Wrestling

F

forclosure

Well-known member
Only starting up cause i know Corpse and one or two people on here will have a field day with this talking about how much it directly links to current politics so go ahead blast away
 
pattycakes_

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
Clashes in the professional wrestling ring from the 1950s to the 1980s hinged on a different narrative. The battle against the evil of communism and crude, racial stereotypes stoked the crowd. The bouts, which my grandfather religiously watched on Saturday afternoons, were raw, unvarnished expressions of the prejudices of the white working class from which he came. They appealed to nationalism and a dislike and distrust of all who were racially, ethnically, or religiously different.
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- Chris Hedges - Empire of Illusion

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.ca/b...llusion-by-chris-hedges/9780307398475/excerpt

Boss ass book.
 
Leo

Leo

Well-known member
saw chief jay strongbow when I was a kid!

have a friend who used to really be into it, we went to a couple of matches at Madison sq garden back in the heyday of Stone Cold Steve Austin, Jake the snake, the Hardys, D-Generation, Shawn michaels, Kurt angle, booker t., Kane, the rock, undertaker, triple h, big show, etc. (actually can't believe some of those guys are still active).

it was a blast.
 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
'Rasslin' surely?

I was into wrestling as a kid (Hulk Hogan, Macho Man, et al), and then again as a teenager (Stone Cold, The Rock, Mankind) but haven't watched it in years.

It must have shaped my worldview in some quite bizarre ways

 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Whatever you think of wrestling 'politically' many of the top performers are brilliant showmen and athletes.
 
Leo

Leo

Well-known member
Corpsey said:
Whatever you think of wrestling 'politically' many of the top performers are brilliant showmen and athletes.
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absolutely. we're so used to watching acrobatic CGI-enabled fight scenes in films that it's easy to forget these guys are throwing each other around, slamming each other to the mat and doing back flips off the top rope in real life!
 
Leo

Leo

Well-known member
btw, former husker du guitarist/singer/songwriter bob mould wrote scripts for WCW back in the late 90s, he's a total wrestiing nut.
 
Leo

Leo

Well-known member
it's also interesting to see how they're always looking to introduce characters who reflect different aspects of culture, in order to appeal to those demographic groups. every personality stereotype and ethnic group eventually has a wrestler to represent them, sometimes proudly (Rey mysterio) but oftentimes in an over-the-top joking manner (more white trash hillbilly brother tag teams than I can name).
 
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padraig (u.s.)

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
I was a huge wrestling fan as a kid, WCW and WWF (before the World Wildlife Fund lawsuit made it WWE)

kind of pro wrestling's golden (maybe silver?) age, coinciding with the peak of extremely rampant steroid abuse

the racial and ethnic stereotypes are so heightened and insane

when I was a kid there was this dude Kamala, a "headhunter from Uganda" who was basically a semi-human savage seemingly without human language (in reality, a guy named Jim Harris, from Mississippi). his ringside manager was a dude in full British colonial getup. I mean what can you even say to that?
 
Leo

Leo

Well-known member
Corpsey said:
Is rasslin more woke these days?
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haven't watched in years but wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't. maybe a few token characters, but I'll bet they've hyped up the MAGA influence versus an environmentalist character . ;)
 
C

CrowleyHead

Well-known member
They did in fact have an environmentalist bad guy last year. The whole "his beliefs are good, but he's abrasive and condescending about it so he therefore becomes bad" deal. As always politics and optics in this stuff is superficial at best.

Interestingly there's been a huge boom in wrestling in the UK in the last decade (have a few friends that've gone to some of the bigger shows, Odai included) but noticing it hasn't permeated at all for folks here.
 
pattycakes_

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
The story line in professional wrestling evolved to fit the new era. It began to focus on the petty, cruel, psychological dramas and family dysfunction that come with social breakdown. The enemy became figures like Layfield, those who had everything and lorded it over those who did not. The anger unleashed by the crowd became the anger of people who, like the Heartbreak Kid, felt used, shamed, and trapped. It became the anger of class warfare. Figures such as Layfield–who arrives at professional matches in a giant white limousine with Texan “hook ’em” horns on the hood–are created by wrestling promoters to shove these social disparities in the faces of the audience, just as the Iron Sheik mocked the crowd with his hatred of America.
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also from the excerpt i quoted in post #2
 
Leo

Leo

Well-known member
trump's campaign rallies have always been a total ripoff of the pre-match shit-talking that goes on in the ring at the average wrestling match. repeating the favorite storyline and catch phrases to whip up the crowd, waiting for their reactions, call-and-response, verbally slagging off opponents.

even the way he came down on the escalator in trump tower to announce he was first running was exactly like how wrestlers enter an arena and make their way to the ring.
 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
I know it's definitely more family friendly these days than the attitude era.

John Cena is renowned for being the world's nicest guy IRL
 
Leo

Leo

Well-known member
Corpsey said:
John Cena is renowned for being the world's nicest guy IRL
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I actually worked on an ad campaign project with him a couple of years ago, didn't work with him directly but everyone said he was a totally nice guy. funny, no attitude.
 
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