(APR 16) President of the Rainbow Boxing New Zealand non-profit organization Benjamin Thomas Watt has confirmed that the organization's board has voted unanimously to close Rainbow Boxing NZ.

In October 2019, it was announced that the inaugural World Gay Boxing Championships would happen in Sydney in 2023. Benjamin Watt, a gay boxing judge, set out to create his own tournament to prepare New Zealand LGBTIQ+ boxers to take on the world at the tournament. “I set out to create Rainbow Gloves so that we would prepare LGBT boxers to have their first fight and help qualify boxers for the tournament itself.”

As ambitious as the ideas were for Rainbow Boxing New Zealand, three challenges impacted the organization, making it difficult for them even to get out the gate.

The first problem that had to factor in was the pandemic. Covid19 impacted New Zealand event industry severely, making it almost impossible to plan any events, especially first-time events. With lengthy lockdowns, no one was able to go to the gym, and with the majority of the people competing were first-time boxers, they needed the extra time to train; otherwise, it became a health and safety issue. The last thing anyone wants is a first-time boxer getting hurt.

The second challenge is the lack of financial backing. It was during the pandemic, and the non-profit is mostly event-focused. Not a lot of funding was available for the organization, especially since it is a sports event of boxing.

Finally, everything crumbled because New Zealand's boxing community was not ready to open its arms to the Rainbow Community.

Starting with Boxing New Zealand did not want to recognize Rainbow Boxing NZ due to the advocacy for transgender people to box. Boxing New Zealand believes if you are born a female, you will fight as a female, and the same goes if you are born a male, you fight a male, regardless of any legal right, hormone therapy, or reassignment surgery you have done. Even people in the boxing community believed it would be fair to have Transgender boxers compete in their division; however, Boxing New Zealand believes that it would be a health and safety risk to create their own division.

Boxing New Zealand also stated they refuse to change their policy. Despite some policies conflicting with the Olympic's decisions, their constitution must align with the Amateur International Boxing Association.

“Boxing New Zealand did, in fact, show signs that they wanted to make changes, however, a lot of what they did in communication to us was misleading.” Benjamin Watt said that Boxing New Zealand asked them to come up with ideas to help the rainbow community compete; however, Boxing New Zealand turned down the suggestions and rejected the membership for Rainbow Boxing to join Boxing New Zealand. On top of that, Boxing New Zealand invited Rainbow Boxing to participate in the AGM of Boxing New Zealand; however, it refused to give details of when and where the AGM would take place.

Finally, the boxing community is not ready for the rainbow community to compete. During the Olympics, the boxing community showed its true colors, with New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard becoming the first openly transgender athlete to compete. The majority of the community expressed their negativity toward having a transwoman competing in the women's division at the Olympics.

On top of that, one of the regular features of Rainbow boxing New Zealand was creating a registry for rainbow-safe boxing gyms for LGBT people to train safely. However, many gyms did not want to be known as “Gay Friendly” as they believed that they were everyone friendly. This is a similar reference to the “All Lives Matter” movement that was going against the “Black Lives Matter” movement. On top of that, some trainers would make regular light-hearted homophobia and transphobia jokes across social media.

The decision for Rainbow Boxing New Zealand to close down the organization happened on April 16th at their own AGM. “The decision to close the organization was a hard and sad one. I feel like I let many people down, and a year of work got wasted”.

Social Media
Women Boxing Archive Network
Instagram: @wbanbuzz
Twitter: @wbanbuzz
Facebook: facebook.com/groups/womensboxing/

 

 #          #           #          #

More Information on WBAN, go to our affiliated websites!
www.womensboxing.org
www.womenboxingrecords.com
www.wban2012.com
www.wbanmember.com
www.floridaboxing.com
www.iwbhf.com
www.wban.tv
WBAN's Group Facebook