In a move that has sent shockwaves through the genteel world of international diplomacy and left many a chin-stroking pundit clutching their pearls, the White House has announced plans to construct a full-scale UFC octagon on the South Lawn. Yes, you heard that correctly: the seat of American power will soon reverberate not with the measured tones of statecraft, but with the primal grunts and bone-crunching thwacks of mixed martial arts. And who, pray tell, is leading the charge against this glorious descent into barbarism?
None other than the Right Honourable Jeremy Cumberbatch, the UK’s Minister for Sport and Cephalopod Groping (I may have misread his brief). On a hastily arranged Zoom call from his broom cupboard in Whitehall, Cumberbatch warned that this “crass spectacle” would “politicise athletics in a way that undermines the purity of sport.” Purity.
Of sport. Let us pause to savour that phrase, last uttered on these shores by a Victorian gentleman objecting to the use of bicycles in polo. The minister went on to lament that the octagon would be erected near the historic Rose Garden, a site where presidents have posed with foreign dignitaries and, on one occasion, a particularly large pumpkin.
The irony is so thick you could spread it on a crumpet. The White House, seemingly oblivious to the international hand-wringing, has confirmed that the first bout will feature a tuxedoed Joe Biden refereeing a tag-team match between Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vladimir Putin’s body double. “It’s time to bring some real action to Washington,” a spokesman declared, adjusting his own tie and failing to suppress a smirk.
Critics have pointed out that the octagon will cost an estimated 47 million dollars, which could have funded breakfast for every child in Ohio until 2032. But what’s a few million when you can watch the Speaker of the House get arm-barred by a former UFC champion? Meanwhile, the UK’s tabloids have gone into overdrive, with the Daily Mail running the headline “GRIT, GRUNT, AND GRENADE-LAUNCHERS: Is This the End of Civilisation?
” The Guardian, ever the voice of reason, has published a think piece arguing that the octagon is a “metaphor for late-stage capitalism’s cannibalistic urges.” To which I can only say: oh, do shut up. In this fever dream of a news cycle, where reality has become a caricature of itself, the only sensible response is to embrace the madness.
Let them build their octagon. Let them grapple and gouge. And if, in the process, we get to see Boris Johnson chokehold a Russian oligarch, then so be it.
I’ll be at the pub, nursing a gin and tonic, ready to cheer or weep, depending on the outcome. After all, in the grand arena of politics, we are all just fighters looking for a knock-out punch.
