Lila SeidmanSee also:
*Competitive Ladies Arm Wrestling? Yes, Indeed
*Top 10 Bars With the Hottest Women in L.A.
On Saturday night, in the protected brick-and-mortar bosom of Lacy Street Studios in Downtown L.A., a MMA training enterprise called Ultimate Female Fitness launched Beat Down Girls, a “female supremacist” wrestling studio and collective, with a four-match, mixed wrestling tournament. Cassandra Lee, the company's founder and madame of fetish clubs past, describes the Beat Down Girls as an athletic “girl gang” that champions the physical, mental and sexual superiority of women over their estrogen-challenged cohorts — and aren't afraid to get in the ring to prove it.
Several of the fit and fiercest from various corners of the women's fighting world, including pro boxer/Penthouse centerfold Hollie “Hotstuff” Dunaway; darling of online BDSM porn emporium Kink.com, Rain DeGrey; former competitive body builder Jennifer Thomas; and buxom-legged newcomer TigerLilly were there on Saturday to spar with more-than-willing male victims.
For those out of the professional fighting loop, this event involved “mixed fighting,” meaning men and lady folk in the ring, together, mixing sweat and guff and grunts. One catch is, the ladies always come out on top — each fight is thrown to the fairer sex to propagate an illusion of impervious female strength. Literally, the champion would, in the immortal words of Mortal Kombat, “finish him” by digging a dainty foot into a helpless lad's ribs and flash her biceps for the crowd. This is prime wank material for a large subculture of fetishists who prefer women of the Amazonian variety, and the fetish hinges on a flawless victory for the ladies.
Rain DeGrey takes down Sam topless; Credit: Got Your Eyes
While Beat Down Girls sounds like a blurry action flick circa 1982, it is actually a nouveau concept. Lee, a self-described “tough girl” wrapped in a seductive, petite Asian exterior, has been night-dreaming of an elite female society dedicated to the physical humiliation of men for decades, but only organized the collective a few weeks ago. Although websites and live tournaments have previously capitalized on the mixed wrestling fetish, Lee believes that the Beat Down Girls is a revolutionary enterprise. The difference, Lee explained, is that the “female first” thesis is not just a remunerative charade for her and her clan — it's the authentic sentiment underpinning the operation and the harbinger of a new world order.
“Everybody does whatever they want to do, but we prefer to beat up guys. There's no reason to fight each other. Men have been ruining this world for way too long, and it's time for women to take it back,” Lee told me in the Beat Down Girls' headquarters, located in a chic industrial loft in Downtown L.A. “This is a movement and if I have to start the damn thing, I will.”
I was struck by the girliness of the energy in the ring. Pinks and purples covered the fighters' toned buttocks. I expected female versions of the Hulk, but all of the ladies were surprisingly petite. Dunaway, the most serious fighter of the bunch, was the teensiest of them all. The pronounced femininity and high octave giggling may be a by-product of self-conscious self-marketing.
“They have to put marketable females together, attractive females,” Dunaway told me before the tournament. “If they're all completely tatted up, wearing trunks down to here and trying to dress like boys and act like boys, then people just watch boys box or whatever.”
Rain DeGrey, a veteran of Ultimate Surrender — an all-girls sexual wrestling show in which the victor dons a strap-on and pegs the loser — reffed the first three matches and then jumped into the ring, pig tails flying, to take on Sam, a “pipsqueak” type but with wrestling credentials of his own.
The energy remained piqued, although there was some stop-and-go in the action because it was being filmed by a premium cable TV channel. At one point, Rain DeGrey pulled a purple ribbon out of her pussy and stuffed it in Sam's mouth while the audience roared something fierce. Then the director yelled “cut” and she did it again for take two. I later saw the ribbon on the ground, slick with a mixture of vaginal fluid and saliva. For some reason, I shoved it in my pocket.
Rain DeGrey's infamous pussy ribbon; Credit: Lila Seidman
The tournament on Saturday was only moderately publicized and attracted an unlikely group of young fashionables. They still seemed to dig the spectacle once it got going. An older woman in front of me kept yelling things like “I want to see more pain in the face!” at the scantily clad Jennifer Thomas, who kicked off the tournament. I heard “Bite her nipple!” echoing from the other side of the ring.
The physical audience on Saturday seemed somewhat incidental. The match was filmed and live-streamed on the Beat Down Girls' website to cater to the real audience: mixed-wrestling fetishists who often prefer to lurk in the woodwork and breathe heavily in peace for a few bucks, rather than trek out to this eerie warehouse, which was formerly used to film scenes from the horror film Saw. Some exhibitionist fetishists, however, were on the premises. On the way to the refreshment stand, the male wrestler who fought Hollie Hotstuff asked me if he could kiss my shoe. I said yes; I thought it was the polite thing to do.
Rain Degrey announces TigerLilly as the winner of the match.; Credit: Got Your Eyes
While each of the four girls featured in the tournament are legitimate fighters, formally trained in at least one genre of sparring, they all offer private wrestling sessions for men or perform for videos sold in the fetish vein. The girls' reaction to the inextricable sexual nature of the female wrestling scene was startlingly varied.
“I wish it could purely be an athletic type of adventure where I don't have emails from guys asking me if they could have a release on my bicep,” said Thomas.
DeGrey's take was a bit different: “You know, sometimes the people that do pure submission wrestling kind of look down on the girls that also throw in some of the sexual aspect. I think that it's hypocritical and they can fucking shut it.”
Lee hopes that the launch of the Beat Down Girls will help fetishists come out of hiding and into the light of self acceptance, as well as allow athletic women to take pride in their guns and girlhood.
For information about the Beat Down Girls go to beatdowngirls.com.
See also:
*Competitive Ladies Arm Wrestling? Yes, Indeed
*Top 10 Bars With the Hottest Women in L.A.
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