Let me preface my statements by saying that I’m only speaking of my tastes, not those of ‘wrestling fans’ as a whole.
I’ve been a fan, off and on, for over 3 decades, and have watched the product change over that time. When I started watching, wrestling was a local endeavour, and worked hard to keep the conceit of reality alive. The wrestling itself was less flamboyant, so that even though it was worked (scripted), it wasn’t so over the top that is was totally unbelievable. Of course, you had some characters who were larger than life and flamboyant, but even boxing had Ali.
When Vincent K. McMahon took over from his father, he built up the circus/carnival atmosphere of wrestling. I won’t digress into a complete history, but he’s responsible for the product you see today - the bad backstage sketches, the matches that defying human physical limitations, etcetera. Over the years, I’ve watched less - I only found out about the Chris Benoit tragedy because I was flipping channels and wanted to find out who was wrestling in the main event. Sometimes, an event or storyline will grip me, and I’ll watch as it plays out, but that has decreased. Despite all that, I still like to watch matches. I love watching the cruiserweights fly around, even though they tell no story, just move from ridiculously dangerous move to ridiculously dangerous move. However, my favorite matches always came from watching guys like Benoit, Kurt Angle, Eddie Guerrero, Shane Douglas, Steve Austin (especially before his broken neck), Bret Hart and Mick Foley (an abridged list). These were people whose style was not over-the-top and made it easy for you to suspend disbelief when you were watching them. They were intense and made you believe, even if only for the 15-30 minutes they wrestled. Sadly, to get to them, I’d have to sit through an hour of bad promotions (and 10 minutes of good ones) and another hour of bad matches. As noted earlier, I really don’t do that anymore.
I wonder, Jodi, if maybe the difference between the Colbert Report and pro wrestling is that you knew Colbert was an act going in?
That is, he’s had a notable comedy career before getting his own show. He was featured prominently on the Daily Show, Strangers With Candy, and a few movie roles. He’s an known actor who was given a stage to work on for the Colbert Report and we all know it.
With pro wrestling, these guys have no such history, and all you know them from is the wrestling gig. Sure, you know it’s fake, but with no prior history it’s harder to evaluate them than it is with Colbert. I don’t watch much pro wrestling myself, but I do know that the Saturday Night Live episode where the Rock hosted and other notable wrestlers guested sure as heck changed my opinion of them simply because I was able to see them perform in a context other than the ring.
I might just be grasping at straws/talking out my ass here, but the reasons you gave don’t sound all that compelling. It might be just differences in opinion here too, but it seems to me that if you take away the difference I explained above, there’s not much substantially different between pro wrestling and the Colbert Report.
Well, I’m not so much into that. But like I said, neither do I consider it an art form for which much of a defense can be constructed beyond “I find it entertaining and what’s it to you?” We’re only going to have a problem if you expect me to watch it with you, because I won’t.
I consider coming into this thread and calling it “laughable” and “an insult to your intelligence” to be denigrating. If it doesn’t bother you, then why make the special point of coming in here and saying those things? To me, it’s not the overt insult that Leaffan’s post was, but more thickly veiled. And damn, Jodi, I thought you were better than that.
I’d like to e-mail Colbert this thread comparing his show to pro wrestling. No, that’s not the difference for me. As I’ve tried to make clear, I understand the conceit of adding additional realism to a program by intentionally blurring the line between “on stage” and “off stage.” I have no problem with that as a technique; I just think it’s really badly done in wrestling, because the characters, premise, and action is all so unbelievable that asking me to suspend disbelief feels like an insult to my intelligence. I simply cannot do it. To me, it would be as successful to employ the same technique with The Power Rangers. I just can’t go there; my imagination isn’t that good.
Well, darn! I’ll just try to bear up.
Again, I disagree. Assuming for purposes of argument there is some similarity in technique between the faux-realism of pro wrestling and the satire of Colbert, IMO it is quantitatively better done by Colbert on every level. There’s no need to assume that opinion is based on prior knowledge of Colbert’s body of work, because it isn’t. Other than him playing essentially the same character on The Daily Show, I have no prior knowledge of his work. And while I have never watched much pro wrestling, there’s never been a time I was not aware that it was an act going in. The only way it could be faker would be if they were using transporters to beam the injured over to General Hospital.
The question to me is this: do news agencies report Colbert as a fellow member of the legitimate media on a real news program, or do they call it what it is: a comedy faux-news show?
I personally don’t watch wrestling, but hey, it takes all kinds. The only part that bothers me is when other news agencies are complicit in the make-believe. If I’m going to watch the news, I want to see the truth.
Therefore, don’t list Harrison Ford as “recipient of the Medal of Yix Yax for helping to destroy the Death Star.” It diminishes real military men who won real medals for real valor. Similarly, don’t list Robert Redford as “played for the New York Knights 1935-1936” and induct him in the Baseball Hall of Fame.
As nearly as I can tell, winning a Wrestling Championship is about as meaningful as winning Employee of the Month. You were diligent and hard-working and performed well for your employers, so you were given a plaque. It is a real reward; it just isn’t a real title and shouldn’t be reported as such in the real media.
This makes me really impatient. What if I have an opinion on ho-hos? Or Elvis painted on velvet? There is digestible good-tasting crap in many media and the fact that you like it doesn’t make it any good. I read Betty and Veronica comics, for chrissakes, but I don’t pretend they are War and Peace. This is the BBQ Pit. If you think any poster can open up a subject for discussion and only get posts that agree with him, then you’re in the wrong forum.
Because I think there are perfectly valid reasons for people to think pro wrestling is trite, unentertaining, and silly. I actually had to put a bit of thought into precisely why I personally feel that way, and I came up with an answer that makes sense to me (I can’t suspend disbelief far enough to accept the outrageousness at face-value), and that might be of interest to people who wonder why people seem to take such issue with pro wrestling as entertainment, and to give it so little respect.
Well, I’m not. Sorry to fall off that pedestal. I think pro wrestling is silly. And boring. I don’t give a rat’s ass if your idea of fun is 12 hours of non-stop pro wrestling, but I am entitled to hold my own opinion and to state it, so long as I’m careful not to impute it to you. If that chaps your ass, too damn bad.
I’ve never opened the sports section of the newspaper or turned on ESPN and seen someone reporting on who just won the WWE championship belt, so your analogy is false. When I read about Benoit’s crime, I read about it in the Entertainment section of my paper.
…and the fans know this, as others have pointed out in other threads. What’s your point?
This is the BBQ Pit. Denigration is it’s stock in trade. There is no such thing as threadshitting in the BBQ Pit. I think you should follow your own advice - if you don’t like what you are reading, quit opening up the thread and getting your feelings hurt.
I would mention that George Michael used to report on the main events of WCW pay-per-views on The Sports Machine, but I imagine that wouldn’t help my case very much.
Oh, Jesus Christ on The Dating Game, Jodi. You can dress it up all you like, but you’re a snob. Yes, it’s the BBQ Pit, and you do have every right to express your opinion. And I have every right to poke holes in your well-thought-out opinion and point out your snobbery. So don’t get your panties in a twist when I do. You don’t like wrestling? Fine and dandy. But the fact that you feel compelled to shit all over it tells me something about you, and it ain’t pretty.
Coupla things. First of all, as insults go, “snob” doesn’t really wound me much. Second of all, I’m kind of entertained to be called a snob, because it’s not a characterization that is thrown at me even occasionally. As I listen to country music on the way to the rodeo, people aren’t saying “Jesus, Jodi, you’re such a snob.” Third of all, if your definition of “snob” is “anyone who thinks any form of entertainment anyone else enjoys in is in any way silly or dumb,” then yes, I am in fact, in this respect, a big ol’ snob.
Seems to me your “poking holes in my opinion” involves comparing pro wrestling to a political satire, and bellyaching that I’ve actually chosen to participate in this thread. So point out my snobbery to your heart’s content. If disliking pro wrestling and actually saying so makes one a snob, then snob I proudly am.
And the fact that you actually think my posts constitutes “shitting all over wrestling” tells me something about you. The fact that you would actually change your opinion of someone else based on what they think of pro wrestling also tells me something about you. Because when you inform me that I have lost your regard over such a completely piddly issue, I can only wonder if your regard was even worth having in the first place.
ETA: No worries snix. I honestly did not mean to offend, and I apologize if I did.
The Entertainment section of the paper reports that Harrison Ford is a recipient of the Medal of Yix Yax? If so, then I have no problem that it reports a wrestler as the recipient of a title.
But I’m betting it doesn’t work that way — wrestling is reported by entertainment news as “real” but movies aren’t.
My point is that Employee of the Month is so trivial that it never gets mentioned unless it’s pertinent. I wouldn’t expect to see “Employee of the Month” 1991 for Wendy’s Old-Fashioned Hamburgers" in my obituary.
