Caracas Chronicles

Say you’re challenged to a boxing match. As you approach the ring, you notice your opponent is not wearing any boxing gloves. He’s just bare-knuckle. And you’re gloved. The referee can see your opponent isn’t wearing any gloves. The fight judges can see that too. They don’t bat an eyelash.

At this point, you have a decision to make. If you jump into that ring, you have to knock the guy out cold. Even though you’re gloved and he isn’t. It’s your only hope. You’ll never win on points with that ref and with those fight judges. That’s obvious. Because that ref and those judges can see just as well as you can that your opponent isn’t wearing any gloves, and if they gave the tiniest fuck about fairness, they wouldn’t allow the fight to go on in those conditions in the first place.

On April the 14th, Henrique Capriles got into the ring with an ungloved Nicolás Maduro. He took one hard, bare-knuckled punch and was knocked out. Then, bloodied and bruised, Capriles  looked up from the ground to the ref and cried “no fair! That guy wasn’t wearing any gloves! I demand a review of the videotape!”

On Saturday night, (in an 11 p.m. cadena!), the referee looked down and said, “that’s impossible! there’s nothing in the rules about reviewing any videotape!” 

Now, a couple of things to note: this debate about the videotape is really a bit of a distraction. The referee, the judges, the entire audience and everyone watching from home knows the other guy wasn’t wearing any gloves. But then, you knew the other guy wasn’t wearing any gloves when you jumped into the ring with him too!

You knew the game you  signed up to.

You knew it wasn’t fair.

You climbed into the ring anyway.

At this point, it doesn’t really matter to me if all your fans are right there behind you cheering you on as you turn to the ref and the fight judges and appeal the decision to award the other guy the win even though he wasn’t wearing any gloves: it’s still pathetic.