Brad Hollerbach is the Director of Information Technology for the Southeast Missourian. His opinions are his own and do not reflect those of the newspaper or its editorial board. He writes this blog primarily for his own amusement and to parody the absurdities of the world we live in. He lives with his wife and two cats that don't really care for one another in Cape.

Is Kissing The Next 'Blood Sport' That Needs Regulating?

Posted Wednesday, October 13, 2010, at 12:00 AM

Good paying jobs are hard to come by, the state's unemployment rate is flirting with ten percent and yet some of the Lilliputian bureaucrats who run Missouri are still trying to micro-manage away even the tiniest business opportunities.

Specifically, the Missouri Office of Athletics (MOA) is attempting to cut short a local business' attempt to bring midget wrestling to the area.

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The Pink Galleon in the Town Plaza booked the Extreme Midget Wrestling Federation to perform at the bar tomorrow night. However, the MOA claims these pint-sized performers are athletes and under their agency's purview like boxing, mixed martial arts and professional wrestling.

This is a wee bit of a problem for the management at the Pink Galleon.

If the bar can't obtain a license from the MOA in short order, the event will be cut-off at the knees.

Locals will not only be deprived of wholesome peewee performers, the wrestlers themselves will be short-changed a paycheck, a paycheck they were almost certainly counting on.

All thanks to some busybody based out of Jeff City who apparently doesn't know squat when it comes to differentiating between an athletic and an entertainment event.

According to the story on this website, the MOA regulates "contact and blood sports, where injuries and the exchange of blood occurs."

Not to belittle the MOA, but couldn't that definition potentially cover almost everything?

Even kissing can draw blood, if it goes horribly awry and one of the participants happens to be wearing braces. Does the MOA consider kissing a "blood sport"? Shall I make sure I get a license from the MOA the next time I smooch with my wife -- just in case?

I think the management at the Pink Galleon should tell the MOA to take their license and their apparent Napoleon complex and go back to Jeff City. We don't need them meddling in the hardscrabble economy of Southeast Missouri.

Then on Thursday, go ahead and have a cover charge at the Pink Galleon. Perhaps, a bunch of unemployed extreme midgets will just happen to show up, drink a little too much and start brawling on the stage.

Nothing wrong with a bar brawl. They sometimes just happen.

And you don't need a license from the MOA for that.

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Yes, Rick, I know that "midget" is not politically correct, but the event was billed as "Extreme Midget Wrestling" and apparently blessed by the "Extreme Midget Wrestling Federation" so I figured the use of the word "midget" was OK.

I don't know if you can be a "fan" of midgets, but I did watch "Little People, Big World" for a couple seasons. Zach reminded me and my wife of our one nephew, only a whole lot smaller.

Thanks for reading.

-- Posted by Brad_Hollerbach on Wed, Oct 13, 2010, at 11:14 AM
None of this about the MAC is anything new. As the editor of the St. Louis Wrestling Community http://stlwrestling.livejournal.com I've been paying close attention to what the MAC has been doing the past few years. While I was unaware of EMWF coming to Missouri to run a show, the MAC has been infamous for being slow to process paperwork forcing shows to cancel (Gateway Championship Wrestling had to cancel five straight times they attempted to run at the Armory) and it wasn't too long ago there was a big fight over the MAC's demand that every lady wrestler get a PREGENCY TEST from a licensed doctor each and every time they were going to wrestle at $50-$100 a pop. Missouri has the stricted regs in the nation and I have to ask where were you when previous wrestling events were being cancelled left and right by these guys? Compare to Illinois, Illinois has no regs whatsoever. Guess which side of the river most promoters run on???

-- Posted by crimefighter on Thu, Oct 14, 2010, at 1:03 PM
Actually Crimefighter, the primary reason I wrote this particular blog was to see how many synonyms for "short" I could squeeze into it (13 by my count).

To be honest, wrestling is not usually my thing, although the novelty of this act may have gotten me to go.

Prior to this issue surfacing locally, I was unaware of the MOA (or MAC if you prefer) existing. It certainly looks like yet another piece of government that has no reason to be except for maintaining itself and the people it employs. The pregnancy test issue you mentioned is particular ridiculous.

Thanks for the information and for reading.

-- Posted by Brad_Hollerbach on Thu, Oct 14, 2010, at 1:32 PM
Yes, it's really the Missouri Athletic Commission. The pregnancy test nonsense made national headlines a couple years ago.

-- Posted by crimefighter on Thu, Oct 14, 2010, at 4:13 PM
*slapface* Good grief Rick, try to avoid mixing up two different situations.

-- Posted by crimefighter on Fri, Oct 15, 2010, at 9:24 AM

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