Dave Meltzer stuff

[Bix]

There's a huge difference between those of us who hate PC culture because of it's rampant self important stupidity and its censorism attempts towards comedy and arts and the whole "I can't hear or read anything that may make me uncomfortable because I can never be challenged or offended" bulllshit that limits education and discussion ...and ridiculous racist, homophobic, mysoginistic fucking zilches wearing Trump hats screaming about "PC won't let me call someone a faggot!"

1. The former is largely a strawman that doesn't exist. Generally speaking, most of the examples of that I've seen have been exaggerated or distorted. For example the response to the Yale Halloween costume letter story from last year usually came as a result of tellings that misrepresented what happened.

2. What's "censorism?"

 

Also, people tend to look at these issues in a vacuum when they're not taking place in one. Trigger warnings are largely about acknowledging that a significantly bigger portion of the population than we like to admit has been sexually assaulted, and are way more prominent online than they are alleged to be in academia. And even online, they're largely limited to feminist blogs and other sites where they know it's appreciated by the audience.

 

What do you see as "PC culture" and how does it relate to calling out someone who repeatedly defends"non-racists" who used the n-word because it was the "official business term" for black wrestlers, in an era where they were seen as more than other wrestlers, no less? Remember, what got this started was Brandon Howard asking Dave why he's so insistent about hating the terms "mark" (which was an "official business term," after all) and "IWC" but explains away use of the n-word. Which is a perfectly legitimate question.

[JerryvonKramer]

We systematically voted down and opposed any attempts to bring in "trigger warnings" for the study of English lit because while it might start with something like victims of sexual assault, it ends up with students complaining about books being too depressing or whatever. Trigger warnings for something being "sad", things like this. We opposed it on the grounds that it infantilised students and was actually patronising.

 

We can't have a culture which wraps so much stuff up in cotton wool. Yes, people are victims of sexual abuse. Does that mean we have to put "trigger warnings" on a module with Sons and Lovers on it? How about American Psycho?

 

I don't think you'd get a panel of people more sympathetic to wider support for victims of sexual abuse than my colleagues, but they still opposed "trigger warnings" on the grounds that they are antithetical to university education. If you don't want to read stuff that is challenging, that might upset you, that might cause you to confront difficult or even disturbing things that happened in your past ... Don't do an English degree, simple as that. We cannot censor literature because sexual abuse exists in the world, and we cannot tailor modules towards what may or may not be disturbing for certain individuals (for any reason).

[BrianB]

My issue with trigger warnings is it puts too much emphasis on individual psychology, as opposed to structural and systemic oppression, and allows for something being "uncomfortable" to be challenged or as an excuse to not have to engage with the materials. I do object a little bit to the idea that you can't draw lines, but I do wonder if you can't draw lines for students who were documented sexual abuse victims... Lolita is a great book and all, but is it really necessary to tackle rape or pedophilia if you're going to be a literature writer, critic, or academic?

 

My issue with PC culture is that it's similarly infantile to most of the trigger warning stuff, i.e. moving the discussion away from justice and towards individual or just group offense, and, secondly, what it usually does is silence rather than further open discussion and debate. It makes people want to "stick to their own" or whatever, because they feel safer and less at risk. It also results in people effectively just being quiet and still having problematic views and probably behaving in objectionable ways, and if they bother to defend themselves at all it's usually with code word stuff and if they can't hide enough behind that then they'll get axed and stigmatized. In reality, imo, educating and informing these people about why they can't go around saying or doing bigoted things is a better solution than just getting them fired and punished through public shaming. To some degree, public shaming has to be involved, but it's obvious that a very big segment of people are quite upset about it, rallying into their media and social media echochambers, getting very resentful, and considering seriously voting for an unfit charlatan to be the President. Hillary definitely has her own issues, which plays into it, but we've still effectively evolved into a political climate where somebody like Trump probably cannot fall below 40% as the Republican standard bearer, both in terms of the primary but also the general election, which is quite a big shift from, say, even 20 years ago.

[Happ Hazzard]

Lance Storm has apparently left the Observer/F4W site to do a podcast with Don Callis on Jericho's site.

[FMKK]

Dave convinced that Vince will resist putting the women on last again after last night simply he preferred the shitty Seth Rollins match really is a case of him letting his own tastes inform his reporting too much.

 

The way he spoke on WOR today was as if it was just accepted fact the women's match was a disaster and the Owens vs Rollins match was great.

[jushin muta liger]

Dave convinced that Vince will resist putting the women on last again after last night simply he preferred the shitty Seth Rollins match really is a case of him letting his own tastes inform his reporting too much.

 

The way he spoke on WOR today was as if it was just accepted fact the women's match was a disaster and the Owens vs Rollins match was great.

And there's a lot of people who thought the same way as Meltzer. I thought the Sasha/Charlotte match was great and I'm starting to think the "who goes on last" story was a planted story by someone who gives information to Dave to keep this show in the news cycle. From all of the promotional outside of the weekly TV, Sasha/Charlotte was the obvious main event match advertised. It's similar to the questioning of the Shane/Taker match being on last when the advertiseing match was Triple H/Reigns.

[BrianB]

I'm not surprised Dave wasn't high on the women's match. It was worked less the kind of style that Dave responds to, and Dave didn't think much about the Last Battle of Altanta either. I'm not as high on the match last night as other people, but it was clearly really good, imo.

[Fando]

But wasn't something "planted" specifically for Dave, people started wondering about it the second it was announced and then Foley blabbed about it on his facebook

[Grimmas]

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Dave Meltzer‏@davemeltzerWON

Dave Meltzer Retweeted Paulie Dangerously.

It's a lot tougher there because the standard is higher. A **** U.S. match would probably be ***1/4 at the Tokyo Dome.

[DeanColes1987]

[FMKK]

 

Dave convinced that Vince will resist putting the women on last again after last night simply he preferred the shitty Seth Rollins match really is a case of him letting his own tastes inform his reporting too much.

 

The way he spoke on WOR today was as if it was just accepted fact the women's match was a disaster and the Owens vs Rollins match was great.

And there's a lot of people who thought the same way as Meltzer. I thought the Sasha/Charlotte match was great and I'm starting to think the "who goes on last" story was a planted story by someone who gives information to Dave to keep this show in the news cycle. From all of the promotional outside of the weekly TV, Sasha/Charlotte was the obvious main event match advertised. It's similar to the questioning of the Shane/Taker match being on last when the advertiseing match was Triple H/Reigns.

 

 

That's fine but to me, he shifted very quickly between his opinion that Owens and Rollins had a much better match to speculating that Vince wouldn't put the women on last again because their match was bad, as if this was now an objective fact or at least the overwhelming consensus. I guess that's the problem with the main reporter of wrestling also being the main reviewer. While he obviously has an incredible knowledge of the business and it's history, I wish his star ratings and opinions on style weren't so influential because a lot of the time those ratings are almost taken as facts by some.

 

Besides, I honestly think the Owens/Rollins style is downright bad for business. But that's a side point.

[jushin muta liger]

But wasn't something "planted" specifically for Dave, people started wondering about it the second it was announced and then Foley blabbed about it on his facebook

I totally forgot about that. Point corrected.

[jushin muta liger]

 

 

 

Dave convinced that Vince will resist putting the women on last again after last night simply he preferred the shitty Seth Rollins match really is a case of him letting his own tastes inform his reporting too much.

 

The way he spoke on WOR today was as if it was just accepted fact the women's match was a disaster and the Owens vs Rollins match was great.

And there's a lot of people who thought the same way as Meltzer. I thought the Sasha/Charlotte match was great and I'm starting to think the "who goes on last" story was a planted story by someone who gives information to Dave to keep this show in the news cycle. From all of the promotional outside of the weekly TV, Sasha/Charlotte was the obvious main event match advertised. It's similar to the questioning of the Shane/Taker match being on last when the advertiseing match was Triple H/Reigns.

That's fine but to me, he shifted very quickly between his opinion that Owens and Rollins had a much better match to speculating that Vince wouldn't put the women on last again because their match was bad, as if this was now an objective fact or at least the overwhelming consensus. I guess that's the problem with the main reporter of wrestling also being the main reviewer. While he obviously has an incredible knowledge of the business and it's history, I wish his star ratings and opinions on style weren't so influential because a lot of the time those ratings are almost taken as facts by some.

 

Besides, I honestly think the Owens/Rollins style is downright bad for business. But that's a side point.

I totally agree with you on that and it sucks because a lot of people do take Meltzer's reviews on stuff as gospel. I've been guilty on that myself as I see his star ratings as a guide. It helped me when I got back to watching wrestling regularly after years of not seeing it but I've disagreed with a lot of the stuff he views as great lately and reading a lot between the lines of what side he gets his info from.

 

Hell, I just went through 97 Observers about Megumi Kudo and he put a de-emphasis on her being the main event of Retirement show at Yokohama Arena saying she wasn't the real draw.

[Jmare007]

 

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Dave Meltzer‏@davemeltzerWON

Dave Meltzer Retweeted Paulie Dangerously.

It's a lot tougher there because the standard is higher. A **** U.S. match would probably be ***1/4 at the Tokyo Dome.

 

 

The funniest part is that the Tokyo Dome isn't the best venue to find great japanese matches. Like, at all.

[BrianB]

 

 

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Dave Meltzer‏@davemeltzerWON

Dave Meltzer Retweeted Paulie Dangerously.

It's a lot tougher there because the standard is higher. A **** U.S. match would probably be ***1/4 at the Tokyo Dome.

 

 

The funniest part is that the Tokyo Dome isn't the best venue to find great japanese matches. Like, at all.

 

 

I think it was hilarious because of how big Dave likes those big Japanese men doing big spots, especially on their heads, but that's also quite true.

[InYourCase]

People that accuse Dave of having a bias towards Japanese wrestling often say "That would've been ****1/2 at the Tokyo Dome." He realizes the Dome is not the epicenter of puro graps.

[Rah]

Doesn't Dave deeply value the importance and crowd investment within a match as an integral part to its rating? It would make more sense as to why certain shows or matches receive higher praise, when the work itself seems rather incongruous to the rating.

 

Though the need to condemn or criticise Meltzer for these ratings is becoming rather played out. In the more broader community, his ratings are either gospel or the "shitty" opinions of a biased man. There's very little inbetween. Yes, he's biased, everyone is, and yes he has "differing" opinions, because he's human and comes to his own conclusions. It's a good enough guide to start with, but the dogged fixation on his ratings is just... strange.

 

Watch what you love. End of.

[sek69]

Dave's value of crowd investment is probably why he's such a big fan of Tokyo Dome matches. Not that they're always the best technically, but Dome matches tend to be the blow off to big feuds and that's right up his alley as a fan.

[stro]

Doesn't Dave deeply value the importance and crowd investment within a match as an integral part to its rating? It would make more sense as to why certain shows or matches receive higher praise, when the work itself seems rather incongruous to the rating.

 

Though the need to condemn or criticise Meltzer for these ratings is becoming rather played out. In the more broader community, his ratings are either gospel or the "shitty" opinions of a biased man. There's very little inbetween. Yes, he's biased, everyone is, and yes he has "differing" opinions, because he's human and comes to his own conclusions. It's a good enough guide to start with, but the dogged fixation on his ratings is just... strange.

 

Watch what you love. End of.

 

Dave has very specific tastes. Things he loves: Japanese men stiffing the fuck out of each other, Japanese men dropping each other on their heads, and lots of cool flips and spots. If you take his ratings seriously, you have to know that he'll give any random Young Bucks match 4 stars even if he's seen them do the same match spot for spot 4 times. If you think the YB suck, then you probably shouldn't look too much into Dave's ratings.

[NintendoLogic]

Dave said last month that his current favorite promotions are PWG and CMLL because he loves the atmosphere.

[Strummer]

 

Dave Meltzer ‏@davemeltzerWON 7h7 hours ago

So the pizza delivery guy comes to my door and freaks out. I know you. You're the guy on the MMA Hour. I love that show.

 

 

and shit is going to meet fan when people see Dave's star ratings for HIAC. I mean maybe not as bad as it once was but a lot of shaking of heads

[World's Worst Man]

WWE fanboys whining that Meltzer rates WWE matches too low, it never ceases to amaze me. It's as if they don't realize that the ratings are fairly subjective and mostly meaningless. It's also rich that the people whining about it don't seem to actually watch any pro-wrestling outside of the WWE, which more than anything makes them look completely silly.

[jushin muta liger]

WWE fanboys whining that Meltzer rates WWE matches too low, it never ceases to amaze me. It's as if they don't realize that the ratings are fairly subjective and mostly meaningless. It's also rich that the people whining about it don't seem to actually watch any pro-wrestling outside of the WWE, which more than anything makes them look completely silly.

I don't think that's the case here. A lot of people on this board thought the HIAC matches were good and they watch a lot of wrestling outside of WWE. Maybe that theory applies to Wreddit but not around here.

[stro]

WWE fanboys whining that Meltzer rates WWE matches too low, it never ceases to amaze me. It's as if they don't realize that the ratings are fairly subjective and mostly meaningless. It's also rich that the people whining about it don't seem to actually watch any pro-wrestling outside of the WWE, which more than anything makes them look completely silly.

Completely meaningless. DM's rankings are just as important as any other random fan who watches wrestling. If your judgement of what a good match is depends on what someone else's judgement of what a good match is, why bother watching at all?

[Cox]

Meltzer's ratings, like them or not, do carry more weight than the average fan's. Dave has been putting out the Observer now for over 35 years, and has reviewed more matches than just about any wrestling fan alive. In his first book, Mick Foley described how getting a positive review of his matches meant something to him, and I'm sure he's not alone there. I don't always agree with Dave's ratings, and I'd encourage anybody who doesn't like his reviews to simply avoid them, but to say they carry no weight is factually incorrect. They carry a ton of weight, both within wrestling fandom and in the wrestling business, and if they didn't carry any weight, nobody would bother getting up in arms with his reviews in the first place.