WWE isn't so bad regarding race

[Everlong]

Not going to get into the debate because I'm on both sides of the fence.

I will say the only black wrestler in the WWE who I felt 100% should have been WWE Champion is MVP. I really, really don't understand how they fucked him up. He had the look, the charisma, the entrance, the attire, the in-ring ability, the talking skills, the gimmick, everything. He was the complete package. Then for some reason, they have him go on a losing streak and turn him face. I mean, really? The guy was golden and the WWE screwed him over. Seeing him falter because of the WWE brass just pissed me off. I remember being really ticked he didn't win MITB at WrestleMania 24, granted CM Punk won in his place but in hindsight, MVP would have been a better choice with Punk winning the next year.



His feud with Matt Hardy, one of the best mid-card feuds ever. One of the rare times you will see a team that isn't really a team win the tag team titles and it make PERFECT sense.

Yeah, MVP could have been a big star. Is he still with TNA?

[SortaCreative]

I think so. He actually did well in Japan too, funnily enough.

[Everlong]

I think so. He actually did well in Japan too, funnily enough.

And we've officially come full circle in this thread

[The Legend]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

[Str8Shooter]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

Why is rooted in the south? I can see the generalization that it's seen as a "redneck" low class type of thing. That's always been a stigma that pro wrestling has been fighting an uphill battle against. But WWF and before that the WWWF was really big in the Northeast for years, drawing big crowds with guys like Sammartino year after year. Not to mention the AWA was real big in the midwest and northern states and wrestling was pretty big in the Northwest as well. I don't see it as being a "southern" thing at all.

[Daz]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

Not true. Wrestling may have garnered a popularity in the south during the second half of the previous century, but the sport as we know it today, largely took root in the Mid-West. Which is why one of the hotbeds of wrestling in America, almost up until this day, is considered to be St. Louis.

[The Legend]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

Why is rooted in the south? I can see the generalization that it's seen as a "redneck" low class type of thing. That's always been a stigma that pro wrestling has been fighting an uphill battle against. But WWF and before that the WWWF was really big in the Northeast for years, drawing big crowds with guys like Sammartino year after year. Not to mention the AWA was real big in the midwest and northern states and wrestling was pretty big in the Northwest as well. I don't see it as being a "southern" thing at all.

The NWA and UWF are both older than the AWA or the WWWF and were the biggest starters of the professional wrestling industry. Both of those organizations are rooted in the south, not the mid-west or the northeast. Later those territories picked up large companies, but professional wrestling in America still was started in the south and first gained popularity in the south.

[The Legend]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

Not true. Wrestling may have garnered a popularity in the south during the second half of the previous century, but the sport as we know it today, largely took root in the Mid-West. Which is why one of the hotbeds of wrestling in America, almost up until this day, is considered to be St. Louis.

Again, look at my last post. St. Louis may be a hotbed today, but it is not the root of professional wrestling in America. Pro wrestling was decades old in the south before it ever evolved into any territory in the north.

[Daz]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

Why is rooted in the south? I can see the generalization that it's seen as a "redneck" low class type of thing. That's always been a stigma that pro wrestling has been fighting an uphill battle against. But WWF and before that the WWWF was really big in the Northeast for years, drawing big crowds with guys like Sammartino year after year. Not to mention the AWA was real big in the midwest and northern states and wrestling was pretty big in the Northwest as well. I don't see it as being a "southern" thing at all.

The NWA and UWF are both older than the AWA or the WWWF and were the biggest starters of the professional wrestling industry. Both of those organizations are rooted in the south, not the mid-west or the northeast. Later those territories picked up large companies, but professional wrestling in America still was started in the south and first gained popularity in the south.

The NWA also used to run almost all of their majors shows in the Mid-West, and it's original founder was the promoter from that region. It wasn't until later that the NWA become more Southernized, as Jim Crockett Promotions emerged and other territories like WWWF started to break away and strike out on their own. Until then, the NWA was much more widespread, not just "rooted" in the south. There were also promotions scattered across the entire country that pre-dated the NWA by years.

Also, the fact that the oldest wrestling company in the world is CMLL in Mexico, sort of devalues your point again. And as previously pointed out, pro-wrestling as a whole has a rich history in a multitude of different countries, with entirely different cultural background, not just contained to "redneck" white southerners in America.

[flock u]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

No it's not Pro Wrestlings Roots are in NYC,and Chicago where guys like Frank Gotch,Lou Thesz,and the like competed. Southern Wrestling didn't come along till later and didn't become prominent till the 70's.

[Str8Shooter]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

Why is rooted in the south? I can see the generalization that it's seen as a "redneck" low class type of thing. That's always been a stigma that pro wrestling has been fighting an uphill battle against. But WWF and before that the WWWF was really big in the Northeast for years, drawing big crowds with guys like Sammartino year after year. Not to mention the AWA was real big in the midwest and northern states and wrestling was pretty big in the Northwest as well. I don't see it as being a "southern" thing at all.

The NWA and UWF are both older than the AWA or the WWWF and were the biggest starters of the professional wrestling industry. Both of those organizations are rooted in the south, not the mid-west or the northeast. Later those territories picked up large companies, but professional wrestling in America still was started in the south and first gained popularity in the south.

The NWA contained many different regions and promotions, including those from the Midwest and other areas.

A quick Wikipedia search:

In 1948, Paul "Pinkie" George, a promoter from the Midwest, founded the original version of the National Wrestling Alliance with the backing of five other promoters (Al Haft, Tony Strecher, Harry Light, Orville Brown, and Sam Muchnick).

The NWA members divided up North America, as well as Japan, into territories that each promoter would "own" and operate in

Upon becoming the booker for Lou Thesz in 1950, Muchnick, who was the head of the St. Louis Wrestling Club, became the new NWA President and maintained that position until 1960.

There was people from the Midwest and other regions, even countries, in the NWA right from it's early years. A promotor from the Midwest founded the thing.

[Daz]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

No it's not Pro Wrestlings Roots are in NYC,and Chicago where guys like Frank Gotch,Lou Thesz,and the like competed. Southern Wrestling didn't come along till later and didn't become prominent till the 70's.

This, a thousand times this.

Also, google the Gold Dust Trio for further reading.

[flock u]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

Why is rooted in the south? I can see the generalization that it's seen as a "redneck" low class type of thing. That's always been a stigma that pro wrestling has been fighting an uphill battle against. But WWF and before that the WWWF was really big in the Northeast for years, drawing big crowds with guys like Sammartino year after year. Not to mention the AWA was real big in the midwest and northern states and wrestling was pretty big in the Northwest as well. I don't see it as being a "southern" thing at all.

The NWA and UWF are both older than the AWA or the WWWF and were the biggest starters of the professional wrestling industry. Both of those organizations are rooted in the south, not the mid-west or the northeast. Later those territories picked up large companies, but professional wrestling in America still was started in the south and first gained popularity in the south.

Wrong Pro Wrestling first gained popularity in the early 1900's through the 20's and it wasn't based in the south then. They had the big cards in places like Comiskey Park in Chicago. The first stars in wrestling were guys like Frank Gotch, Ed Lewis,Lou Thesz, and Fred Blassie and NONE of them were southern either.

[EmperorWu]

Circled Square is in fact right if you look at the history of professional wrestling in America. It's rooted in the south where it traditionally has been a Confederate flag waving white redneck sport and following.

If we're going back in history, regardless of where wrestling has it's roots as everyone is debating. Let's get back to this white people's sport, no black fans thing. Let's not forget the success of wrestlers back then that were African American, and were legitimate stars.

Butch Reed, Tony Atlus, Ron Simmons, Bearcat Wright, Ernie Ladd, Bobo Brazil and more, were all huge stars. JYD is probably the biggest black star of all time, one of the biggest ever period and he was more or less southern based. In the modern era we have Booker who was massively over until HHH arguably killed him. Rock is possibly in the top 3 biggest stars of all time, and as we've decided he counts as black. Now before someone tries to argue the lack of talent in the modern era since I only made two examples. Is that because there are less potential quality stars, or is it because there is now only one major company and they don't have much interesting in making another minority star? Hell even WCW gave Booker a ton of reigns. WWE seems to have the mentality of it's international fan base that they just have to have wrestlers that look like these people. However they often don't care at all about putting effort into making these guys legitimately over. And they almost always just give them a stereotypical gimmick for reasons???

So this brings me to two counter points to the two arguments I've seen being made. If these black guys were so successful. Then one of two things is possible. Either there are a lot of black fans who helped make these guys big. Or even if the audience is white, they are more than happy to make huge stars out of people who aren't white. I would say that nulls at least one or both of those arguments; Black people aren't fans, or white people only want to cheer for white people.

Since we love to think of people that came before us as more backwards and these guys had awesome success in the racist ol' south. It's a little harder to argue that a black wrestler couldn't be successful in this era.

[Circled Square]

I'm glad that some people understood what I was trying to say. I think it's very true that wrestling is a white person's sport. To say it isn't just because of it being an international game is like saying the NBA isn't a black sport because of the international players/leagues abroad. It's the fact that the WWE is the biggest of them all and has top tier talent on it's roster. They've had plenty of wrestlers come over from companies overseas that fail miserably because it isn't the same type of wrestling that they are accustomed to. I totally see why people think that the WWE puts minorities in shitty gimmicks, it's true, another one that comes to mind is Kung-Fu-Naki.

I also don't see anyone besides The Rock and maybe JYD that had very lasting star power. I don't want to hear wrestlers from 600 A.D because who knows if they'd work in the modern era.

[EmperorWu]

Since I brought up Booker earlier and I just randomly happened to stumble upon this...



Forget Bryan's road to Wrestlemania last year... WWE blurring the lines between truth and work even then.