I was gonna put this in MPSIMs, but it reads like a lame rant, even though it’s not. A rant, I mean.
What’s up with this backyard wrestling stuff? These kids parade around in outfits they bought at Target and make up goofy names like “The Suspiciously Affectionate Swimming Instructor” and “Furious George” and throw chairs at each other. They have championships and belts and announcers and storylines and rings and everything. It’s almost like a real professional wrestling show…without the “real” and “professional” part. I mean, why do these kids do this? I saw a show about it on MTV and they filmed a match. The crowd was a record at 7 people. It’s basically like these kids are living in a fantasy world. One of them was talking about becoming famous and getting all the women. Famous for being a nutcase, maybe. And I’m sure he’ll be a hit with the women at the Institute. The ones who haven’t gouged their eyes out yet, at least.
And then there’s this ‘blading’ thing where they actually gash themselves with a razor blade! It’s to make it look more realistic. So people actually think you were hit in the head full force with a pipe and landed on by a 300 lb wrestler doing a Cranium Torpedo Smasher Crushspike. See, the thing is, you’re mutilating yourself for like 10 people. Five of which are your friends. Four of which are neighborhood kids hiding out from the cops on drug charges. And one is a WWF talent scout. — Sike!
Maybe I’m just out of touch with the younger generation. Being an 18 year old geezer, I just don’t understand how this is a healthy state of mind to be pretending you’re a pro wrestler. I’d understand (in a way) if the kids were 6 and 7, but these guys are 16 and 17! There’s so much energy put into this stuff it’s almost sad that no one attends.
Has anyone actually been to one of these shows? Is it as hokey as I’ve gathered from the internet and MTV? And are these guys delusional or just having some fun after school?
I think backyard wrestling is hilarious, I’ve checked out many of the pages devoted to it, if there was local ‘league’ I would probably go check it out.
Yes, it is kids emulating the new heroes, the wrestlers. What would you rather have the boys do, go out in hip huggers and navel-exposing shirts, wear pigtails and go-go boots, go shopping, play with dolls and look and act like Brittany Spears???
They took out the toy guns, and with cops are killing kids brandishing these toys. Teasing girls, which used to be ‘boys will be boys’, now lead to sexual harassment lawsuits. The boys have to do something else to pass the time and work out their agression. Thus this backyard wrestling. Since it is uncontrolled and for the most part unsupervised by adults, there are the risk of injuries.
Some people who want to break into the business use these backyard tapes as the audition to the promoters. The wrestler who became world-famous for hurting himself, Mick Foley, started out as a backyard wrestler. So did the Hardy Boyz. (Edge and Christian doing MST3K-type commentary on the Hardy Boyz tapes is a classic in wrestling promos.) Funny that while WCW had Marcus Bagwell telling kids to stop the backyard shows, the WWF used the backyard tapes of their wrestlers as angles.
I used to cut promos like the wrestlers do with my sister. She did a good and funny Roddy Piper while I did a mediocre hulk.
how or why is this different from kids who want to be good skateboarders, or band members even?
jub
Well, shit! That sounds like fun! Let me just find a chair…these artsy fartsy antique Chippendales my mom loves so much will do nicely…and a costume…fuck it, I’ll just go in my tighty-whities…that’s it! My name! Tighty Whitey Man!
LOOK OUT NOW, BEEEEYATCHES! TIGHTY WHITEY IS GONNA KEEEEEEEEEEL YOU!!!
Skwerl,
Lighten up, fantasy is part of the learning process. When I was a kid, we strapped on the cap guns and played Roy Rogers and Jesse James, robbed banks and killed each other all day. As far as I know, none of us carried this into adult life.
When my grandsons (4/6) come to stay overnight it’s a given that a foam mattress will be on the floor before the night is over and the WWF or the NWO will commence.
We toss, turn, flip, slam and butt until Grampa can’t take anymore. It’s good exercise and beats the shit out of watching the shootings on TV.
Maybe I’m wrong, won’t be the first time. But I don’t think it’s a major reason to call out the guard.
When I was a kid, I did the same things. (Well, not wrestling, but fantastical stuff.) I’m just intrigued because these guys are 16-21 usually, which is past the normal overly-imaginative stage we all go through.
Also, I thought of the band/skateboard analogy, and my only rebuttal is that garage bands don’t usually go through the trouble wrestlers do (costumes, names, storylines, stages, etc). I know the over-the-topness for backyard wrestling is necessary to emulate the pros, but it seems like it’s all a fantasy league. To me. I guess it’s just a very elaborate, choreographed hobby.
Actually, I think it’s all pretty funny. In a sad sort of way.
Man, my freshman year of college, these two guys who lived on my friend’s hall were obsessed with wrestling. I went to a hardcore liberal arts hippie school, so maybe it was an ironic obsession, and I know one of them wrestled in high school. Anyway, they used to wrestle in this outside commons area all the time, and once, they stole a tray from the dining hall, cut it in half, and somehow put it back together. So one day when they were fighting, this one guy “broke” the tray on the other guy’s back. It was so fucking funny. Yah, it was kinda creepy and weird, but just to know people that into something, especially something as dumb as wrestling. . . it was just a riot.
Why?
Fun, fun, and more fun.
I certainly don’t dig the razor blade bits, but wrestling is lots of fun and putting on a big hokey show around it is probably lots of fun too.
I saw a show on it once, but they didn’t do the razor thing, they were actually hurting themselves.
One kids was paralized from it and now he goes around telling to kids to change their ways.
I laughed my ass off watching them.
Okay, it is kinda stupid, but I’m not doing it.
Especially with people running around in tighty whities!
They showed some of the parents also, and the ones they showed were pretty all for it.
They are the ones who have to pay the medical bills.
These kids were jumping of garages onto tables with an elbow drop, and hitting each other to unconsienceness with folding chairs.