WWF causing real pain (WWE in General)

Member Name: gollygumdrops

Product:	WWE in General
Date:	05/10/01 (98 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: It's fine for over 21's

Disadvantages: It's not a kids show

I’m going to call it WWF, even though they can’t call themselves WWF any more because the WWF (World Wide Fund for nature, or World Wildlife Fund as it used to be) owns the name, and although they offered to sell the rights to save some seals the wrestling boys wouldn’t pay up, so the sandal wearing hippies got tough and the wrestlers ran away like a bunch of cissy boy dancers.

OK, I kind of gave my hand away fairly early. I’m not a major fan of WWF. Why not? Well first here are the reasons that don’t bother me much:

It’s fixed: I’m really not concerned that the bouts are fixed. Everybody knows the bouts are fixed. It’s carefully orchestrated. Not even the most die hard fans would consider WWF a real sport. They know it’s about entertainment, not faster, stronger, higher. It’s not like this is an event that people bet on in good faith, it’s not like it matters who wins, it’s only fair that everyone gets a chance. Come to think of it, it might be nice UK football was fixed, as I for one am getting mighty bored of MUFC.

It’s choreographed: So what? All the great stage musicals have been wonderfully choreographed. The WWF dancers, oops, strike that, wrestlers, work hard to ensure that the fan base gets good entertainment. If the bouts were to go ahead without careful planning people could get hurt, or worse still, audiences might get bored.

It’s not a real sport: I do disagree with this to an extent. OK so they aren’t sports people in that they are competing for anything, but they are athletes. The chaps in WWF are very fit, and excellent gymnasts. Yes fellas, if you want to make it in the world of WWF get fit, get flexible, get pirouetting on bars. It’s not a pure strength thing. Ballerinas make far better WWF wrestlers than weightlifters do. These chaps need incredible physical awareness and concentration to pull of
a show that lets the audience think it’s a real fight, whilst ensuring that neither they nor their opponent suffers serious injury.

Nobody gets hurt in the ring: I’m quite cross with this assertion as people do get hurt. It’s certainly not the purpose of the performance as it is in say boxing, but people can get hurt. Lack of preparation, poor choreography, inappropriate improvisation, and falling poorly can all cause injury, sometimes serious.

It’s Baywatch for gay men: I can’t really confirm or deny this, what with not being a gay man and all. However, it certainly draws a bigger crowd than Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks at the Bedworth Civic Hall on World of Sport. It’s not unreasonable to suggest that this may have something to do with the relative cuteness of the participants. Large, muscular, tanned men, neatly shaved all over, covered in baby oil and grappling with each other does have some homo erotic overtones. There are certainly very few female WWF fans as man on man action tends to be less attractive top straight women than woman on woman action is to straight men. Female WWF has never really taken off. So what if it is ‘Baywatch for gay men’, does it really matter?

So up to now WWF with all its’ showmanship, American excesses and anti sporting ethics hasn’t bothered me, so why just the one star?

The reason I despise WWF is that it kills people.

Steady on Golly!

WWF has already resulted in at least two deaths of primary school children, along with countless hospitalizations. Children watch ‘The Rock’, or ‘Stone Cold Steve Austin’ go at each other in the ring, jumping on them from 6’ in the air, or throwing someone clean across the ring before walloping them in the gut as they ricochet back. You know and I know that the performers stand no more chance of real injury than the Sharks and Jets in West Si
de Story, however children can’t process this information as easily. They see the actions, they see that no one was hurt and they replicate the moves themselves. People do get hurt, badly.

Every time we show children violence without consequences we encourage violence with horrible consequences.

WWF defend themselves against this accusation by asserting that their target audience is 18-25 year old men. That ranks right up there with the tobacco companies assertions that they have no reason to believe that smoking causes cancer. It’s a downright lie.

If this fairy tale were true we may see joint Budweiser and WWF promotions, we could have tokens in our packs of Malboro that we could collect for WWF lighters. Never gonna happen. What we do get is Burger King childrens’ meals with cut out wrestler finger puppets, and Triple H T-shirts in toddler sizes. There's more money to be made in licencing toys and candy than there is in targetting adults with pay per view and WWF mortgages.

Greco Roman wrestling is a perfectly good sport with a fine Olympic tradition. If kids want to watch wrestling sit them in front of that for an hour. They’ll soon want to go out and play, or read a book, or make up a play, and perhaps a few less children will be murdered by their WWF watching siblings.

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