Jump to content
DVDVR Message Board

MARCH 2021 Discussion of Wrestling.


Recommended Posts

3 minutes ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

In recent memory Cesaro when he was a babyface had the hottest hot tags I can remember in awhile. Charging uppercuts, dives to the outside, top rope double stomps, rolling through to springboard uppercuts... yeah Cesaro is my answer.

Oh, man, I do love me a good Cesaro hot tag.  It seems like so long ago that he would go back and forth with running uppercuts and tear up a beach ball in the process.  It kind of makes me wonder for as great as he is as singles if maybe his career destiny was always to be a tag person.  Don't get me wrong, him as WWE champ would be aces but I tend to remember a lot more from his tags with partners like Hero, Sheamus and others.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Technico Support said:

Holy fuck, I looked it up and this shit is fucking insane

Sweet tap-dancing Jeebus! How is this shit even possible in 2021? That's like something out of a 1940s Warner Bros. cartoon. Does VKM really think that modern day Nigerians walk around carrying spears? I tuned out of WWE about the time of the first Saudi tour, so I had no idea that this shit was going on. I know Crews likes getting a paycheck, but this is just beyond awful.

  • Like 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Stefanie Without Stefanie
1 hour ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

Go back through my examples because I spell them out for you (the Goldust stuff might be in an earlier monthly thread so you might need to use the search function here). It's completely horrible. And if you don't know why it's horrible, you discuss it with someone who might see it as horrible (namely anyone who may be trans or women in general). I wouldn't feel comfortable speaking for them on those issues. Do that extensively and THEN come back and see if you still feel the same.

Hi! I'm guessing you were referring to this?

On 3/3/2021 at 10:01 PM, Elsalvajeloco said:

Man, I watched a Nitro (4/22/1996 IIRC) and a Raw (5/26/1997 where Shawn and Austin win the tag belts) the other day. The Nitro features Bischoff giving away the Raw results and he calls Goldust a transvestite among other things. On the Raw, Lawler cuts this tirade on Goldust that DEFINITELY would get a show canceled today. How in the fuck is that still on the network?

Because yeah, that made me extremely uncomfortable to go back and watch.

There were a lot of moments that Goldust was specifically intended to trigger transphobic reactions from, like when he was stripped down to lingerie at the end of his match with Roddy Piper at WrestleMania XII, or pretty much his entire TAFKA Goldust run.

Or when the Headbangers started wearing dresses and cone bras in the ring aside from the skirts they had been wearing after they turned heel. That was solely to trigger transphobic reactions too.

Or... heck, the entirety of Adorable Adrian Adonis. Or Vito in his dress going from "he's just more comfortable in it" to suddenly starting to wear a thong and keylocking people while putting his opponent's heads under the hemline of the dress.

Need I continue? Do I have to?

Edited by Stefanie the Human
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't have Photoshop installed, so just imagine a meme where there's a picture of Travis Bickle and Betsy at the porno theater on their first date with "WWE" written over Travis, "Peacock" written over Betsy, and "WWE Network Archives" written over the porno marquee.

Like I'm imagining people at Peacock just being horrified at what they're bought, while Vince guffaws about how it's such good shit.

Does anyone know what the review mechanism is right now?  Are people at Peacock literally going through hours of footage or are people tipping Peacock off?  Can someone give me the tipline number?  ?

Edited by Technico Support
Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 minutes ago, NikoBaltimore said:

Oh, man, I do love me a good Cesaro hot tag.  It seems like so long ago that he would go back and forth with running uppercuts and tear up a beach ball in the process.  It kind of makes me wonder for as great as he is as singles if maybe his career destiny was always to be a tag person.  Don't get me wrong, him as WWE champ would be aces but I tend to remember a lot more from his tags with partners like Hero, Sheamus and others.

I got to see a Cesaro hot tag at a WWE house show in November 2015 as he/Sheamus vs. The New Day vs. Luke Gallows/Karl Anderson vs. Enzo/Big Ass and it made for my second favourite house show I attended. The other reasons: finally got to see Sasha Banks live because she wasn't at the other house shows I attended, Chris Jericho (turns out that was his last match in the UK) and the best seats of any house show I'd gone to.

Edited by The Natural
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

27 minutes ago, Hagan said:

Here's the thought experiment:

Slippery-slopes arguments are fallacious because they ultimately are arguments in bad faith. However, there is a very logical chance that the end point is the archive gets nuked. That's not pie-in-the-sky conspiracy. Logically, you can look at what they are editing, what they are looking for and all of us can easily name HOURS AND HOURS of content off the top of our head in the archive that is racist, sexist, homophobic and misogynistic. 

So, show of hands: if Peacock decides to just nerf the archive or put up shows that are so heavily edited as to be basically old VHS clip jobs, are you okay with that? I can certainly accept that maybe it's a better overall for a lot of reasons but it's not bad faith to suggest that that's what we're ending up with AT BEST. . 

I know what offends me, but that isn't the issue. The issue is where does the line get drawn? Do we eliminate all footage of Gorgeous George, even though that was late 1940s-1950s TV. By all means, without context his gimmick is offensive as hell.

Where will people stand on Adrian Street's character (semi-effeminate ass-kicker)? I don't honestly know where the line should be, but I do know portraying a black man of Nigerian descent wandering around with a spear is about as offensive as anything I've seen on television in the last decade.  

  • Like 6
Link to comment
Share on other sites

28 minutes ago, Technico Support said:

Does anyone know what the review mechanism is right now?  Are people at Peacock literally going through hours of footage or are people tipping Peacock off?  Can someone give me the tipline number?  ?

If you really want to stick it to them, you should contact NBC's parent company, the Sheinhardt Wig Corporation. 

  • Haha 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Stefanie Without Stefanie
18 minutes ago, OSJ said:

I know what offends me, but that isn't the issue. The issue is where does the line get drawn? Do we eliminate all footage of Gorgeous George, even though that was late 1940s-1950s TV. By all means, without context his gimmick is offensive as hell.

Where will people stand on Adrian Street's character (semi-effeminate ass-kicker)? I don't honestly know where the line should be, but I do know portraying a black man of Nigerian descent wandering around with a spear is about as offensive as anything I've seen on television in the last decade.  

The line will get drawn somewhere, obviously. The question is, how much bigotry are you willing to tolerate in what you watch, knowing it might harm others?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1. We should listen to people who can or do get hurt by these things, seek their opinions, respect their opinions.

2. When possible, I believe in contextualization. If you're going to leave something, don't just leave it there without contextualizing it. Provide explanation and resources. If it is necessary to remove something, it's not enough to just remove it. Remove and offer context in its place or attached to it.

3. I know personally, I am impacted differently by things that happened before I was born (and I'd say especially before I had hit adolescence) and after, but that's just me. But it's all probably on a case-by-case basis relative to #1 above.

  • Like 3
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

WWE’s history is like wading through a sewer trying to find a lump of gold.

For every great match or promo you’ve got 100 things that are terrible or offensive or both.

This is a company that 18 months ago had the Jordan Myles T-Shirt controversy and here we are with Apollo walking about with a spear. I don’t think they will ever change without pressure from the TV companies who fund their bullshit.

The things they are removing is probably stuff 99% of us would never likely re-watch anyway. 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

56 minutes ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

And just to reiterate, I am in favor of erasing the black face segments. I have zero issue with those being erased from history. And the audio of any slur.

That's where we're in agreement. I've never said once that you have do a total scrub where you take away the visual aspect. It's not that hard to remove six or seven seconds of audio. There are creative ways you can remove stuff without it being harmful to your overall viewer experience. And the stuff that has to be removed where the visual component is part of? Just the cost of doing business.

I've learned from the Chris Benoit discussion we had here (I wanna say a year or so ago now maybe or longer) that people will die on that hill if need be. Like I'm talking get bayoneted in the throat like a soldier in a war movie. It's not really a zero sum game in this aspect because my argument has never been touch everything. The troubling aspect for all involved is IF you have to because it's so toxic. If your leg gets gangrene and the doctor says the infection has spread to the point where amputation is necessary, you can get second opinion after second opinion. That leg has got to go. It's not because the doctor doesn't like you having two legs. That's not gonna help you at all to blame the doctor(s). You're the one who didn't go to the doctor before the infection spread and it was far too late. 

What you're having is a bunch of individual, tiny conversations that need to hammered out between you and the party responsible for why this content needs to be removed. You cannot feign ignorance and not be able to compartmentalize things. You can't say on one hand, "I understand"  and then on the other hand "I don't understand.". You clearly understand why these things are extremely problematic. You're having a hard time coming to grips that something you love can be extremely problematic. Therefore, you cannot pass the buck to those who have a problem with it or could potentially have a problem with it. Your issue is with WWE, WCW, ECW, or whatever promotions appear on the WWE network or Peacock. It is what it is. It has to go. Does everything on the streaming service have to go? No and that has never been my point. I pay the same subscription price as everyone else. I don't have some fear everything is going to be gone.

1 hour ago, Eoae said:

Elvis has articulated a lot of his points very well.  I’d be in complete agreement with him if he wasn’t so interested in making sure (over and over) we know we’re shit people if we disagree with him even slightly.

You wanna know why? Because my race is not something I see as a laughing matter. Hence, THIS entire discussion. Hell, if you implied that you were cool with blackface, you'd be in HR quicker than a hiccup. 

And you sound completely silly saying, "Well I would be in agreement with the truth BUT I don't like the tone and delivery." That's absolutely moronic on your part. That's why issues on race continue to persist. If you refuse to listen and hear people out, your own personal problems with race will never go away. You cannot say something racist, double down, and be confused that the affected parties are mad. That's insane.

Also this thread doesn't have to be closed because you're too immature or unlearned to have that conversation. If you wanna disqualify yourself, be my guest. No one is holding you hostage. Your idiocy maybe, but no one else is.

  • Like 2
  • Thanks 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

36 minutes ago, Casey said:

“Preserving wrestling history” is about the dumbest excuse for people to use to defend their opinion on why NBC shouldn’t be doing this, too.

What do you mean?  People need to realize how sleazy and horrible wrestling was and is.  Bowlderizing WWE history is grotesque.  Deleting Jerry Lawler's commentary isn't going to change the fact that WWE pushed softcore pornography from women who were forced to do things that were reprehensible.  

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 minutes ago, Stefanie the Human said:

The line will get drawn somewhere, obviously. The question is, how much bigotry are you willing to tolerate in what you watch, knowing it might harm others?

In current day programming? Zero. Zero tolerance for people that should know better in this time and place. Which is why Peacock should have just bought the rights to the live PPVs and let the network be the network. I have a different view on the older content. It shouldn't be judged against today's standards, it should be judged against the standard of the time it existed.

I'm not someone trying to stand up for the vile shit. I'm as socially inclusive as everyone else that posts here. My point with this is, through the microcosm of wrestling / scripted entertainment, we all have varying scales of what the line is. Anyone outside the bubble finds *all* of pro wrestling dumb & offensive. Hell there's people out there that find men and women being allowed to wear spandex trunks in public offensive. Do they get to draw the line? Do we have to adhere to the most strict views of that person? Does all old footage have to be cgi to include full body suits like they made the women wear in Saudi Arabia? Where does the line get drawn? Who draws it?

This is scripted entertainment. These are characters. Movies have good guys and bad guys. Are we deleting chunks of movies from the 80s when the bag guy says a bad thing? I guess it's not an apples to apples comparison. But I love Macho Man. He was a heel who treated his significant other like shit in hindsight. In today's context it certainly comes off as domestic violence and gaslighting. Do we have to erase Savage's work because of the character? I think we all agree domestic abuse is not fucking cool right? So who gets to decide where a domestic abuse character weighs in vs trans-phobic character? Or vs jingoistic character?

Delete all black face content.

Delete audio of all slurs.

But if you go further than that, the entirety of pro wrestling history is gonna go down with it.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

And you sound completely silly saying, "Well I would be in agreement with the truth BUT I don't like the tone and delivery." That's absolutely moronic on your part. That's why issues on race continue to persist. If you refuse to listen and hear people out, your own personal problems with race will never go away. You cannot say something racist, double down, and be confused that the affected parties are mad. That's insane.

Y'all might want to soak up this free game before he starts charging for it. 

  • Like 1
  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

21 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

You're having a hard time coming to grips that something you love can be extremely problematic. Therefore, you cannot pass the buck to those who have a problem with it or could potentially have a problem with it. Your issue is with WWE, WCW, ECW, or whatever promotions appear on the WWE network or Peacock.

To this I respond with this :

10 minutes ago, DEAN said:

What do you mean?  People need to realize how sleazy and horrible wrestling was and is.  Bowlderizing WWE history is grotesque.  Deleting Jerry Lawler's commentary isn't going to change the fact that WWE pushed softcore pornography from women who were forced to do things that were reprehensible.  


Like if you want to take that stand, I'm all for it. But go all the way. Don't pick and choose. Because I think it's you who is compartmentalizing things here. I love pro wrestling. But unfortunately I know it's a fucking sleaze factory. The indys of today are way different of the indys of when I started in wrestling. Things are moving in the right direction. There is a lot of representation of all kinds of inclusive thought processes and it's great. But no matter how much better we do on the indys, that doesn't clean up the fact that this business was built on a pretty gross foundation.

Deleting the characters you don't like when viewed through today's lens doesn't erase them from existing. It doesn't absolve the decision makers of the time for that gross decision. It doesn't change that WWE / WCW / ECW/ AWA / NWA / whatever else were sleazy as fuck. And in WWE's case can still be pretty sleazy today. So I would just point out maybe it's you who can't come to grips with enjoying this form of entertainment that always has, and still does, profit off of some pretty gross people.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

Like if you want to take that stand, I'm all for it. 

Apparently not because you're not understanding some very simple things. 

Quote

But go all the way. Don't pick and choose. 

You don't get to tell people when they should go all the way OR even judge if it is going all the way. Hell, I will even use my self for example. One of the few admitted slip ups I had (and I probably wouldn't call it a slip up as much as a learning experience) is when we were discussing a Walter Hill movie (The Assignment w/ Michelle Rodriguez and god knows who else was in it....Sigourney Weaver maybe?) a few years ago. There was controversy about Michelle Rodriguez playing a transman (sorry if my terminology isn't correct my bad). I know someone had a major issue with it and I think there was a boycott, and my reply was something to the effect of "Man, I don't even see why someone would be mad at this. Hell, I didn't know the  movie had already been out. You should probably direct your energy elsewhere on something bigger." This in turn pissed off Dolfan and we had a little misunderstanding that was quickly resolved. However, with the benefit of hindsight, I shoulder the blame for that misunderstanding because I didn't have the proper context of what people were mad about and the controversy. Again, it was a movie that completely flew under the radar. That doesn't change that I had a faux pas. It wasn't my place to say don't pick and choose your battles. Not when I am not on that side.

Second, I can be mad about racism and still understand WWE and NBC are running a business. I understand what comes with that. I also understand what comes with being a customer. If I am a big time customer for a certain t-shirt website and they have to remove certain t-shirt designs for inappropriate material or even anything that can be construed as that, I am not going to be pissed that they had to do that. I am also not going to draw conclusions that this could put their whole business and my enjoyment of it in jeopardy. What's going to happen is what's going to happen. That's out of my power. It's on them if they didn't do their due diligence.

Quote

Because I think it's you who is compartmentalizing things here.

Well yes cause my whole point is you're smart enough to compartmentalize those things. Or hopefully you are. You can do that and figure out getting rid of certain things weren't infringe on your entertainment. If it is, that's probably something you need to resolve within yourself.

And as for what Dean said and what you said about erasing things...the point isn't to erase anything. The point is to call out and say that this doesn't belong in our society or any form of entertainment. And as much as I love DEAN, I can say what he said is completely off base. Just because something is scummy doesn't warrant any excuses of the behavior since it's just so far at one end of spectrum it's ridiculous. Not when your fanbase is SUPPOSEDLY extremely diverse. It's not gonna fly. Because WWE (and wrestling in general) has been outlaw territory, it's become normalized to the point where people don't even feel anything anymore. And that itself is a huge problem because it's only reflective of a toxic fanbase. I am in favor of improving it so we don't have to go through shit like this anymore, and people can learn from it. It seems like people refuse to learn. 

Now you have the fact that NBC brought in the brutal and nasty reality check in the form of swift censorship. To steal a phrase from the great KRS-ONE, "YOU....MUST...LEARN."

  • Like 3
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

In current day programming? Zero. Zero tolerance for people that should know better in this time and place. Which is why Peacock should have just bought the rights to the live PPVs and let the network be the network. I have a different view on the older content. It shouldn't be judged against today's standards, it should be judged against the standard of the time it existed.

Santina Marella was in the Women's Royal Rumble LAST YEAR. Would anyone like to try and claim that that gimmick is anything other than massively transphobic?

  • Like 2
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

This is scripted entertainment. These are characters. Movies have good guys and bad guys. Are we deleting chunks of movies from the 80s when the bag guy says a bad thing? I guess it's not an apples to apples comparison. But I love Macho Man. He was a heel who treated his significant other like shit in hindsight. In today's context it certainly comes off as domestic violence and gaslighting. Do we have to erase Savage's work because of the character? I think we all agree domestic abuse is not fucking cool right?

Problem is, a lot of times the good guys were doing bad things and being cheered for it (Piper, DX in the Nation sketch, etc.), and the bad guys were hated for doing things we consider pretty normal now (e.g. Goldust).

And as for who draws the line, that's already been answered in this thread -- whoever owns or distributes the content. The same way the heirs of Dr. Seuss aren't forced to publish books they're no longer comfortable with.

Edited by Dog
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 minutes ago, AxB said:

Santina Marella was in the Women's Royal Rumble LAST YEAR. Would anyone like to try and claim that that gimmick is anything other than massively transphobic?

Honestly think your reaching here but I’m sure you can find way better examples to try and stoke the flames some more. The network has been around how long? For which you have no doubt been a subscriber to at some point and now that this shit is on Peacock and someone finally gave a shit to censor WWE that isn’t WWE your ready to go all Occupy Titan Towers up in this bitch? 
 

I despise Vince and his sleazy ways as much as the next dvdr poster but to think wrestling will ever change or be truly cared about by anyone other then the people who watch it is foolish at this point. 
 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

21 minutes ago, Infinit said:

I bet Vince thinks it's OK for Apollo to have a spear, because Drew comes out with a sword.

"WHAT'S THE GODDAMN DIFFERENCE, PAL????"

God... you're probably right. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...