Photo Credit: UFC.com
John Kolosci wrote up the following in his blog from the Chicago Sun-Times:
We have now been in the house for a while and are finally getting into a rhythm. The training is tough, but Matt Serra, Ray Longo and Pete Sell are PHENOMENAL coaches! I’ve never trained so hard in my life (I’m just happy I didn’t puke)! After 7 straight days of two a days, we finally got a break to try and heal up a bit. Everyone on the team had numerous aches and pains. After all the hard work in the gym, you do feel real good about what you just accomplished. Serra, Longo and Sell continued to remind us that if you want to compete at this level, you have to train at this level. It made it easier having 7 other guys pushing you along with the coaches, and no one wanting to give up. We also talked the staff into getting us a massage therapist and chiropractor to come in one or two days a week. We looked forward to those days. I don’t believe I’ve ever iced up or put so much muscle rub on in my life! I was dreaming of a bathtub full of muscle rub to just lie in, although that wouldn’t be too pleasant on the lower extremities (ouch, the burn!)J Not sure if anyone noticed all the wrappings around everyone’s feet, but we did some footwork drills on the “non-fight” canvas and everyone on the team had HUGE blisters on the bottoms of their feet. Now, I know it sounds like a sissy type issue, but they were horrible, especially when you need to pivot for boxing or shoot for wrestling. Ben Saunders had about a quarter of the skin on the bottom of his foot just hanging loose. His was the worst, and it was quite disgusting. But, of course we dealt with it and moved on…
Training and Bible Study?!?! What was Hughes thinking? I must speak a bit on my “I’m offended as an Atheist” quote since most people do not understand the term. Also, since Hughes and Barrera get their air time on “God this” and “God that” and all I get is one quote, I must elaborate. I don’t try to push my beliefs, but since it aired, I’ll explain. For Hughes to push Christian bible study on people was absolutely ridiculous. What if someone was Jewish, Islamist, Buddhist, Agnostic, Atheist or any one of the numerous other religions out there? It’s completely offensive. I guess I can best be described as a Secular Humanist, which amongst many other affirmations includes no supernatural beliefs. Please remember that Hughes and many others are Atheists to Zeus, Apollo, Amon Ra, Mithra, Krishna, Baal, Thor, Horus and the plethora of other gods throughout history, but for some reason they are content on believing in their own god. I’m not content, as I believe they are ALL figments of the human imagination. Many religionists will tell me that we need religion for morality? Sorry, but Ancient Egyptians have literature, dated over 4000 years ago, outlining the ethic of reciprocity or the “Golden Rule”, and countless other traditions taught the same thing without supernatural beliefs. This ethic on morality is simply a human and social law of conduct and yes, I do live by it. Religionists continually point to “faith” as their answer when cornered with facts they cannot refute, but to me faith is nothing but the acceptance of a fearless certainty in the absence of all rational evidence, which is antithetical to wisdom. At one time, I was a Christian and I was even a Deacon of a church before I actually started questioning these beliefs, and it did take me a while to break the spell. I will admit that a good brainwashing is hard to break. This is obviously just a short blurb, as I could actually write a book on this topic, but we can save that for a later discussion. Bottom line is that I’m a good moral individual with love for others, but without any supernatural dogmatic beliefs. Thanks for listening, now on to the next topic… Outside of training, there was still “the house”. It was already getting on peoples nerves. Again, watching this show from home is MUCH easier than living it. With no access to phones, internet, books or music, we were all getting a little stir crazy. I could already feel my IQ lowering, as I was dropping the F Bomb in just about every sentence I used. I like to read a lot and this was just strange. We also had just one washer and dryer to share amongst 16 guys that were training twice a day each. It was hard to get a spot, but we managed, and separating whites from colors was not an option. No way can you take up two cycles for such a petty reason! I haven’t done laundry in over 5 years (since I met my fiancé), and embarrassingly had a bit of trouble my first time. I had to get a little instruction…
Joey Scarola was simply a cry baby. Yes, as a person he was a nice guy, but he was mentally weak. I couldn’t even talk to him anymore, as he was driving me crazy. All the negativity and ceaseless crying was very annoying. I was sitting there wishing he would just go home because he was bringing me down. He should have just kept to himself until he got over it, or at least that’s what I would have done. How many times could you hear “You just don’t get it” or “I don’t think I can take this”? Yes Joey, we do get it! Perhaps he wasn’t aware that we were all in this house together and we are all going through the same garbage as he was. Nobody likes losing and nobody likes the house, but guess what, we signed up for this and now we must deal with it. Serra shared a story with us about when he and Joey were in the airport on the way to the show. Joey turns to Serra and asks: “Do you think they’ll let me wear Abercrombie and Fitch on the show”? Now what type of question is that? Is that what a fighter (or anyone for that matter) should be worrying about on their way to the biggest opportunity of their life? Annoying, just plain annoying…
Fight pick time was actually quite amusing, as Dorian was pacing the house as if he was fighting that day. He was absolutely convinced that we were picking him to fight Ben Saunders. Watching the show was the first time I really got to see how Dorian was acting and, quite honestly, he seemed a little nuts. I found it amusing how JRoc was trying to talk him down. I know getting in “fight mode” is something most fighters do, but this bordered on the edge of insanity. I do know that he was very surprised when we chose Matt Arroyo to fight him. We all thought that was a good match up, as Dorian was a stand-up fighter and Matt was slick on the ground. We felt that Matt could get it to the ground and submit Dorian. Honestly, many guys on our team were ground fighters and could have matched up well with Dorian (as long as he didn’t knock us out), but Serra chose Arroyo.
The fight went pretty much as we expected. Matt did eat a big knee at the beginning and he did share with us that he saw stars for a second. But, Matt sucked it up, got the fight to the ground and continued his game plan. He was showing some very nice ground-n-pound and when the ref told Dorian he had to do something or the fight would be stopped, Dorian tried rolling over and was caught in a rear naked choke. End of fight. Matt looked quite impressive and moved himself into the quarterfinals…
I’d like to add a little note about the actual fights. We’ve now had 4 guys fight on this show and all of them agree that the surroundings are just plain “weird”. No one has ever fought in a situation where there are no fans and just a handful of people, you fight in a small gym and you fight with someone you live with. You are eating breakfast and walking around the house with the guy you are going to fight! Not to mention, every fight is now the biggest fight of your life, you know that if you lose you are out of the competition and that millions of people are going to be watching this soon. It’s just plain crazy, and mentally draining, but of course that’s part of the show and we cope with it… Just thought everyone should get an idea of how we are thinking…
Until next time my friends…
12 Comments so far
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[…] fighter? His name is John Kolosci, and he is my new favorite fighter this season. Here’s his take on the controversial “Bible Study”. (It’s a pretty good read! He’s pretty eloquent for a fighter. I hate to […]
By Saint Gasoline » Blog Archive » The Ultimate Fundie? on 09.29.07 10:20 pm | Permalink
John, I am officially rooting for you throughout the rest of this season of TUF. And if you lose, I’ll contintue to root for you wherever your journey in MMA may take you. I think it’s great that you weren’t afraid to come out as an atheist on the show, even in the presence of so much overt spirituality from the opposite camp. And I totally agree with your assessment of Hughes’ “Bible Study”–it was arrogant of him to assume all of his fighters were believers, and even more arrogant to ask the fighters to compare him with “the queen” because of his “helpful nature”. The other fighters were more correct to compare him with God, who also likes to help people–but only after asking for their devotion and worship like some sort of arrogant little twit. Yes, Hughes is god-like, but that ain’t a good thing!
By Saint Gasoline on 09.29.07 10:33 pm | Permalink
Dood, Congrats on currently winning the biggest ongoing fight of your life: The daily battle for your own mind. Best of luck to you and here’s to society’s continued evolution to neo-theocratic ethics foundations. I just hope we can survive until the time it kicks in.
By Juaco on 10.01.07 6:41 am | Permalink
Good for you! Kudos for standing up to the bible thumper. You are eloquent and intelligent in setting out your beliefs- i am not a follower of the fight scene but support you in your endeavours. You should seriously think about writing that book- you would get through to so many young people that need support in their fight against brainwashing.
By Psychodiva on 10.16.07 6:19 am | Permalink
Hi, hello, privet
munificently
By Inwadocantten on 11.27.07 5:44 pm | Permalink
It’s nice to have some atheist/secular representation in the MMA world. Sooo many of these guys are incredibly religious, and while that’s fine for them, it’s a little perturbing. It’s ironic, also, that Matt Hughes is such an ego-maniac, and at the same time so deferential to Jesus in all of his success (at least on the surface).
Anyways, I’ll be rooting for ya.
By Jacob Dink on 11.29.07 11:49 am | Permalink
Hi one and all.
To bring a little truth to this situation, it should be noted that the book of the Tanach (Jewish Bible or Old Testament) that Matt Hughes had everyone read was ‘Esther’.
Meaning, it was a JEWISH STORY about a JEWISH WOMAN who saved JEWS.
It appears people are not fully familiar with what the Old Testament is or how it relates to the three major religions, which all embrace it.
So, I don’t think a Jew would be offended at reading the Old Testament, as that is the equivelant to the Hebrew Tanach, which is the same book in Hebrew.
Further, Muslims would likely not be offended either.
Muslims also believe in the Old Testament, however a few of their stories deviate from the Old Testament, as Mohammad, for some reason, did not want to verify his retellings prior to writing them in the Koran. So he has a few of his retellings incorrect, yet he reveres the Old Testament and claims the Jews and Christians changed the Bible some.
So, Christians, Jews and Muslims would not be offended at reading ‘Esther’ from the Old Testament.
I just want to put that out there, as no one seems to realize or have noted this.
Regarding John being an atheist, I guess I have to give you credit for having great faith. For I find atheism to take great faith to believe there is no God. There are way too many arguments for the existence of God that make atheism look very weak at best.
I actually believe atheism, once analyzed, actually proves the existence of God. Take for example Philip Pullman.
He creates a movie about killing God and it is actually a childrens movie that just came out yesterday, called ‘The Golden Compass’.
His story is essentially taking the Garden of Edena and flipping it on its head. He literally takes the position of the Devil by saying the forbidden fruit truly does give knowledge and that knowledge is that God is weak and evil.
Now, ask yourself, if a person is a true atheist, why would he make a movie about killing God?
For if God does not exist, there would be no need to kill him, would there?
Considering also people I have known, I have seen the same pattern with atheists I have known personally.
A little background, I used to be a Mechanical Engineer. I worked with one man (about the only atheist I knew) who was a devout atheist.
Not too surprisingly, he listened to music that was talking about killing God and even had a picture on the back of it where God was being dissected.
Again, same question. If atheists do not believe in God, why do they have to ‘kill God’ in their minds.
Perhaps it is because the idea of God is somehow in their minds and they need to get it out of their minds to be atheist.
Well, how could that be? Perhaps God created them and put this knowledge internally within them?
Now, that would make more logical sense considering the situation, seeing if there was no God, there would be no need for atheist to continually ‘kill God’ in their minds..
For what would be the point? God don’t exist, right?
Sincerely
Tony
By Anthony on 12.08.07 10:30 pm | Permalink
Your ability to misconstrue Pullman’s goal as in writing the Golden Compass is indeed impressive. Obviously, it’s incoherent to not believe in God and then think he should be killed. Pullman’s story then, in a lot of ways, is IRONIC: even if the God of the Judeo-Christian religious DID exist, these are some of the horrible and perverted realities we’d have to deal with. Daemons represent our free will and our knowledge of morality, which, for the most part, is innate, and only needs a decent childhood to be brought to fruition. The Church, more literally than in real life, but no less truly, wants to cut away our moral knowledge and abilities, replacing them with their own, perverse versions. Yes, children steal a little, or have little wars with each other. But that’s not sin, or evil, in any meaningful way. What is evil is what the Church of this book attempts to enforce, though scripture. Ultimately, Pullman is making a powerful statement: even if he is wrong about God’s existence (which you have failed to show that he is), he wouldn’t want to live in the type of world in which God exists.
God, to an atheist, is entirely irrelevant. The only thing that makes him relevant is theists’ constant enforcement of their attempted interpretations of his perverse will. If theists left atheists alone, then Pullman wouldn’t have to write books in which the characters ultimately kill God. But a world in which the Pope says things like “AIDS may be bad, but condoms are worse”, then ironic and acerbic attacks of theology will necessarily exist.
By Jacob Dink on 12.09.07 12:38 pm | Permalink
Oh, and sorry you lost on the finale John. Hope you stick with it.
By Jacob Dink on 12.09.07 12:39 pm | Permalink
I could pull out about 10 arguments that are about 100 times more powerful than the one I displayed here.
My point from the last post was if I can argue that analyzing an atheist can prove God’s existence, that shows how futile atheism is. You should be questioning your viewpoint, not dogmatically ignoring what I stated. Your argument of God being irrelevant in the mind of an atheist, has nothing to do with CONSISTANCY and logical deduction. So, your statement does not nullify my argument.
I am also from Indiana, as John here is, and people here often take the idea of God for granted. I find it humorous that he claims to have been a Deacon, yet he did not know that Esther is a book of the Hebrew Tanach (Jewish Scriptures). Or, perhaps, John didn’t want to make Matt Serra look like an idiot for saying ‘jews’ would be offended at reading Esther.
Either way, the fact still remains, Esther is a JEWISH book. And the 3 large religions which are based on God coming to man (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) ALL are literally different branches of interpretation on what happened after the Old Testament. So, they are just literally dissagreeing on who Jesus is.
Other than these three religions, all the other major religions are man trying to reach God or spirituality, such as Hinduism, Taoism, Buddhism, etc.
So, only 3 religions have God reaching to man and they are all arguing over the same story.. One is right, the other two are wrong..
And it would make sense, if there is a God, that he would try to make himself known to man in some manner. And as we all know, man is not perfect, so man reaching for God will never get it exactly right, so on the face, no philosophy of man can be completely right, due to man’s erroneous nature. Atheism would be in that boat also, for it is based on philosophy of man trying to figure it all out himself. Good luck with that one.
Sincerely
Tony
By Anthony Woodcock on 12.09.07 1:12 pm | Permalink
“My point from the last post was if I can argue that analyzing an atheist can prove God’s existence, that shows how futile atheism is. You should be questioning your viewpoint, not dogmatically ignoring what I stated.”
I know what your point was. Unfortunately, you must analyze an atheist’s viewpoint successfully to use it as proof for God. Misinterpreting Pullman’s ironic fantasy novels does not qualify as successful analysis of an atheist’s viewpoint, and thus, does not qualify as a successful proof of God’s existence.
I would love to debate the specifics of why you think atheism is untenable, and why I think it is entirely reasonable, but obviously, this is not the place to do it. Would you be willing to continue the discussion via email (jwdink@sjcsf.edu) or via a forum (http://forums.philosophyforums.com)?
Let me know. Thanks!
By Jacob Dink on 12.09.07 5:17 pm | Permalink
Thanks for the post
By Wilmvolavog on 08.02.08 6:42 pm | Permalink
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