Clawing, pinching or twisting the flesh.

"Grabbing the clavicle."

"Eye gouging of any kind."

"Throat strikes of any kind, including, without limitation, grabbing the trachea."

These are just a few of the 31 official and explicit "fouls" in the hugely popular hybrid fight game known as mixed martial arts – and yet the most telling of all the infractions is much further down the list. This foul does not involve "Putting a finger into any orifice or into any cut or laceration on an opponent" or "Kneeing the head of a opponent on the ground". It involves the absence of such blows. The absence, indeed, of any blows.

In MMA fighting, "Timidity" is a foul of its own, specifically: "Timidity, including, without limitation, avoiding contact with an opponent, intentionally or consistently dropping the mouthpiece or faking an injury."

This perhaps best personifies the polarising nature of a flourishing global pastime and industry. The rules are as carefully codified as those in boxing contest, but the desired – and marketed – image of its combatants is definitively more vicious and frenzied. It is this image – of two men violently and creatively maiming one another inside an enclosed octagon, surrounded by a braying mob, while organisers rake in pay-per-view dollars – that for many is simply too much to abide.

It was for Victoria, for a long time. Last week Minister for Sport John Eren overturned a ban on fights inside the "cage" or "safety enclosure" or "octagon" – or whatever you want to call the preferred venue for MMA clashes – but rewind to 2007 and the situation was markedly different. At that time, then sport and recreation minister James Merlino defiantly declared he would not follow the lead of other states in allowing MMA in cages.

"I have never approved," he boomed, "and will not be approving, any combat sport competitions staged in cages."

And then a funny thing happened. Labor changed its mind. It even made overturning the ban an election promise. Outgoing Victoria Police chief commissioner Ken Lay was among the most strident voices against the lifting of the ban. Lord mayor Robert Doyle also spoke out, and still practically seethes over the topic. Quick to condemn all combat sports for the "wider societal message" they send, Doyle saves a little extra vitriol for the gladiatorial cauldron and theatre of notoriety produced by MMA.

"Why do we need to add ultra-violence to our calendar of events? I think we've had enough experience in Melbourne with one punch cowards to know this is not a good move," he says. "I know politicians don't like to break promises, but this is one the premier should break."

That will not happen. The sport of MMA is perfectly legal, Labor points out, and the government has a "duty of care" to make sure contests are held in the correct enclosure, rather than a boxing ring.

"We recognise that this sport is not for everyone," said a government spokesperson, at the same time acknowledging that even with the "cage" ban in place the sport has surged locally – peaking in 2014 with more than 70 contests in Victoria. "Good governments move with the times."

Next up,  Eren appointed boxer and barrister Simone Bailey to the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Board, furthering displaying an intention to uphold the integrity of combat sports. Ultimately though, the stated goal of all this recent action is to boost tourism and major events, and bring to the city an event hosted by the Ultimate Fighting Championship, which is billed as the biggest league in the world of MMA.

"If we don't host one of the world's fastest growing sports, how can we call ourselves the sporting capital of the world?" Eren said. "We want to tap into this multimillion-dollar market but unsafe laws are getting in the way."

With those laws now redundant, the green light is on.

Jarrah Loh, editor of the MMA magazine Fight! Australia, said the ban being lifted  has already opened the floodgates. Fights staged by the promoter Hex are being held in Flemington on Saturday. Next week a group known as AFC will hold more. A planned UFC event in November is already being hyped.

"The UFC fights at Etihad Stadium will be one of their biggest shows ever," Loh says. "It's about flexing their muscles and showing how popular this is here. Melbourne is a massive market for them."

The commercial entertainment behemoth produces more than 40 live pay-per-view events around the world, broadcast in 129 countries to nearly 800 million households. They are used to these kinds of territorial regulatory battles. They have to be.

"They don't give up," Loh says. "They're well versed in law. They're slick and really smart and keep their company clean and corruption free, which is pretty rare for a fight organisation."

The local face of the group is the affable Tom Wright, general manager for UFC in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. He started lobbying in Victoria a few years ago, offering "the correct information" to decision makers. He visited Spring Street a handful of times, meeting at first with Hugh Delahunty and Louise Asher, and their then-shadow counterparts.

Wright has been through this before in Canada, where he was once commissioner for the Canadian Football League. (He is also a former president of the Canadian arms of Salomon, adidas and Spalding, as well as chairman of their Special Olympics). His strategy is education.

"There was a misconception that mixed martial arts was banned. It wasn't," he said. "You were allowed to compete, but only in a boxing ring – an unsafe environment. It defied logic."

This "unsafe" argument is simple: MMA fighters grappling in a boxing ring run the risk of going under, over or through the ropes and out onto concrete flooring, whereas such falls are impossible with a fenced enclosure. Not only that, but using a boxing ring instead of the more ubiquitous "cage" tends to favour fighters with a specialist background in boxing, who are adept at cornering opponents and "cutting off the ring". So the ring is both unsafe and unfair.

Needless to say, Wright is thrilled to have prevailed. Twelve months ago Melbourne and New York were the two biggest markets in the world where fighting in the UFC octagon was not allowed. "We've been able to check off one of them," he says.

Soon it could be two. The main road block in New York was an unco-operative politician – state assembly speaker Sheldon Silver – who was in January arrested after a massive corruption scandal. A new face in his chair will "change the conversation".

"They picked the wrong people to have a fight with, because we are persistent, disciplined and patient," Wright says. "We'll get to New York, just as we knew we would get here."

Much of the antipathy toward the sport, Wright believes, is based in the terminology. Calling the enclosure (which has no roof) a "cage" implies there is no escape. This is in turn leads to the label "cage fighters" – which feels one step removed from "human cock fighters".

"Danny Green is not a 'ring fighter' – he is a boxer," Wright says. "But the term 'cage' has been part of the Aussie vernacular, and it's actually one of the challenges we've had."

Wright has had the same experience in Western Australia, which established a ban on the use of cages in 2013. He has met with ministers in Perth and has reached out to WA Premier Colin Barnett.

Those opposed lean on two responses. They don't like the look, says Wright, or they believe MMA encourages visceral and bloody-minded street violence in impressionable young men.

"It's similar to the idea that every Formula One fan that goes out and watches the race this weekend will get into their Holden and go up Collins Street at 120 kilometres per hour," Wright says. "They just don't do that."

Much of the battle then for MMA promoters lies in "changing perceptions" and "dispelling myths", and yet the advertising material of MMA is perhaps the central myth-maker. The sport creates and nurtures the perception that it is the toughest, roughest and meanest on the planet.

In fairness though the discipline is gradually being normalised. In the United States for instance, several NBA, NFL and MLB players and teams use MMA as a form of cross training. Closer to home, Australian NRL and AFL clubs have taken the connection to another level, with many using grappling experts in coaching roles.

Remember the infamous Chris Judd "chicken wing" tackle, or a similar technique that raised eyebrows when used by Cyril Rioli? Some attributed that manoeuvre to John Donehue, a Brazilian jiu jitsu expert and former bodyguard to Nelson Mandela, who has also been a specialist tackling coach with league team the Melbourne Storm and rugby's Western Force – along with footy clubs including Hawthorn and Carlton.

Images such as this, which make the wider sporting public wince and flinch, highlight the severity of MMA. President of AMA Victoria Dr Tony Bartone condemns all combat sports, but he reserves a special place for MMA.

MMA bouts often end in submission rather than a knock down, but Bartone dismissed the suggestion that it could be less damaging than boxing (which focuses on repeated concussive blows to the head).

"The head might not be the prime target, but the range of trauma and violence – with kicks, elbows, knees – is infinitely broader," he says. "You can do a hell of a lot more damage when you combine all of that together. All that does is just spread the love."

Citing a 2014 study published in the American Journal of Sports Medicine, Bartone also noted that the rate of knockouts was significantly higher in MMA than in other combat sports, perhaps because fighters need to protect the whole body, leaving the head exposed to a more substantive blow.

Claims that the sport promotes healthy exercise and co-ordination with fitness and balance were, he said, beside the point. "The training and the dieting and the endurance and the discipline are not what we're questioning. It's harnessing all those skills and channelling them to the sole and utter goal of injuring, maiming or harming your opponent."

Dr Peter Lewis, chairman of the Australasian Ringside Medical Association (and the presiding doctor for most boxing and kickboxing fights in Victoria), sees the ban in a different light. He explained that the growing size of fighters, paired with more advanced wrestling moves, has increased the number of men being flung from boxing rings.

"We have had events where fighters have gone over the top rope and landed on their necks and heads and required hospitalisation," he says. "Of all the serious trauma I've seen, half has been due to going over the top rope."

Lewis argues that the central complaint is one of ethics and aesthetics. Each pugilistic sport has its own injury pattern. Boxing – head blows. Kickboxing – leg injuries. Muay Thai – elbow strikes and lacerations. "And as you go towards MMA, you get the strangulation tap out, which looks horrible," he says. "We might not like the style, but I'm a sports physician – I go where the injuries are."

Of course injuries appear to be the last thing on the mind of the MMA community in Melbourne. Promoters and fighters are quietly thrilled to enter fights in an octagon at home – instead of going interstate (or into a boxing ring).

One such mixed martial artist is Rodolfo "The Nightmare" Marques, 31, a Carnegie resident currently training and teaching at Krav Maga Evolution in Moorabbin. Marques is quietly bemused by all the fuss.

Born in Brazil and raised in Rio, he grew up with capoeira – an ancient and elegant combination of music, dance and kicks – and also vale tudo – an obvious precursor to MMA that came to stand for "no holds barred" and "anything goes."

"No rules," says Marques, smiling and jabbing a sparring mitt during a midweek workout. "Head," he says, imitating a head butt. "Elbows too."

He came to Australia two years ago after a stint in Japan, where the sport enjoys enormous popularity. His strength is – unsurprisingly – his Brazilian jiu jitsu. And he will lean on that when he fights American boxer Gabriel Solorio on Saturday.

"He is a striker – I am a grappler," said Marques, standing above his trainer in a "ground and pound" drill (where he practises raining down punches on a prone man). "If I can bring the fight down, I can use my style."

Marques is hoping for a big crowd. He wants the sport to grow larger and more lucrative. He remembers what it was like fighting in Brazil, where the competition was tough, the purses small and the sponsorships scarce. MMA was a legitimate career option there for fit young men. Like soccer it was a way out of the slums – all too similar to the "hoop dreams" mobility of disadvantaged young African Americans.

"If you work hard, train hard, hit hard, it can give a good future for you, for your family. Mixed martial arts is a good opportunity,"  The Nightmare says. "It is like a dream."