(Sports Illustrated) The controversial UFC gladiatorial league will be holding an extended exhibition match this Friday at the Tacoma Dome. Included in the bouts will be former champions Jonas Callistoga and Maria Vasquez, as well as controversial Changeling fighter Akuma. The last member of the championship card has drawn the ire of local groups, including the Seattle chapter of the Humanis Policlub.
"We don't need the genetic mutants coming here to parade their supposed superiority over the rest of us," said HP spokesperson William Fairborough. "Our children need better role models. Human role models. This tastless titillation of the masses before the altars of violence and deviancy merely adds to the legacy of depravity our permissive society is bequeathing to our children."
Other groups, such as Mother of Metahumans, have denounced the Humanis Policlubs avowed plans to picket the tournament. "While we may not agree with the violence of these exhibitions," conceded Rosamund Goldblum, president of the Seattle chapter of MoM, "protesting the matches based solely on the metatype of the participants is the worst kind of racism. Our society spent a good portion of the last two centuries moving away from sort of racist thinking, and the Humanis Policlub wants to drag us back into those dark days."
The rhetoric is flying thick and fast as both groups plan protest and counter-protest. It's entirely possible that atheletes within the ring may stop to watch the struggle outside of it.