UFC champion Ronda \u201cRowdy\u201d Rousey is someone you either hate to love or love to hate. \u00a0The first time I saw her in the ring was during winter break of 2013, in North Andover, MA, where my mother\u2019s side of the family convenes each year for the holidays. \u00a0My older (male) cousins had split the pay per view cost of live-streaming that night\u2019s fights, and I watched disdainfully from an armchair as the announcers appeared on the screen, excitedly discussing what I had already decided was a primitive, brutal and needless sport. \u00a0The most anticipated event of the night, made clear by my cousins\u2019 animated dialogue, was the fight between Ronda Rousey and Miesha \u201cCupcake\u201d Tate. \u00a0The two had first gone head-to-head a year earlier, in a fight that left Rousey the new title-holder, and Tate with a broken arm. \u00a0Tate, back to reclaim her title and her pride, was both the underdog and the crowd favorite. \u00a0As someone who considers herself a kind, sympathetic person who takes no pleasure in the pain of others, I never expected to enjoy watching MMA (formerly titled \u201ccage fighting\u201d), let alone end up rooting for Rousey. \u00a0Yet, from the moment she entered the stadium to Joan Jett\u2019s \u201cBad Reputation,\u201d her expression so theatrically hostile I almost expected her to burst out laughing, I was intrigued.<\/p>\n
The fight began and, although Tate held her own (she\u2019s the only fighter to have lasted more than a single round against Rousey), Rousey\u2019s athleticism and ferocious dedication clearly placed her in another league; 58 seconds into the third round, Tate found herself in a deadly armbar and tapped out. \u00a0I was hooked; I watched YouTube videos of Rousey\u2019s older fights, read articles about her, and (for the first time ever in my life) looked up stats on websites like espn.com. \u00a0What I admire most about Rousey is her indestructible persistence. \u00a0A former Olympic Judo champion, she is also largely responsible for the recent inclusion of women in the UFC, and learning about her victorious seizure of a new right for women is incredibly empowering.<\/p>\n
Despite her history-making role in women\u2019s athletics, Rousey tends to be a polarizing figure. \u00a0In a New Yorker article entitled \u201cMean Girl\u201d by Kelefa Sanneh, she is quoted saying \u201cI\u2019m the heel, I\u2019m the antihero. \u00a0And I like it that way\u201d (The New Yorker). \u00a0While she is a gifted athlete with unprecedented skill, she is also incredibly cocky, stubborn, and, occasionally, openly disrespectful; after defeating Tate for the second time, she refused to shake her hand. \u00a0Her Instagram page is full of saucy quotes, such as, \u201cDon\u2019t confuse my personality with my attitude. \u00a0My personality is who I am. \u00a0My attitude depends on who you are.\u201d \u00a0While I am not ashamed of my infatuation with Rousey, I am aware that the cultural capital she holds clashes with the way I present myself to the world. \u00a0Rousey proudly exhibits qualities that, in anyone else, I would condemn, but my admiration of both her athletic prowess and her brazen self-confidence make following her career an undeniable guilty pleasure.<\/p>\n
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