NOT HUMAN NATURE

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 263, 27 January 1928, Page 10

NOT HUMAN NATURE

So much in sport has been placed on a scientific basis these days that it need come as no surprise to hear that eminent Norwegian medicoes have given their attention to the k.o. in boxing. The conclusion they reach is that a knock-out wallop on the jaw produces a most undesirable state of affairs, and “possibly leads to idiocy.” These symptoms have often been noted before by people less skilled in physiological formulae than doctors. The suggested remedy is the elimination of the knock-out, and points decisions in all fights. It will possibly be welcomed by the “tip and run” artists of the boxing ring, but how on earth the budding Fitzsimmons are to be prevented from connecting with an opponent’s jaw without resisting the heaven-sent opportunity to let go a real sleep-producer passes this writer’s comprehension. “It ain’t human nature,” naively commented one of THE SUN’S office boys, who has some little skill with the gloves, and to whom I referred this perplexing question. One doubts still more if the rank and file of fandom will welcome the medicoes’ solution of such a pretty problem. Since the days of the Romans and the murderous Cestus, the k.o. has been the piece de resistance of pugdom. Eliminate it, and what will happen? It is a guinea to a gooseberry that boxing will start to rival tiddleywinks and ping-pong as a pleasant evening diversion. —J. M. MpK.