Former WEC bantamweight champion and current UFC contender Miguel Torres has been released from the UFC following making a rape joke on Twitter. This is a very strong move on the UFC's part and, frankly, was quite unexpected. Given Forrest Griffin making a recent similarly ill advised joke about rape and Rashad Evans invoking the Penn State child rape scandal in fight promotion yesterday it almost seems like Torres was just the guy who took it far enough that the UFC could take action beyond Dana "having a talk" with the involved fighter.

The news came from a Dana White interview with Sports Illustrated:

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.

Dana talked some to Ariel Helwani about the subject in a recent interview where he explained that the explanation Miguel gave just wasn't as solid as the one Forrest gave for his similarly tasteless joke. That response after the jump:

From Ariel's interview with Dana: