I've been a fan of MMA for the last 3-4 years. Having "some" Martial Arts experience, being traditional Karate (Okinawa Te) training as a young teenager (4-5 years) then some TaeKwonDo as an Adult (2-3 years) my interest in flexibility lead me to Yoga, which I have practiced and taught for over 15 years. I'm just giving this as context for where my viewpoint comes from. It should not come as a huge surprise that I don't much like Conor or his overall impact on MMA. While he has brought a lot of global focus and attention to the sport, his success, mixed with his constantly escalating desire to "be" the sport coupled with his antagonistic behaviour before fights has always seemed to be the antithesis of what I would personally look for in a Martial Artist. That's not to say I gravitate towards goodytwoshoes (eg I like Masvidal) I want authenticity, and I want to see fighters evolving in a positive direction, not just in terms of their success but also their growth as a person.
I thought Conor started going off the rails leading up to, and certainly after his fight with Aldo. He seems like a very intelligent person who is nonetheless controlled by an ego that has been excessively overfed due to his remarkable success. I think Conor was and is a very skilled fighter but his career path was also given every opportunity to blow up, courtesy of Dana White, who knew this guy was money right from the start. I actually feel that Dana himself probably carries some level of responsibility for what Conor became, it's almost like he gave him the keys to the Kingdom without any safeguards to ensure Conor would not fall victim to the sort of excesses that sort of money and celebrity was bound to bring him. Given Conor's personality it was as clear as day (to me anyway) that he was headed for trouble.
Given his trajectory, there is nothing remotely surprising about the allegations Conor is currently facing and I don't think there is anything wrong with speculating on the balance of probabilities about his guilt or lack thereof, as long as we all remember it is just that, speculation (no matter how well reasoned), and that ultimately, the presumption must be innocent until proven guilty. You only need to put yourself in a situation where you yourself are facing a false accusation to recognise the justice in taking a position like that.
Having said that, the things we already know as fact are pretty damning in terms of what they say about Conor and how badly his life has already been messed up. We know a woman was raped, and we know Conor did have sex with that woman but claims it was consensual. assuming the best case scenario for Conor, he is telling the truth, and his victim is either lying or not willing to name the true rapist, meaning the current suspicion falls on Conor. In this scenario, a DNA test should have been able to identify the presence of 3rd party DNA not belonging to Conor, meaning he should ultimately be in the clear for this.
The problem is, in this best case scenario he has now been publicly outed as f!cking around on Dee with a 20 year old woman. Since we know this is true, we can reasonably speculate his relationship is in very bad shape, and probably has been for some time. It is actually quite a miracle that she is still with him, but real life is complex and messy and no one should be speculating on her morals that she has chosen to stay with him because we simply don't know enough to make any sort of judgement about her situation or the very difficult choices she has sitting in front of her. Regardless, life for her must be pretty miserable, as he has disrespected her in a way that would surely be pretty humiliating for anyone with any sense of self worth and dignity.
The bottom line is I think Conor has become such a cliche that I almost can't despise him like I once did because it is so clear everything in his life is imploding and I can't help but feel that the tragedy is that he had so much, and appears to right on the edge of losing it all. For the poor woman who got raped, she deserves justice and regardless of whether it was Conor or not, I hope she gets it. I personally won't take any joy in seeing Conor fall if it was him, in fact I really hope it wasn't him, because as bad as his situation is right now, it stands to get one hell of a lot worse if he did in fact do it.
In the worst case scenario, where he did do it, even if he does not get charged or convicted, his life will still be forever ruined, because you can lie to everyone else, cover everything up with millions of dollars, but you can't lie to yourself. Every time he looks in the mirror, he will know what he really is, and that shit will be like a mill-stone around his neck, ruining everything else in his life. This is a type of Karma no one can escape.
