Fighting is as important to the NHL as sex is to a honeymoon.

Those that love fighting realize the importance of allowing the players to police themselves in ways that referees fail to do.

As for you who think it’s barbaric and unnecessary, think of it as two men trying to hug each other or doing an aggressive interpretive ice dance.

I am not promoting or encouraging fighting at all, but I am telling you that when it happens, it is for a reason.

Two terrible non NHL-related hockey fighting incidents in recent months have caused the NHL to discuss the idea of banning fighting.

This debate has been in the works for years now but the result will be the same. Fighting is loved, is needed, and is staying.

“If you take fighting out of the game, you eliminate the players’ ability to regulate the violence in the game. That’s what fighting does,” Toronto Maple Leafs general manager Brian Burke told the Toronto Star.

“Fighting to me is the self-policing mechanism in the game to prevent the head shots, the hits from behind, and I will never vote to have it eliminated,” added Burke.

Tragedy in a fight is as uncommon as taking a slap shot in the neck with a puck or being slashed by a skate in the throat. Players are grown adults and are fully aware of what bad things can happen.

In these cases, players know what may happen if they don’t wear a neck guard during the game. The same is to be said for fighting. Players are aware of the danger if they choose to fight.

Think of all the concussions that have been caused from an open-ice body check, high elbows or hitting from behind. I guess the league now has to eliminate all body contact.

Is fighting responsible for breaking hands with a slash, crosschecking players in the face or for the famous knee-on-knee injuries?

No, but this shows that the natural game of hockey causes many more injuries than fighting itself.

Commissioner Gary Bettman has already admitted that he has no intention of eliminating fighting completely from the game but he is looking for ways to make it safer.

One idea is to enforce the wearing of helmets during the fight. Once a helmet falls on the ice, the fight stops immediately.

Other ideas are things like 5 to 10 game suspensions, more expensive fines and changing the instigator rule.

Either way, none of these ideas involve removing fighting from the league entirely. Love it or hate it, but if you hate it, stop wasting your time and get used to it.

Published in Volume 63, Number 21 of The Uniter (February 26, 2009)