Felon Fights: Masculinity, Spectacle and Suffering
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Open Access
Type
Conference paperAuthor/s
Tomsen, StephenAbstract
Felony Fights is a website and set of DVDs depicting ‘no rules’ combat between male former convicts and a range of opponents. In these, the spectacle of violence serves to obscure the profoundly unequal relations of power that shape their production and viewing appeal. In Felony ...
See moreFelony Fights is a website and set of DVDs depicting ‘no rules’ combat between male former convicts and a range of opponents. In these, the spectacle of violence serves to obscure the profoundly unequal relations of power that shape their production and viewing appeal. In Felony Fights, embodied marginality and poverty are presented as evidence of the animal brutality and the carceral character of the fighters. This resonates with populist explanations for criminality and male violence, and the punitive sentiments that are linked to law and order thinking about the failure of the penal system to adequately punish and inflict suffering on dangerous criminals.
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See moreFelony Fights is a website and set of DVDs depicting ‘no rules’ combat between male former convicts and a range of opponents. In these, the spectacle of violence serves to obscure the profoundly unequal relations of power that shape their production and viewing appeal. In Felony Fights, embodied marginality and poverty are presented as evidence of the animal brutality and the carceral character of the fighters. This resonates with populist explanations for criminality and male violence, and the punitive sentiments that are linked to law and order thinking about the failure of the penal system to adequately punish and inflict suffering on dangerous criminals.
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Date
2011-05-17Publisher
Sydney Institute of CriminologyLicence
The author retains copyright of this work.Department, Discipline or Centre
Sydney Institute of CriminologyShare