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UFC CEO Dana White is opening up ahead of next month’s UFC White House card.
On Tuesday, TIME Magazine profiled White for their cover article “How Dana White Took the UFC From the Fringes to the White House.”
TIME’s new cover: Dana White helped turn MMA from a fringe blood sport into a global empire through the rise of the UFC. Now, he’s bringing it to the White House’s South Lawn.
“There are some nights, I’ll get up at the end and go, ‘What the f-ck do I do for a living?’”… pic.twitter.com/qXosIuWSUW
— TIME (@TIME) May 26, 2026
In the piece, White explains that he’s “unapologitically masculine” and gives his rules for men, including never splitting the bill with women on dates and not complaining about their problems.
Via TIME Magazine
“I am unapologetically masculine,” White says. Men, in White’s mind, never split the bill when out to dinner with a woman. Men don’t shirk family responsibilities. And they never, ever, vocalize their mental-health struggles. “Talking about it publicly, I just feel like it opens the door to make young men think that it’s OK to just f-cking go, ‘Oh, I’m having mental [health issues],’” White says in a mock whiny voice. “Handle it behind closed doors. Don’t show that weakness to anybody.”
White also talks about his disdain for the phrase “toxic masculinity.”
“What is toxic masculinity?” says White. “Who has it? Who’s too masculine?” I suggest that when this attitude begets unjustified violence, you can call it toxic, no? “Then you’re a douchebag,” says White. “There’s a difference between being a douchebag and being masculine.”
The UFC CEO went on to say that he doesn’t mind being lumped in with the rest of the “manosphere.”
If White’s worldview has spread during Trump’s second term—in March 2025, the New York Times wrote that White “has helped define a new, masculinist American mainstream”—and if the White House fight signals its crescendo, that’s fine by him. “There’s nothing I hate worse than men that don’t act like men,” says White. “So if that puts me in the manosphere, then I guess I’m in.”
It’s interesting to see White do a lot of press ahead of the UFC White House card, it’ll be interesting to see how big the ratings for the event will be.