# Good role models?



## Jonathan (Nov 4, 2008)

Just curious- of the MMA fighters that are seen in 'the public eye', who would you suggest is a good role model?  Someone upstanding, 'clean', etc.?


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## jarrod (Nov 5, 2008)

randy cotoure


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## Brian S (Nov 5, 2008)

jarrod said:


> randy cotoure


 

 GSP and Anderson Silva


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## SensibleManiac (Nov 5, 2008)

Randy Couture, GSP, Bas Rutten, Anderson Silva, Matt Hughes, Thiage Alves, Nate Quarry, Demian Maia

There are lots of good role models, nobody is perfect but all these fighters have shown some moments of great class, respect and honor.


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## Nolerama (Nov 5, 2008)

There's a ton of really smart guys in MMA who choose the sport over their otherwise conventional life that can inspire those to be brave enough to think outside of the box.

However, I question why Americans encourage youth to look up to sports figures and emulate them.


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## jarrod (Nov 5, 2008)

SensibleManiac said:


> Randy Couture, GSP, Bas Rutten, Anderson Silva, Matt Hughes, Thiage Alves, Nate Quarry, Demian Maia
> 
> There are lots of good role models, nobody is perfect but all these fighters have shown some moments of great class, respect and honor.


 
i have never liked matt hughes, although he's a great athlete he never showed any humility or respect until gsp dominated him.   



Nolerama said:


> However, I question why Americans encourage youth to look up to sports figures and emulate them.


 
very good point.  i think it's okay to look up to athletes, but i don't see an reason authors, musicians, & academics can't be admired as well.  

jf


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## kaizasosei (Nov 5, 2008)

I really respect these fighters.  Check out the interview.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-UhsQlqKWc&NR=1

--------------sorry for getting a bit off topic but..
Here i will try to portray my understanding to date of the strategy involved in mma with regard to factors such as standup, groundwork, strength and aggression or even overconfidence and carelessness, in a series of 4 clips...


1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0qRQFJg9tA&feature=related
2.  



 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=267i7rKeECA&feature=related

3.


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## Journeyman (Nov 5, 2008)

What about Forrest Griffin or Rich Franklin?  They seem like decent people and I don't think I've ever heard anything bad about them, but I don't really follow the details of MMA fighters' personal lives.


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## theletch1 (Nov 5, 2008)

Nolerama said:


> There's a ton of really smart guys in MMA who choose the sport over their otherwise conventional life that can inspire those to be brave enough to think outside of the box.
> 
> However, I question why Americans encourage youth to look up to sports figures and emulate them.


It isn't just Americans. The ancient Greeks did it.  The Romans did it.  You find a civilization and you will find that the strongest, the best warriors, the best athletes are looked up to.


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## jarrod (Nov 5, 2008)

theletch1 said:


> It isn't just Americans. The ancient Greeks did it. The Romans did it. You find a civilization and you will find that the strongest, the best warriors, the best athletes are looked up to.


 
that is true & as it should be, but the greeks & romans also looked up to plato, homer, seneca, virgil. et al...the cult of sports does seem to have a bit more favor these days.

jf


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## zDom (Nov 6, 2008)

SensibleManiac said:


> Randy Couture, GSP, Bas Rutten, Anderson Silva, Matt Hughes, Thiage Alves, Nate Quarry, Demian Maia
> 
> There are lots of good role models, nobody is perfect but all these fighters have shown some moments of great class, respect and honor.



Bas Rutten of all people? Surely you jest ...


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## punisher73 (Nov 6, 2008)

What do you mean by "good"?  Are you just looking for someone that after they beat someone up and they show respect?  What about charity work or other things OUTSIDE of MMA and then I might consider them as a role model.

I think we lower our standards as a society when we use athletes as "role models" that give nothing back to their communities.  So what if they don't commit crimes or get into trouble, like Chris Rock says YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO DO THAT!!!


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## CoryKS (Nov 6, 2008)

Junie Browning.  :rofl:


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## Nolerama (Nov 6, 2008)

coryks said:


> junie browning.  :rofl:



haha roflmao!


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## Skpotamus (Nov 7, 2008)

Every society likes to put exceptional people on a pedestal.  For many youth, it's sports figures because what kid doesn't want to be a professional athlete?  

The big problem with this is that they are all people, and have flaws.  Putting them on pedestals can really dampen a kids enthusiasm when they find out about those flaws.  

Bas Rutten was known for getting drunk at clubs and getting into fist fights, not to mention urinating on a dance floor.

Rany Couture is on his 3rd wife, the other marriages ended from his infidelity.  

Quentin Jackson actually did donate time and money to childrens groups, then went crazy with his infamous slow speed chase.  

The top fighters for class in and (apparantly) out of the ring while being absolute ellite are GSP, Anderson Silva, Fedor Emilianenko, and Rich Franklin.  

My vote would probably go to Franklin.  He told his own home crowd to stop booing anderson silva and that he deserved respect.  I don't think I've ever heard a fighter do that before.


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## kaizasosei (Nov 7, 2008)

We are all human and most of us have some kind of flaws.  Some of them quite obvious and some of them rather hidden.  The more famous one gets, the tougher it sometimes is in that, for one, if you make a mistake in life such as being disrespectful or messing up relationships...etc,  it becomes an even bigger deal than if you were just the average joe and not supposed to live up to some kind of ideal.  so much for that.

About mma fighting in general.  I don't know what it is like in other places, but my experience so far has taught me that mma is all out, no bs fighting.  There are some limitations, such as to omit striking or certain destructive moves.  But the omission of those moves is actually to allow the contestants or practitioners to go even more crazy in the respective field.  For example grappling.  Grappling is the closest and more gentle form of combat.  A strike if you think about it, is in essence degrading, offensive and a clear display of malicious intent.  Grappling can be very aggressive and often is so, it is also by no means completely safe as by certain jointlocks, one can do much damage such as breaking or dislocating parts of the body.  One can even indirectly strike the opponent against the floor with a big throw or an offbalancing technique.  However at the heart of it, grappling is closer, and closer is challenging and more rewarding provided one is not overly destructive.  

The most versatile and therefore most free form of fighting is real combat, freefighting or even war.  There are some arts that do incorporate a great deal of freedom, but due to the dangers involved they usually do not go all out.  Furthermore, within the martial arts world, people and arts have become soft in many instances and completely omit the real, violent, all out-mentatily, sometimes to the point of forgetting what real fighting is. 

This brings me to my next point.  The heart of a person and how it is tested through the martial arts.  Firstly, in real combat, you cannot be a pansy.  You cannot be wining and accusing your opponent of anything because unless there is some kind of interruption in the war, it would be seen as nothing more as a distraction to the real combat at hand.  I believe that the martial arts and combat experience, even or especially training, is one of the greatest tests of the human heart.  In realistic training, you see right away, who is being soft, who is accusing other training partners of nonsense or being unjust or unfriendly.  You also can see if someone is being overly destructive or taking advantage of the weaknesses of others in an excessively unfair way.  In real combat training, there is no way to hide anything, the only way would be to hide behind belts and titles, but that would be besides real combat training.

ok, so we have these brutal gladiator-type ma, and we have this artsy martial arts that talk about philosophy and boast some kind of spiritual knowledge...
why is that?   Yesterday i asked myself if history is repeating itself. ? Maybe the artsy stuff is a product of past violent martial arts tests and encounters. That those that saw the war, the violence and the harshness of loss, created sortof peaceful martial arts focused on skill sometimes even avoiding any sort of confrontation.  

I was in the bus yesterday and i saw a slightly bigger kid having a scuffel with another out of the corner of my eye and when i looked over the big kid smacked the other kid in the head barely able to reach him but nevertheless i heard the distinct sound of his first knuckles knocking the kids head.  No big damage, it drew a smirk from me and i shrugged my shoulders before redirecting my attention everywhere else. Just to finish off, the kid hit did not get offended, seemed more mentaly adept than the larger noisy bully kid(may just be superficial judgement-whatever),they reengaged their initial talks- 
  still, i suddenly thought about how easily the kid made the move to strike and how normal he felt after-like hey i got you.  Because at first i thought the kids were brothers, but then it appeared that it was a scuffle over a seat in the bus between classmates.   
 I couldnt help thinking that that kid that hit must have gotten the inspiration from some freefighting fight or k1 or something like that.  I just remember now how i saw some much younger kids barely over kindergarten age and one of the them was going ******* attempting all kinds of stuff you normally only see on payperview or youtube in freefighting.  
I came to the conclusion that freefighting is still sport, but it is damn close to real combat- in essence everything can be seen as combat, even a game of chess, but the moves of freefighting, k1 or pride are brutal. Kids are the first to notice that.  They notice it instinctively.  The spirit sticks out like a sort thumb-even boxing can sometimes look like playing chess in comparison.

Therefore i wonder if mma is a good role model for kids at all.  Maybe for warrior kids or kids that are to be fighters or desire themselves to be fighters, i can see that mma is effective and to the point.  Kids however, have their own way of distinguishing reality.  And bottom line, violence is looked down upon in most places for various reasons...

In training ma with one another, one must be understanding and tollerant.  One must have a heart like a willow tree that is raised up high yet soft and able to withstand harsh yet normal training attacks and the intent involved.  When we are in real combat, the heart cannot afford to be soft and must punish and destroy its opponent.  That is the essence of real combat.  Nothing for the weak and the weak can often be seen cowering down before and pleading to the stronger or violent to stop the violence.  In training however, one must be understading and aggreeable lest we begin to throw stones at one another in the form of disagreements or insults that will amount to no good and possible culminate into real violence.  Indeed, mercy and understading if not strategy can forgive even real blows.


maybe history is repeating itself with mma.  mma is true warriorship in many ways, there is also much skill in mma as well and with time i predict the spirit of mma will drown out many of those that neglected the heart of the warrior for too long or in deviously cowardly ways.  

On the other hand i predict that mma will continue to learn from many martial arts to the point of becoming a very complete science and possibly go on to incorporating more even more and true ethical approaches to training.  Then we might be able to speak better about role models in mma.
Because fairness is the way to sport as well as life.  
Combat is something so nasty, noone would want to live in a world of combat without any connection to the more human aspects of life. 

real combat combined with good sport=true martial arts


 j


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