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Acceptable behaviour at live shows


Hannibal Scorch

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For every genuinely great chant, there's ten "she's a crackwhore", "show your tits" or "Jason takes it up the ass". I'd sacrifice the possibility of ever recreating the atmosphere of Lawler vs. Dreamer - one of my favourite ECW matches - if it meant never having to subject people to those chants.
 

A couple of examples that maybe people will consider worrying about as being overly "PC" or whatever, but are all part of the reality of a wrestling show;

The vast majority of shows I've worked, we have been paid by the event/venue to provide entertainment - meaning they handle ticket sales etc., and means that I don't have the authority to kick people out if they use slurs or abusive language. The second show I ever worked was attended by a rugby club outing, all of whom were drunk, loud, obnoxious and offensive, which ruined the show by intimidating the families that had come to watch, and basically meant that every other member of the crowd stayed quiet, rather than engaging with the show as they normally would.
 

I've worked shows in secondary schools, where the kids attending are shouting homophobic slurs at wrestlers. It's possible that there were also LGBT kids in that audience who were effectively forced to sit in silence while a room full of their classmates yelled homophobic abuse without being punished for it - precisely because of the kind of attitude you're talking about; it was "blowing off steam", it's all part of the show. But what does that tell the LGBT kids, already unsure of their place in the world? That they're the acceptable punchline for everyone else's abuse. From a moral point of view, I don't want any of our customers, or our talent, to feel uncomfortable or unsafe in the environment our shows create. From a business point of view, I don't want anyone feeling so uncomfortable, unsafe or offended that they don't buy a ticket for the next show, or go and tell all their mates not to. Sometimes my nephews and nieces have come to watch my shows, or I've taken them to watch other wrestling - I don't want them to learn that shouting this kind of abuse is acceptable anywhere. And before anyone steps in and says "I wasn't talking about being homophobic", I will extend that to include calling someone a "fat cunt" as well. Because if it's acceptable for dad to say it at The Wrestling, it's acceptable for Little Billy to say it in the playground. 

Couldn't agree more. It's just down to being self aware of the product you are going to see. If the poster looks like it's advertising a family product, either don't go or act with respect around you. After all if a an adult went to Disneyland childless, you certainly wouldn't curse or act in a drunken fashion.

I think promotions with a more adult fan base, should be a bit loud and laree. Chant and sing be involved in an immersive environment. I've been attending shows for years and have hardly heard any homophobic/racists chants. Promotors are well versed to deal with such bad behaviour. Like I said as fans going to shows, it's just a case of being self aware.

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Sorry @Snitsky's back acne, but I'm not having your attempt at a get-out from what you originally said. Your first point in this thread was:

19 hours ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

Wrestling has become incredibly sanitised and 'woke' over the past several years and it is massively to its detriment rather than its benefit.

You then went on to describe how it's different now from back then when you said...

52 minutes ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

It was racist, it was sexist, it was homophobic, it was all the things that would be considered 'politically incorrect' and it was never 'right' BUT it was accepted. People knew that wrestling would play on their prejudices and always go for the lowest common denominator. Wrestling attracted the working classes, the people who WOULD go to shows to call the heels names and shout all night.... and it was incredibly popular.

You can't come into a discussion ranting about how wrestling has become incredibly sanitised and "woke," painting this change as a negative thing, to then go on and describe the environment before said change consisting of sexist and homophobic behaviour and expect people to not believe you're a fan of such behaviour.

Fucking hell. This discussion has basically consisted of the following:

You: "wrestling's rubbish these days. It's incredibly sanitised, which is massively to its detriment rather than a benefit."

Normal people: "You think so? What makes you say that?"

You: "Well, it was racist, sexist and homophobic back then. What you'd call politically incorrect. That was acceptable back in them days though."

Normal people: "So, you think wrestling was better when people could be racist, sexist and homophobic?"

You: "Well, no. That's not what I was saying..."

Normal people: "No, it is. You said it's sanitised now and that's not a good thing. So by default you think it was better when it wasn't sanitised and was racist, sexist and homophobic?"

You: ".......Look, I'm not racist, but...."

Just admit it mate. You came steaming in looking to noise folk up and you made a roaring cunt of it. 

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22 minutes ago, wordsfromlee said:

You maybe not have explicitly said racism/homophobia/etc but it seems to be implied by the use of THE WORST.

If that’s not implied then what is “the worst” if it’s not racism or homophobia?

How has this leap been made? 

I was referencing stuff like 'fat prick' and 'cunt' - now of course they are not worse than racism or homophobia [although cunt is obviously very strong] but that was not even on my agenda. Go back and read the initial things I posted - I didn't reference or imply [at least I thought I hadn't] anything racist or homophobic in what was being said - that has been woven into the narrative by everyone else and addressed by me to the point where now that seems to be THE thing everyone is hanging their hat on.

If people want to discuss that, fair enough, it's obviously a massively important topic to discuss but, honestly, have a go at me for calling Ricky Knight a 'fat prick' when I was 17 if you like but Jesus Christ the whole 'well you were CLEARLY implying racism/homophobia when you said this thing that was nothing to do with racism/homophobia' rhetoric is getting REALLY tiresome. 

If I was the one that had brought up racism/homophobia to begin with I could accept it as a stick to beat me with.
I didn't.
If I had made it the focal point of my initial arguments I could accept that too.
I didn't.



 

Edited by Snitsky's back acne
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1 minute ago, wordsfromlee said:

I didn’t realise that calling someone a fat prick was the WORST (in all caps) thing you can say to someone. My mistake. 

You've obviously never had to come out of the closet and tell your parents that you are fat.  A daunting task, Fat people have to witness abuse everyday.

Gay, Trans and non-white people have no idea what they have to go through

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1 minute ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

How has this leap been made? 

I was referencing stuff like 'fat prick' and 'cunt' - now of course they are not worse than racism or homophobia [although cunt is obviously very strong] but that was not even on my agenda. Go back and read the initial things I posted - I didn't reference or imply [at least I thought I hadn't] anything racist or homophobic in what was being said - that has been woven into the narrative by everyone else and addressed by me to the point where now that seems to be THE thing everyone is hanging their hat on.

If people want to discuss that, fair enough, it's obviously a massively important topic to discuss but, honestly, have a go at me for calling Ricky Knight a 'fat prick' when I was 17 if you like but Jesus Christ the whole 'well you were CLEARLY implying racism/homophobia when you said this thing that was nothing to do with racism/homophobia' rhetoric is getting REALLY tiresome. 

No, if you'd been referencing stuff like calling someone a fat prick you'd have said wrestling is incredibly sanitised these days as opposed to back in the day when you could call a fat wrestler a fat prick or a cunt.

If you'd said that you'd have had people like me saying "well, you can still call a fat wrestler a fat prick or a fat cunt today, can't you? I mean, you'll look like a total twat, but it's not as if you're being arrested for that kind of language at a wrestling show." Especially if it was an over 18's night club show. Down the local community centre with my 6 year old nephew sat beside you there'd likely be a problem.

What you said was that wrestling today is incredibly sanitised, then you proceeded to describe the days when it was sexist, racist and homophobic. It was you who raised that particular point, so it's not hard to see where the leap has been made, is it?

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6 minutes ago, wordsfromlee said:

I didn’t realise that calling someone a fat prick was the WORST (in all caps) thing you can say to someone. My mistake. 

Do you take everything in life so literally?

2 minutes ago, David said:

No, if you'd been referencing stuff like calling someone a fat prick you'd have said wrestling is incredibly sanitised these days as opposed to back in the day when you could call a fat wrestler a fat prick or a cunt.

If you'd said that you'd have had people like me saying "well, you can still call a fat wrestler a fat prick or a fat cunt today, can't you? I mean, you'll look like a total twat, but it's not as if you're being arrested for that kind of language at a wrestling show." Especially if it was an over 18's night club show. Down the local community centre with my 6 year old nephew sat beside you there'd likely be a problem.

What you said was that wrestling today is incredibly sanitised, then you proceeded to describe the days when it was sexist, racist and homophobic. It was you who raised that particular point, so it's not hard to see where the leap has been made, is it?

Again with the whole 'well if you really meant that you would have said this' and 'well clearly even though you didn't say it you were implying it' stuff?
Yes, we can go over the 'well if you'd have said this instead' stuff but that's pointless.

I can only try and clarify things [I admit to not always being clear] or go 'No, that's not what I meant'.
Other than that I really don't know. I'm certainly not going to say I meant something that I didn't just because someone thinks I did.





 

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5 minutes ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

Yeah, it's not like I'm being bombarded with loads of different posts or anything...

The only reason anyone gets bombarded with posts on here is when what they are posting is clearly wrong. I'd say that 99.99% of post bombardments are caused by this. 

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