Mark Aragon, staff photographer of Jackson-Winkeljohn, was recently ban from covering UFC fights. On December 30, 2017, Aragon covered a fight between Holly Holm of Jackson-Winkeljohn and Cris Cyborg. After the fight, he posted a photo of Cyborg to his Instagram, calling her a “dude” and referring to her as a male. The post resulted in a public backlash, and it eventually got UFC to pull Aragon’s media credentials for future fights.
In his Instagram post (which is now deleted), Aradon posted a photo of Cyborg and wrote: Soon after the post went public, UFC journalists reacted on Twitter, strongly judging Aragon’s behavior. Cris Cyborg also reacted by posting the screenshot of Aragon’s Instagram post and commenting:
A post shared by ®️ Cristiane Cyborg Justino (@criscyborg) After a strong backlash, Aragon and Jackson-Winkeljohn apologized (kind of) through social media, trying to justify Aragon’s comment. They wrote that the photographer heard Cyborg’s team mock Holm and her performance, and he acted “out of anger and frustration.” https://www.instagram.com/p/Bda6c4Un_Ht/
After Jackson-Winkeljohn posted the explanation to Facebook, Cyborg responded: Posted by JacksonWink MMA on Monday, January 1, 2018 She added that she hoped his media credentials were denied “allowing a more professional photographer to take his place.” Her management had contacted UFC with her concerns, and indeed, UFC eventually banned Aragon from covering future UFC events: As Bloody Elbow writes, banning Aragon is an unexpected move from UFC, since they had their own history of mocking Cyborg. They believe it turned out to be more profitable for UFC to promote Cyborg than to trash her, and they merely set Aragon as an example. In any case, I believe mocking anyone this way is immature and low. As for the photographer, I understand we all have emotions, but staying professional often requires us to put these emotions to the side. [via Bloody Elbow, PetaPixel]
