Mischief. Mayhem. A squash court.
The University of Manitoba is investigating a campus fight club after a November "altercation" in the sports centre's squash facility.
A concerned gym-goer contacted university authorities in late November when he saw young man emerging from the Frank Kennedy Centre's court sporting a bloody nose, and included a link to an 87-person Facebook group, called the K.Y.O. Fight Club.
Spokeswoman Leah Janzen said the university believes the fight was organized and consensual, and the Facebook group, which has since been taken down, included numerous references to other fights.
The university originally took disciplinary action against all 87 of the group's members by suspending their gym memberships "out of an abundance of caution," Ms. Janzen said. But after further investigation it tied five young men - four students and a part-time staff member - "most closely linked" to the November fight, and took away their fitness privileges for a month. Ms. Janzen said the investigation into the incident is ongoing, although she said criminal charges are unlikely because no one has come forward to make a complaint, assault-related or otherwise.
"The degree to which it was formally organized, the degree to which it was an ongoing, is hard to determine ... [but]as we understand it, everyone involved was there of their own volition," Ms. Janzen said.
"We continue to investigate as best we can to ensure that this does not take place on campus again. This is not any type of behaviour that we condone. That facility is there for the use of people who are interested in healthy living and working out, and we want to keep it that way.
"We were quite disturbed."
There are no university rules against fight clubs, but the altercation violated the squash court's terms of use, prompting the suspensions, Ms. Janzen said.
Police in Brandon, Man., broke up a similar group in September of last year: The Brandon Beat Down involved more than 100 people aged 15 to 28 engaging in routinely beating each other to a pulp in fights that baffled police (and some of the youths' parents) for months. Then, participants were charged with prizefighting - any "encounter or fight with fists or hands between two persons who have met for that purpose by previous arrangement made by or for them." YouTube videos of the Brandon Beat Downs were subsequently removed.