Miguel Torres released by the UFC for making rape joke on Twitter

Recently UFC bantamweight and former champion Miguel Torres made an inappropriate joke about rape on Twitter. The full tweet was:

If a rape van was called a surprise van more women wouldn’t mind going for rides in them. Everyone like surprises.

read official Twitter...

The fighter defended an enslaught of critics after the comment, citing that everything should be free to joke about. It turns out UFC President Dana White did not agree, and announced today in an Q&A for Sports Ilustrated that he had released the fighter:

SI.com: And what about Miguel Torres’ tweet from yesterday

White: This morning I’m on [Michael] Landsburg’s show, up here in Canada, and he hits me with the quote of what he tweeted. Now there’s no explanation for that. There’s absolutely nothing I could say to make any sense of that. And the fact that he even thinks that’s funny or that’s a joke, it disturbs me. It bothers me. Again, you’re dealing with a guy that’s a smart guy, that owns his own business, that’s been one of the top fighters in the world forever. And I cut him today. He’s no longer with the UFC

SI.com: Was that announced today

White: It’s being announced right now to you. You’re the only one that knows. Miguel Torres has been cut from the UFC and his career with us now is over

SI.com: Was this the first time something’s happened with Torres? Or was it a second offense

White: No, this was the first time. And then he said he hadn’t heard what happened to Forrest [Griffin, who drew fire for tweeting "Rape is the new missionary" last month]. Really? Where do you live? What business are you in? How do you not hear about these things? You should have paid more attention. It’s to the point now where, there’s going be times when things happen and mistakes are made. I cannot defend Miguel Torres. I cannot defend what he said. What he said makes no sense other than when he says, “It was a joke.” Well, I don’t think that’s a funny joke. I think it’s disturbing.

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Since hearing about this release from the company, MMAFighting.com's Matt Erickson has tweeted that Miguel Torres was quoting a popular TV show for the tweet he was fired for:

Just spoke to @MiguelTorresMMA via text. He assures me he was quoting from "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" and was watching it at time.

read official Twitter...