(Some) Ethical issues to be explored in the Philosophy of Martial Arts
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5007/1677-2954.2026.e110276Keywords:
martial arts, ethics, transgender athletes, women, virtuesAbstract
In this paper, the reader finds an introduction to some discussions in Ethics applied to Martial Arts through a brief analysis of some of the most widely popularized debates amongst the general public, namely: the alleged immorality of the practice and the spectacularizing of MMA, a debate that was particularly popular in the 2000s and 2010s with the rise of MMA and events such as the UFC in the USA and Brazil; the participation of transgender athletes in combat sports, which became a controversial topic during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games; and the issue of women’s participation within Martial Arts communities, a perennial issue from the times when such participation was prohibited to nowadays, when it is not only permitted but encouraged, albeit often without much critical examination. Finally, we demonstrate how Martial Arts can provide a unique contribution to enhance our study of moral virtues in Philosophy, showing how the interaction between Philosophy and Martial Arts yields mutual enrichment.
References
BRASIL. Ministério do Esporte. Diesporte – Diagnóstico Nacional do Esporte – Caderno I. Brasília: Ministério do Esporte, 2015.
BRASIL. Constituição da República Federativa do Brasil de 1988. Brasília, DF: Presidência da República, 1988.
CAMARGO, W. X.; KESSLER, C. S. Além do Masculino/Feminino: gênero, sexualidade, tecnologia e performance no esporte sob perspectiva crítica. Horizontes Antropológicos, v. 23, n. 47, p. 191-225, 2017.
COELHO, R. C.; DA COSTA, L. A. Arte e estima no tatame: reflexões sobre estética e ética nos desportos de combate. In: MARTINS, C. P.; LUZ, A. M. (org.). Da Luta/On Fight. Lisboa: AFDLP, p. 517-531, 2025.
DE LA ROSA, M. Historic MMA rivalries, part five: politicians vs. MMA. 2009. Disponível em: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/129309-historic-mma-rivalries-part-5-politicians-vs-mma. Acesso em: 12 set. 2025.
DIXON, N. A moral critique of mixed martial arts. Public Affairs Quarterly, v. 29, n. 4, p. 365-384, 2015.
DIXON, N. Internalism and external moral evaluation of violent sport. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, v. 43, n. 1, p. 101-113, 2016.
DIXON, N. Boxing, paternalism, and legal moralism. In: MCNAMEE, M. J.; PARRY, S. J. Ethics and Sport. London: Routledge, 1998
GATLIN, L. The origins and development of Kanō Jigorō’s Jūdō philosophies. The Arts and Sciences of Judo, v. 2, n. 1, p. 50-63, 2021.
GIANCRISTOFORO, L. N.; ZIMMERMANN, A. C.; SAURA, S. C. O Mosquitinho do tatame me picou: a experiência do Jiu-Jitsu na vida das mulheres. In: MARTINS, C. P.; LUZ, A. M. (org.). Da Luta/On Fight. Lisboa: AFDLP, 2025. p. 466-478.
LUZ, Alexandre Meyer. Por uma filosofia da violência. Ethic@, Florianópolis, v. 23, n. 2, p. 105-137, out. 2024.
LUZ, Alexandre Meyer. Filosofia da violência e aspectos filosóficos da autodefesa. Trans/Form/Ação, Marília, v. 48, n. 6, p. e025195, 2026.
LUZ, A. M.; VIDEIRA, L. G. S. Filosofia e/das artes marciais. In: MARTINS, C. P.; LUZ, A. M. (org.). Da Luta/On Fight. Lisboa: AFDLP, p. 57-93, 2025.
MESSNER, M. A. Sports and male domination: the female athlete as contested ideological terrain. In: MORGAN, W. J.; MEIER, K. V.; SCHNEIDER, A. J. (org.). Ethics in Sport. Champaign: Human Kinetics, p. 267-284, 2001.
MORCARZEL, R. C. S.; DA COSTA, L. A. Knock out justo ou golpe baixo? Reflexões sobre a participação de atletas trans nos desportos de combate. In: MARTINS, C. P.; LUZ, A. M. (org.). Da Luta/On Fight. Lisboa: AFDLP, p. 492-516, 2025.
PARRY, S. J. Violence and aggression in contemporary sport. In: MCNAMEE, M. J.; PARRY, S. J. Ethics and Sport. London: Routledge, 1998.
PRADO, V. M. Patrício Manuel: uma masculinidade queer no boxe para “homens”. Revisa Punto Género, n. 16, p. 241-265, 2021.
PRECIADO, B. Testo yonqui. Madrid: Espasa, 2008.
RUSSELL, G. Epistemic viciousness in the martial arts. In: PRIEST, G.; YOUNG, D. (org.). Martial Arts and Philosophy. Chicago; La Salle: Open Court, p. 129-144, 2010.
SARAIVA, J. M. Filosofia, artes marciais e violência: contribuições a partir da Epistemologia da Ignorância. In: MARTINS, C. P.; LUZ, A. M. (org.). Da Luta/On Fight. Lisboa: AFDLP, p. 424-447, 2025.
SIMON, R. Violence in sports. In: MORGAN, W. J. (ed.). Ethics in Sport. 2. ed. Champaign: Human Kinetics, 2007.
VEIT, W.; BROWNING, H. Ethics of mixed martial arts. In: HOLT, J.; RAMSAY, M. (org.). The philosophy of mixed martial arts: squaring the octagon. New York: Routledge, p. 134-149, 2021.
VIDEIRA, L. G. S.; LUZ, A. M. Questões de epistemologia e estética na filosofia das artes marciais. Kriterion, [S. l.], v. 67, n. 164, 2026.
WEIMER, S. On the alleged intrinsic immorality of mixed martial arts. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, v. 44, n. 2, p. 258-275, 2017.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Leonardo Gomes de Soutello Videira, Alexandre Meyer Luz
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors retain copyright and publication rights over their works, without restrictions.
Upon submitting their work, authors grant ethic@ the exclusive right of first publication, with the work simultaneously licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 International License. This license allows third parties to remix, adapt, and build upon the published work, provided that proper credit is given to the authorship and to the original publication in this journal.
Authors are also permitted to enter into additional contracts, separately, for the non-exclusive distribution of the published version of the work in this journal (for example: deposit in an institutional repository, make it available on a personal website, publish translations, or include it as a book chapter), provided that authorship and the initial publication in ethic@ are acknowledged.
