage.
Competitors face off and take turns to deliver bare, full-force, open-handed strikes to the cheek.
To assess the possible harm, medics screened videos of tournaments and have now written a warning letter in a leading journal, JAMA Surgery, external, about their findings.
Unlike boxing, no head gear is allowed and defenders cannot duck to avoid blows. Even flinching is banned.
Opponents are scored based on the amount of damage they inflict and how well they cope with getting slapped themselves.
The sport is popular in the US, but other countries, including the UK, are in on the action.
Next month, Liverpool will hold what is being billed as the first-ever British Heavyweight Slap Fight Competition.
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It is not the first warning public about the sport though.
The alarm was raised in 2021 after Polish slap fighter Artur Walczak suffered a brain bleed during a match in which he was knocked out and lost consciousness.
Despite hospital treatment, he died weeks later of multiple organ failure linked to his head injury.
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What will these liberal doctors take away from us next. Before you know it, they are going to start telling us competitive paint huffing is somehow bad for you.
We’ve upgraded to steam deck exhaust huffing now
I think anyone who has watched a few minutes of slap fighting realises it can’t be healthy.
Next month, Liverpool will hold what is being billed as the first-ever British Heavyweight Slap Fight Competition.
I’m already going to the wrestling in October but still…
Just hearing about this makes me think you already need some brain damage to participate in something as stupid as this.
This makes as much sense as competing about who can bang their head against a brick wall the longest.
The wall of preference at my school was concrete rather than brick and the game was just to run at it as fast and fearlessly as possible.
Hey um….are you going to use that idea ?
It makes about as much sense as other fighting sports to me, i.e. none.
Increasing in popularity.
Next decades “sport” will be “ow my balls” and the best picture will go to “Ass”
It’s becoming increasingly clear that the main problem with Idiocracy is it is set too far in the future.
Go away, 'bating!
They might have their causality backwards regarding the serious brain damage.
This just in, water is wet…
Oh crap. I hope the water isn’t wet, it makes things wet brigade doesn’t show up.
Still waiting for someone to explain to me how water is dry.
I give a link below but sin_free gives a decent summary - to be wet is to have water on something, so water itself can’t be wet.
Well ack-shew-ally…
This just in, water is wet…
Is it? Or does water make other things wet?
Put it this way. His brain is the opposite of his mouth. It’s squished up against the side of the skull moving towards it and when the kinetic force goes through, after his skull stops moving, his brain will impact the other side. It’s probably only a minor concussion but ask football players how a ton of consecutive minor concussions works out.
Or wrestlers.
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The video of the slap thst killed him is on YouTube, the other guy was a monster too.
Oh no…
He’s replying in the comments too…
This is sad…
Superb!
They’re banned to prevent fatalities.
I mean, it isn’t different from boxing or mma, or any other full contact “sport”. At some point, the pads come off, and the likelihood of injury goes up. But that’s part of what draws people to that kind of activity in the first place.
It isn’t even just combat sports, though things like rugby and American football might as well be called combat sports. I mean, American football has pads at pro (or any organized level) level, and there’s still a shit ton of injury.
Slap fighting is only unique in that every hit is to the head.
The pads actually make the injuries worse as people feel safer and consequently hit harder.
Depends.
On the pro level, they’re usually hitting the same with or without pads.
At a hobbyist/amateur level, that’s my opinion/experience as well. I know I paid more attention to both defense and how I hit without pads. Well, until I realized I was sloppy with pads.
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Dana White took to Twitter on Tuesday to promote his new Power Slap League television show, days after the UFC president was filmed slapping his wife on New Year’s Eve.
