Thoughts on Tony "The Viking" Halme's passing

[Matt Phillips]

I'm sure

You may remember Tony as Randy Couture's debut opponent in the UFC. He was also a pro boxer, and wrestled professionally under the name Ludvig Borga.

Many of you may not know that Halme was also a member of the Finnish Parliment representing the poorly named "True Finns" party. He famously flew into a roid rage once, terrorized his girl friend, and threatened police officers with a handgun.

IMO Tony was a Nazi and a fuckup, and someone who stoked the fires of predjudice against the Swedish speaking minority in Finland of which he (paradoxically) is a member, but he's passed and I suppose I hope he's resting well now.

Perkele!

[Kentucky Fried Chokin]

Whoops, I thought you wanted an assesment of his guard passing. LOL

[strikistanian]

Whoops, I thought you wanted an assesment of his guard passing. LOL

I was also expecting this thread to be about guard passing.

[BaronVonDingDong]

What did he die of? How old was he? Do you have a link to an English obituary?

[Matt Phillips]

I wasn't actually announcing his death. I was announcing that, even though I hated the guy, now that he's gone he deserves his mention. Wiki seems to have all the details http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Halme

One note on the "True Finns" party: This is a funny translation... I used it to, but the literal translation is Ground, Basic, or Fundamental Finns. Looking back I think "Pure Finns" captures the shitfuck of an ideology he espoused.

[Holy Moment]

I remember reading in Randy Couture's biography that Randy's mother cried when she watched Halme's pre-fight interview, where he said he had balls of iron and would rip off his opponent's arms.

I was surpised to see on his MMA record that he had three losses in MMA before the Couture fight. He was the boxing champion of Finland, though.

[Hesperus]

I was expecting a thread about gridiron.

[han090]

Hey WarWheel, what's your connection to Finland? I wish my finnish was sufficient enough to come up with a good response, but all I can say is kiss (short or long), thank you, you're welcome, hello, ****,**** me, and some other not so useful words.

As I understand it, describing the Swedish speaking people of Finland as a minority may cloud the issue somewhat (not in the least because most of finland is made to learn swedish through the school, and must pass a language test for many government jobs, but i'm assuming you mean swedish speakers as their first language), since Finland was invaded and occupied by sweden, and the modern "swedish" Finnish people are more likely to be wealthy descendants of those who seized land from Finland.

So it's really an expression of class war more than anything.

Plus the Swedish People's Party has twice the number of seats that the "true finns" party has.

But hey, i'm far from an expert on Finland.And none of the above stops Halme from being a perkele!

[Matt Phillips]

Hey WarWheel, what's your connection to Finland? I wish my finnish was sufficient enough to come up with a good response, but all I can say is kiss (short or long), thank you, you're welcome, hello, ****,**** me, and some other not so useful words.

As I understand it, describing the Swedish speaking people of Finland as a minority may cloud the issue somewhat (not in the least because most of finland is made to learn swedish through the school, and must pass a language test for many government jobs, but i'm assuming you mean swedish speakers as their first language), since Finland was invaded and occupied by sweden, and the modern "swedish" Finnish people are more likely to be wealthy descendants of those who seized land from Finland.

So it's really an expression of class war more than anything.

Plus the Swedish People's Party has twice the number of seats that the "true finns" party has.

But hey, i'm far from an expert on Finland.And none of the above stops Halme from being a perkele!

My daughter is Finlandsvenska. Nuff said.

[Snake Plissken]

Other then, at the time, being astounded that some "WWF dude" decisioned Iran "the Blade" Barkley in a boxing match.....I got nothing.