And here is a pic: https://twitter.com/QoSBaszler/status/307660295915057152

as a state rep, you are a disgrace to SD and america.
as a pastor, you are a disgrace to christianity.

It came as a big surprise to me this morning when I woke up to read on other MMA news sites that you have apparently published part of an email I had sent you. I don’t regret anything I’ve written, but I did find it odd that you took my email as a defense of MMA. As I wrote in the email, not only couldn’t I care less about how you feel about the sport, but also, I didn’t even write the article that you have attributed to me. I also found it pretty odd that you didn’t chose to publish that part, but I digress.

I’m not here to point out the factual inaccuracies in your posts about MMA. I’m not here to debate you. I’m also not here to encourage you to watch a sport you have no interest in. I’ve already seen dozens of people try to do all three of those things on the comments sections of your website, only to watch you essentially claim that knowing absolutely nothing about the sport helps you see it for what it really is (?). I may be a lowly writer for CagePotato, but even I have better things to do with my time than argue with a guy who genuinely seems to believe that his ignorance towards a topic makes him the only trustworthy source of information on it.

Rather, I am here to tell you that if you are serious about getting MMA banned, you may want to consider stepping down from your unofficial position as the anti-MMA community’s mouthpiece.

Up until now, the only reason that anyone has paid attention to your rant has been your comparison of the sport to child pornography. In your mind, you didn’t receive the reaction you wanted because other people were too shocked to focus on the point you were making. In reality, other people dismissed the comparison because, believe it or not, they can tell that you didn’t even have a point when you made it. You’ve flip-flopped on what the comparison is supposed to mean – a telling sign in itself that you made it without any real point in mind – going from ”MMA is the worst sport in terms of injuries and violence” (which it clearly is not, as anyone who knows who Lawrence Taylor and Joe Theismann are would know) to “Anyone who understands addiction knows that it starts off with MMA then progresses to murder!” (Because obviously, porn addiction starts with innocent stuff like child porn then works its way to buying a Girls Gone Wild DVD, right?).

Making such an over-the-top comparison does nothing but turn away people who may otherwise agree with you, and serves no purpose other than turning your own argument into a gigantic self-parody. Perhaps if you are serious about getting MMA banned, you should allow more rational people to lead the argument. Who knows, maybe a businessman who has actually researched whether or not MMA legalization affects the economy or a doctor who has researched the long term negative health effects of being an MMA fighter may be taken much more seriously than a pastor who tries to use scare tactics and shock value to make his case.

Sincerely Yours,

Seth Falvo

P.S. If you really want answers to the questions you have posed at Christian MMA fans and fighters, Fightlinker has already published a rebuttal, and I personally think it’s fantastic.

P.P.S. While I appreciate your offer of a free book, if you did as much research while writing it as you did while being South Dakota’s unofficial voice of the anti-MMA community, I must decline your offer. I have no use for a doorstop, paperweight, or firewood, and frankly, I bought more toilet paper today at Sam’s Club than I’ll ever go through.

So the challenge has been laid down before you. If preventing violence is your goal, then MMA ,football, as well as all other contact sports, should be in your crosshairs to ban. As a man of God, a man trying to prevent violence, you must lead the charge to ban all contact “violent sports.”

In this passage, Paul refers to “the games”. These games Paul references, and to which he gives no sign of disapproval, included fighting. Furthermore Paul explicitly references this in verse 26, in the context of exhorting his audience to follow the athletes’ example of physical discipline in their spiritual discipline. He draws a similar comparison in 2 Timothy 4 when he says “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith.” In all this, Paul a) assumes his audience has seen and is familiar with the games and b) never feels compelled to condemn the games (though Paul is stylistically known for his extended sidebar statements in the midst of a larger point), just the opposite – he commends the athletes to his readers! This is despite the fact that unlike modern MMA there were not weight-classes, health screenings, oversight commissions, etc. Combatants were bare-fisted, there were few rules to speak of.

So I have to ask, if the Apostle Paul didn’t have a problem with sport fighting, why do you have such hatred for the far less brutal incarnation we see today?

As for your now infamous question of “who would Jesus elbow in the face?”, I acknowledge that the specific scenario sounds bizarre and unlikely; but no more violent than when Christ (with calm premeditation) fashioned a whip and struck out at the merchants in the temple. We also know that Christ allowed for the state to wield the power of the sword, and that He is one day coming to bring terrifyingly violent judgment. So let us not be content to reduce Jesus to a limp-wristed pacifist, hippie moral teacher; he is far more than that. And his Sermon on the Mount (which is meant to be taken as a whole and not divided into proverbs on violence, meekness, etc. divorced from each other), calls on his followers not to seek their own justice, to put others before themselves instead of being so preoccupied with their own “rights”, what they “deserved” or what is “fair” in their own eyes. THAT is what the reference to turning the other cheek is about. If someone strikes you, don’t get mad that he dared invade your space, violate you, hit you; turn the other cheek, but rather put yourself below him, and you will receive an eternal reward over earthly respect.

First, as I wrote to you originally, I was not trying to persuade you that MMA should be legal. As I wrote, to each his own, I just found that for a pastor to site Forrest Gump over the Bible was really disgusting. If you’re going to post my private emails without my permission, you should post the entire thing.

Second, as I _also_ pointed out, that article you linked to “written by me” was written by Ben Goldstein. This explains why it was signed “BG” at the bottom. Lying isn’t very Christian, now is it?

I’m not here to waste time debating you; personally I feel anyone who argues against something without doing research and then claims some sort of divine sight (or whatever term you keep citing) when others correct him is clearly crazy. I’m just here to clear up my email for those who seem confused.

Your ability to research things before writing about them is just fantastic, isn’t it?