The UFC is a league built for social media; On any given Australian Sunday, we’re stuck to our screens as our feeds feature highlights packages ending in knockout blows, and fighters employ entire dance routines for their entry to the octagon. Staredowns lead to scuffles at the weigh-in while trash talk and trolling fill the gaps during the leadup to the fight. The competitors fight for social clout well before they go toe to toe on fight night, and the league leverages the brittle egos and enormous audiences of each fighter to amplify their content, fill their seats, push their product and PPV signups. It’s something, man. It’s a well-oiled machine rolling through city after city, showing long-standing sports leagues a thing or two about creating an engaged community.
In contrast to the performative strutting, chest-puffing and capping of the competitors, one fighter stands on his own two as a man first, fighter second ... and social media troll comes somewhere in the low-300s. Australia’s Robert Whittaker is more interested in using his platform to spark social change than hit 500k views on TikTok, but his unique strategy is defying the odds – the man they call Reaper is consistently one of the most admired and well-loved fighters in the Ultimate Fighting Championship.
Only five days after losing his UFC Middleweight Championship belt to challenger Israel Adesanya, Robert Whittaker spoke candidly to Complex about fatherhood, family, community work and staying humble.
In social media comments, in YouTube comments, on Reddit, it's astounding to me, among all the negativity you usually encounter on those platforms, how well-loved you are – Is this something you've noticed?
[laughs] Thank you very much. It's something I've noticed now, but I'm under the honest belief that like attracts like. I feel that, on my podcast Grange TV and on my social media platforms, I'm just being me. I'm trying to be a guy that one day my kids will look up to. I'm trying to set an example to my own kids first and foremost, but [also to] any other young guys, or older guys, that care enough to have a look. Like attracts like, and I feel like we've created a culture that displays that
How do you think you've built that culture?
I think it's just an organic thing, I am who I am. I stay true to my morals and values and I didn't try to be someone I'm not. I didn't try to act a clown to get more likes, I didn't try to hit a viral video because I acted a fool. Obviously, that impacted my initial growth [laughs].
I never went viral and hit a million views in two days but it's something I've been consistent with and honestly my fan base and a lot of the fans, especially in Australia, they see that I'm genuine. I'm not trying to be fake, I am who I am, and I'm just a normal bloke like everybody else.
Did you have a role model or maybe a case study that you looked at, or someone you admired, that inspired that outlook?
My old man for sure. he's probably my biggest role model, in my life. He's a guy who kept me straight and narrow, he's very much 'don't be a fool, don't embarrass yourself', he was my biggest role model. he set a great role model for me and my brother, and I can only hope to do the same for my own kids.
You've mentioned previously that he was big on honour and integrity – where did you see that displayed?
I'm not too sure. It's hard for me to pinpoint individual moments of when it was displayed, it's just something that I grew up with. We were very much 'what happens on the field stays on the field,' 'be humble in defeat, be humble in victory.' I guess the best way to say it is that my old man is just very down to earth; he's a normal guy like everybody else, and I'm just trying to make him proud. If I had have done something, acted like a clown on YouTube or anything like that, he would have given it to me – trust me. So I just try to make him proud.
As someone with a platform, it's my responsibility to use that platform to the better of others.
And yourself as a father, you're trying to do the same thing now
Yea. I want to be the sort of man my kids can look up on YouTube and show their friends, and not cringe. I want to be the sort of man my kids are proud of, they want to boast about their old man, they want to show off their old man, not someone they're embarrassed by.
Do you feel you're tracking well on that trajectory?
Yea, I feel like I'm on the right track, the right path. I have really good people surrounding me, a really great support network; friends and family and coaches and workers and my kids are happy, I'm happy, I feel the love from the fans, the crowd, and yea I feel like I'm on the right track.
My son is three years old, and he's big on punching. I have to try so hard to tell him again and again 'you don't punch people, you don’t punch people’. It's easy for me to do, I've never punched anyone. What about yourself, is that a challenge in the home when so much of what you do revolves around striking?
Yea definitely. It's super hard to try to tell my boy 'don't hit your brother' when I do what I do for a living [laughs]. There's that comprehension in communication barrier still. But it's not that punching is wrong, it's just that there's a time and a place. But trying to explain that to a 4-year-old is challenging at the best of times.
The first thing people say when I mention Robert Whittaker seems to be ‘he does a lot of work with kids in the community, he's a good guy'. Can you tell me what you do to help out?
We have a Gracie Aboriginal Pathways program. It's an educational program. We try to get physical education and physical health certificates out to remote communities. We fly in Indigenous guys or girls from the remote communities, bring them in, educate them, get them to get their Certificate 3 and 4 and then they go back with that skill set, open gyms, stay down here and work, or whatever. And it's been great. We've had a lot of success, we're running another block right now and yea it's been great to be able to make a difference, to be able to give people skillsets they wouldn't have had otherwise, give people chances to be able to work in those industries
brain damage is real, I am under no illusion that it's not. I wanna get in, get out, and be happy.
Indigenous Australians are systematically robbed of opportunity, and you're doing something about it. I have to say, that's very inspiring.
With my entire career I feel, as someone with the spotlight and someone with a platform, it's my responsibility to use that platform to the better of others. Honestly. I've never been one for fame, fortune ... obviously I want to make enough money to be able to set my family up, look after my family, like anybody else. But, apart from that, it's important what you do with the spotlight.
We’re here at [gaming convention] PAX right now. I'm assuming that the role of gaming in your life is the escape from everything else you've got going on.
As you can imagine, fighting is stressful. There's a lot of pressure involved in that, and being able to play video games, especially Bethesda games where it's open-world, sandbox, RPG, where you create a little character that's not yourself, that doesn't have to worry about paying his mortgage off, he just has to worry about the dragon that's trying to eat him. You know, simple problems. To be able to just escape and not have to think about the realities of life is great. Honestly it really helps keep me in balance.
What’s your favourite game?
I play a tonne of Elder Scrolls online. It's an RPG, open-world, sandbox kind of game that you can play with your mates, so it's also a social outlet for me.
Is there anything else that you're doing in your life to de-stress that isn't gaming?
I'm very aware of mindspace and mindfulness, so there are exercises I employ when things are quite up in the air where I need to slow myself down, and I manually go through some exercises for my headspace. But otherwise, the healthy balance between training, work, games, and family time, if all is balanced, I'm quite good.
Would you consider yourself as having an entrepreneurial outlook on your career?
Yea, definitely. I'm very aware that you cannot fight forever. I'm very aware that I have a small window of opportunity to not only make some money in fighting, but also to use the platform fighting gives me to make sure that I'm looked after, to make sure that I have a bigger impact in the long run. So at the moment, we're running Grange TV, we have the GAP program, but also, we have a couple of gyms in Sydney that we've opened up. These are things that are built off the back of my career, because the whole idea is to fight because I want to, not because I have to.
You're building enterprise around your core offering
On hundred percent. That's the angle we've been working. I don't want to be fighting forever, brain damage is real, I am under no illusion that it's not. I wanna get in, get out, and be happy.
If we look at UFC and we look at gaming – two big parts of your life – they're very male-dominated. When it comes to young men, we're very aware of the impact of the media they consume and the way they’re behaving. Is this something you're aware of and do you think you can work towards to improve the lives of young men?
It's something I would like to have an indirect effect on. But it's something that I don't think just myself can really make a massive change in. A big thing that I'm trying to do, indirectly, is trying to bring a spotlight to the sport of mixed martial arts, because in doing so, the livelihoods of the young athletes trying to come up will be better for it. Because I remember how hard it was for me to come up and how hard it was, but on the back of that I guess my next biggest thing is just to get my story out there. To tell people my story so they can see, they can take the message from it; they can see what has brought me high, what has brought me low. I have to jump hurdles like anybody else, and certain things are normal, it doesn't matter who you are, you can get affected by them, such as depression and anxiety. I think just bringing awareness and letting people take the message they can out of my story will be the biggest impact I can have. And leading by example.
What would you like your legacy to be?
I just want to be a good husband, good father ... that's it. I wanna say good fighter but, honestly, if it came to being a good husband and father or a good fighter, I'd pick the husband and father. I'm gonna pick my family every day of the week, I don't care about fighting that much. It's one of those things. I want to make sure my family is happy and looked after. My legacy is my kids. If they grow up to be decent human beings, I did alright.
