Lance Storm and Shane Helms On Women In MMA: ‘If You Don’t Like It, Don’t Watch’

Both Lance Storm and Shane Helms took issue with a recent interview with ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith, who said that he didn’t like women’s MMA and didn’t want to see them in the Octagon.

Smith said on the Black on the Air podcast (via MMA Fighting): “Where I jump off the bandwagon is where they try to engage physically. For example, I don’t ever want to see a woman boxing a man. I don’t want to see that. I don’t want to see a woman in the UFC fighting a man—even though there are some women out there that will kick the dude’s butt. When I think about pugilistic sports, I don’t like to see women involved in that at all. I just don’t like it. I wouldn’t pass, I wouldn’t promote legislating laws to prohibit them from doing so, but I don’t want to see women punching each other in the face. I don’t want to see women fighting in the octagon and stuff like that. That’s just me. I certainly, what I adamantly would be against is them fighting men. I don’t think that’s cool. I’m not a proponent of that. Plus you don’t ever want to give men a license to believe that it’s all right to be physical with a woman, to be quite honest with you. You don’t want to do that.”

Helms replied on Twitter that if Smith didn’t like it, he didn’t have to watch.

Lance Storm added: “Seems simple don’t it? There is a lot of stuff I don’t want to see, so I just don’t watch.”

Then don’t watch. I love it. https://t.co/pszNkeyPqu

— Hurricane Helms (@ShaneHelmsCom) February 3, 2021

Seems simple don’t it? There is a lot of stuff I don’t want to see, so I just don’t watch.

— Lance Storm (@LanceStorm) February 3, 2021