HappyLifestyleJournal
It has been 16 years since we first watched Fight Club and got our minds blown. Since then, there have been numerous actual fight clubs opened around the world for people who just want to release the anger and get their fists bloody during their spare time.
However, these fight clubs are not something you can encounter just like that. The members are very strict about the first rule of fight club and we all know what that is – NEVER talk about fight club. However, it is a public secret that they do exist. If you want to participate, you have to be invited or to know exactly where to look.
These fight clubs exist all across the globe and they usually function on the principle of two people (usually men) fighting it out with their bare hands until one of them faints or says “stop”. Others, however, don’t follow the same rules and are much more violent and brutal. Showing a sign of weakness can only get you into more trouble. In most cases, audience is non-existing. That is, if you’re there, you have to fight.
Even though the fights are consensual and not essentially illegal, the fights are kept secret. It has happened more than once that an injury inflicted at fight club ended up fatally because of the fear of going to the hospital. The law is also quite strict when it comes to minors involved in such doings and this is something that is not tolerated by the police.
For our part, we will break the first rule of Fight Club and tell you all about two real-life fight clubs you can visit and join. If you know how to find them, of course.
New York
Inspired by the movie, there is a real-life fight club in New York. However, as it usually happens with these places, the club is kept pretty secret. The locations change and fights are held at different places in New York. Since these fights are on the edge of the law, they are kept on the low and you won’t be able to see advertisements for this fight club. Instead, if you want to join, you need to be lucky enough to know the right people who have the right information.
The exciting matches take place inside of a ring while a group of psyched people watches and cheers. Fighters range from models to marines, all bloodthirsty and adrenaline addicted. One spectator and a photographer that had the chance to observe matches up close recalls his experience as he walked inside the building for the first time: “The scene was rampant. The music was shaking the walls as if there was a subway going through the floor below us.”
Attractive half-naked ring girls tie the whole story together as they entertain the audience in between the matches just before the fighters take over the scene again ready to draw blood on each other.
Moscow
Russians are pretty notorious around the world for their hardcore stances and especially the very narrow-minded attitude towards manliness. Homophobia is something normal and to prove you’re a man, you basically have to get down and dirty and get your knuckles bloody. This is the whole idea behind the fight club in Moscow called The Ronin Family. The two men that founded the club were actually members of a real underground fight club and they decided to create their own club that would offer one-week courses which would turn “urbanites into real men”.
If you want to get physically and mentally tortured, this is the place where you should go. And you need to pay a lot of money to even get into the course, $900 to be exact. The course starts with talking about the worst thing the participants have ever done, only to proceed with difficult physical exercises you can’t say “no” to. The men participate in bare-knuckle fights and if they at any moment want to quit they are either beaten up or kicked out without the possibility of returning. There are even wooden knives involved for some exercises.
The basic concept is believing in yourself and fighting the “inner enemy”. But the realization of the concept is quite brutal and definitely not for everyone.
