Dave Meltzer stuff

[MikeCampbell]

Listen to some of Paul Heyman's commentary during Albert's little 2001 singles push.

[Johnny Sorrow]

I find it interesting how in an industry filled with outdated stereotypes (and people who hold them) that Dave's (presumed) Jewish background has never been referred to by him or by other people.

 

I also find it interesting how Meltzer, Alvarez, and Keller - a (presumed) Jewish man, a half-Mexican man, and an openly gay man - are all leading journalists in the wrestling industry - an industry that has at various times traded on negative stereotypes of these groups to draw heat.

 

It surprises me that anyone other than WASP men would want to be a fan of pro wrestling, since the business generally regards anyone outside those parameters as a one-note stereotype that can be used to draw heel heat.

I'd imagine it's because the steroetypes in wrestling are so over the top and silly, that they just laugh at them. I'm a half Italian who was born in Kentucky and raised in New Jersey. Hillbilly Jim and The FBI never bothered me.

[El-P]

There's definitely been times where Paul Heyman has played something of a stereotypical Jewish lawyer type.

Really ? That never struck me at all. Plus his name was Paul E. Dangerously, which isn't exactly Jew sounding.

 

Well, of course, the category that is stereotyped the worst is women though. Especially since the Attitude Era.

[Ditch]

Listen to some of Paul Heyman's commentary during Albert's little 2001 singles push.

That was positive, though. 'Moyle of Mayhem', c'mon.

[Guest Slickster]

Paul Heyman renaming the Albert Bomb into the Meshuggenator always stuck with me.

 

I just learned what it meant when Gene Okerlund would always throw to "the lonsman David Penzer!"

[Jingus]

Anti-semetism seems to be fairly rare and tame in the business. I never heard a peep onscreen about Raven being Jewish, for example; and aside from his last name and the never-happened "Mossad gimmick" deal, nobody ever really brought it up when it came to Goldberg. Really, their bizarrely stereotypical treatment of the Scotty Goldman character stuck out more than it should, just because that kind of thing hardly ever happens. Compare it to how awful the treatment is of practically every non-white wrestler, for example; is there literally a single one on television now whose gimmick isn't at least partly based on their ethnicity?

 

Question: Meltzer completely destroyed the old lie about 93000 in the Silverdome, right? I'm arguing with some idiot at some other board who completely refuses to believe that the WWE might have, gasp, lied about something. Anyone got any handy sources on that matter?

[Guest Slickster]

Anti-semetism seems to be fairly rare and tame in the business. I never heard a peep onscreen about Raven being Jewish, for example; and aside from his last name and the never-happened "Mossad gimmick" deal, nobody ever really brought it up when it came to Goldberg. Really, their bizarrely stereotypical treatment of the Scotty Goldman character stuck out more than it should, just because that kind of thing hardly ever happens. Compare it to how awful the treatment is of practically every non-white wrestler, for example; is there literally a single one on television now whose gimmick isn't at least partly based on their ethnicity?

 

Question: Meltzer completely destroyed the old lie about 93000 in the Silverdome, right? I'm arguing with some idiot at some other board who completely refuses to believe that the WWE might have, gasp, lied about something. Anyone got any handy sources on that matter?

http://wrestlingclassics.com/.ubb/ultimate...7260;p=1#000002

 

The source is Dave Meltzer's firsthand conversation with Zane Bresloff about the situation, so this person might say 'WHAT IF DAEV IS LYEING?'

[Guest Slickster]

I guess I also find it fascinating how Dave Meltzer has been able to keep so much of his private life private for 20+ years. We don't know anything about, say, his family or his hobbies or what's on his iPod.

 

I think the paucity of background information on Dave furthers his reputation as THE preeminent authority instead of just 'a wrestling reporter.'

 

When Dave posts in a thread, it's kind of like when Linda McMahon would appear on WWE television: you knew it was something significant from an authority who was 'above the fray.'

[sek69]

The only non white wrestler I can think of who's gimmick is based on their ethnicity would be R-Truth doing the "white guy's idea of how a rapper acts" gimmick. WWE has really toned down the ethnically based gimmicks as of late, the only one I would think comes even close is Alberto Del Rio being a Mexican JBL, but it's more a rich guy gimmick with a guy who happens to be Mexican instead of the opposite like it usually is.

 

Mark Henry, David Otunga, MVP (he originally at least was a spoiled athlete gimmick), even Alicia Fox....none of them have a ethnically based gimmick. I guess you could make a case for Darren Young since the only identifiable thing about him was his Buckwheat hair and looking like John Cena's black twin.

[Guest Slickster]

The only non white wrestler I can think of who's gimmick is based on their ethnicity would be R-Truth doing the "white guy's idea of how a rapper acts" gimmick. WWE has really toned down the ethnically based gimmicks as of late, the only one I would think comes even close is Alberto Del Rio being a Mexican JBL, but it's more a rich guy gimmick with a guy who happens to be Mexican instead of the opposite like it usually is.

 

Mark Henry, David Otunga, MVP (he originally at least was a spoiled athlete gimmick), even Alicia Fox....none of them have a ethnically based gimmick. I guess you could make a case for Darren Young since the only identifiable thing about him was his Buckwheat hair and looking like John Cena's black twin.

And thank God for that. I could never understand why there were any black wrestling fans in the 80s and 90s since black people were invariably portrayed as jobbers, Angry Black Men, or as dancing happy-go-lucky babyfaces. And that's without even mentioning the Memphis territory...

[Jingus]

Thanks, Slickster.

 

Mark Henry, David Otunga, MVP (he originally at least was a spoiled athlete gimmick), even Alicia Fox....none of them have a ethnically based gimmick.

But most all of them were at one point or another. Mark Henry was "Sexual Chocolate" and "The SELF-PROCLAIMED Silverback", and MVP was a stereotypical cocky superstar basketball player who shouted "BALLIN'!". Alicia, like many of the Divas, has no apparent gimmick or personality at all; and Otunga and Young are part of the Nexus storyline which pretty much steamrolls over everything else in its path.

 

Point is, practically every non-white non-American has at some point had a gimmick which was entirely based on their race or nationality. They took one look at Kofi Kingston, and thought "huh... weird accent... dreadlocks... let's make him an (implied) Rastafarian from Jamaica!" And of course there's practically every Samoan ever; in the 21s century, they're still doing Jungle Savage gimmicks. It's not just the other races either, it's also foreigners: Regal is English: well, obviously he's gotta be a stuck-up nancyboy! Never mind that his accent is the British equivalent of an Alabama drawl. Or even worse, Irish Finlay, The Irishman From Ireland, With His Green Irish Trunks And Irish Shilleleigh and Irish Folk Entrance Music and Irish Leprechaun Sidekick... and the dude is correctly announced as being from from fuckin' Belfast. Apparently the WWE thinks we all flunked geography class. The business has gotten slightly better in recent years about not leaning so hard on racial and national stereotypes, but you'll still get plenty of stuff like the Highlanders or Crymetyme or whatever other minstrel-show junk amused Vince this week.

[Sean Liska]

I think they've toned down on the evil foreigner stuff because so much of their business is international now. Places like France, UK, and Mexico are great for them, so you won't be seeing anything like the Mexicools on lawnmowers or La Resistance carrying poodles anymore. Guys like Wade Barrett, Sheamus and Drew McIntyre don't have stereotypical gimmicks, and can be babyfaces when they visit home (maybe not Barrett, might be too good at being a heel).

[sek69]

Not for nothing, but Belfast *is* in Northern Ireland, so referring to him as Irish isn't incorrect on their part.

 

Also yes, most if not all non white wrestlers in WWE had some kind of ethnically based gimmick but your original question was is there anyone on television now who doesn't have a racially motivated gimmick so pointing out that there were a bunch of them years ago doesn't seem germane to the topic at hand but whatevs.

[Jingus]

Not for nothing, but Belfast *is* in Northern Ireland, so referring to him as Irish isn't incorrect on their part.

I know, but it's still not Ireland, it's a part of Great Britain. It's one of those details that the WWE just ignores, figuring that its audience is too simple to get such a complicated concept. When it's not complicated at all and I understood it back in grade school. Kinda along the same lines of how many foreign-born wrestlers are just announced from their country, instead of their home town. The company comes off like it thinks the fanbase is too stupid and will be confused by such a complex idea.

 

Also yes, most if not all non white wrestlers in WWE had some kind of ethnically based gimmick but your original question was is there anyone on television now who doesn't have a racially motivated gimmick so pointing out that there were a bunch of them years ago doesn't seem germane to the topic at hand but whatevs.

Yeah, I shoulda phrased that better. I don't keep up with the shows much now, so I'm slow to notice if they've fixed an old problem. But, man, wrestling has been slow to fix this problem. Sidney Poitier became the first black person to become a legitimate movie star back in the 60s, but naturally it took the WWF/E thirty or forty years (depending on if you count the Rock as "black") to first put their heavyweight championship on a dude of African descent.

[sek69]

I know this seems like a fairly small nit to pick, but as someone who is of Irish descent, Northern Ireland is still part of the island of Ireland. I would wager anyone from there would consider themselves Irish even if they are officially British subjects. Maybe billing him from "Belfast, Ireland" is too simplistic but I don't expect WWE to worry about international politics vis-a-vis the billed hometowns of their middle card wrestlers.

 

 

 

Yeah, I shoulda phrased that better. I don't keep up with the shows much now, so I'm slow to notice if they've fixed an old problem. But, man, wrestling has been slow to fix this problem. Sidney Poitier became the first black person to become a legitimate movie star back in the 60s, but naturally it took the WWF/E thirty or forty years (depending on if you count the Rock as "black") to first put their heavyweight championship on a dude of African descent.

After Poitier won in 1963, no black actor won an Academy Award until 2001, so movies haven't been too much better than WWE in recognizing people of color.

[rovert]

Being from Carrickfergus Finlay would likely identify himself as British or Northern Irish NOT Irish.

[El-P]

it's also foreigners: Regal is English: well, obviously he's gotta be a stuck-up nancyboy! Never mind that his accent is the British equivalent of an Alabama drawl. Or even worse, Irish Finlay, The Irishman From Ireland, With His Green Irish Trunks And Irish Shilleleigh and Irish Folk Entrance Music and Irish Leprechaun Sidekick... and the dude is correctly announced as being from from fuckin' Belfast.

Europe seems like a strange concept indeed. Remember Frenchy Martin ? The monocle, the beret, the baguette. Yeah, because we french people look like some 19th century bourgeois. The killer was that of course, Marin was from Quebec, and Quebecers are a lot closer to US people than French people anyway. La Resistance, same deal. I guess the thinking is : they speak french, they are french. Well, people in Africa speak french too... They probably think Paris looks like what they see in "Amelie".

[rzombie1988]

The only non white wrestler I can think of who's gimmick is based on their ethnicity would be R-Truth doing the "white guy's idea of how a rapper acts" gimmick. WWE has really toned down the ethnically based gimmicks as of late, the only one I would think comes even close is Alberto Del Rio being a Mexican JBL, but it's more a rich guy gimmick with a guy who happens to be Mexican instead of the opposite like it usually is.

 

Mark Henry, David Otunga, MVP (he originally at least was a spoiled athlete gimmick), even Alicia Fox....none of them have a ethnically based gimmick. I guess you could make a case for Darren Young since the only identifiable thing about him was his Buckwheat hair and looking like John Cena's black twin.

And thank God for that. I could never understand why there were any black wrestling fans in the 80s and 90s since black people were invariably portrayed as jobbers, Angry Black Men, or as dancing happy-go-lucky babyfaces. And that's without even mentioning the Memphis territory...

 

There were alot of black memphis fans in the 80's and 90's. Watch the shows, you can see.

[Jingus]

After Poitier won in 1963, no black actor won an Academy Award until 2001, so movies haven't been too much better than WWE in recognizing people of color.

Yeah, point taken. But still, there were black superstars at the top of practically every other medium of popular entertainment except wrestling. Eddie Murphy was breaking box-office records at the same time that the WWF's only token gesture was having an aging JYD lose tag matches in the semi-main. It's even weirder when you look back at times like the 70s, when black athletes were already dominating most real sports, but the top of the card in wrestling was always lily-white even despite their claims of trying to be as realistic and kayfabe-loving as possible.

 

They probably think Paris looks like what they see in "Amelie".

It doesn't?

 

There were alot of black memphis fans in the 80's and 90's. Watch the shows, you can see.

Memphis was the only place I've ever been which had a black majority in the crowd. That was really bizarre, just because I'd never seen one like that before. I've been to a couple of lucha shows with all-hispanic crowds, but that's different because it's marketed and sold differently. With ordinary American rassling, I'm just conditioned to expect a crowd full of young white men and rednecks of all ages.

[Wahoos Leg]

Old Mid-South TV, especially during JYD's jeyday, had a major black population on the TV shows.

[Log]

Kinda along the same lines of how many foreign-born wrestlers are just announced from their country, instead of their home town. The company comes off like it thinks the fanbase is too stupid and will be confused by such a complex idea.

It's funny that you mention that. I think that I actually learned a lot about geography when I was a kid from watching wrestling. They'd announce Andre as being from Grenoble, so I'd look it up in my atlas. I was always intrigued by the Million Dollar Man's various residences and look them up.

[El-P]

They probably think Paris looks like what they see in "Amelie".

It doesn't?

*looking through the window*

 

No, it doesn't. Sorry... It's still a beautiful city, especially if you only visit it, but living there for the last ten years, my take on Paris is that it's dirty, old, people are downright rude and it's expensive as dirt (not quite as London, but still). I wish I would learn german to leave this place and live in Berlin, which is the coolest city in the world. Still, sometime I ride a bike at night and I realize that yes, it's a beautiful city and I understand its aura. I realize I'm lucky to be in a place so many people wish they would be. Still, I would be glad to move at this point.

 

End of the grumpy french guy minute.

[El-P]

It's funny that you mention that. I think that I actually learned a lot about geography when I was a kid from watching wrestling. They'd announce Andre as being from Grenoble, so I'd look it up in my atlas. I was always intrigued by the Million Dollar Man's various residences and look them up.

I always got a kick out of Andre being announced as "Grenoble, in the French Alps", and I thought this might sound very exotic and mysterious to american hears. Usually foreigners are happy to get a city at all, in case of Japanese it's usually Tokyo even though they don't come from there. So to have the name of a middle-size city like Grenoble being announced at the MSG was kinda cool to me.

[S.L.L.]

I know this seems like a fairly small nit to pick, but as someone who is of Irish descent, Northern Ireland is still part of the island of Ireland.

 

On top of that, while it is technically part of Great Britain, and people from Belfast are technically British, do not ever tell them that.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles

 

I always said that the best thing about the Finlay/Regal matches in WCW was that they were pretty much wrestled the way you would logically expect an English dude and an Irish dude (Northern or otherwise) to wrestle each other - by just borderline beating each other to death.

 

Unless Finlay is/was a loyalist, I'd think portraying him as an Irish guy who acts Irish despite being Northern Irish isn't super far-fetched.

 

Maybe billing him from "Belfast, Ireland" is too simplistic

He actually was billed as being from "Belfast, Northern Ireland".

[sek69]

It should be mentioned too that Regal was playing a British nancy-boy type character long before he was in WWE. Hell, his first run he was A REAL MAAAAAN'S MAN (which was probably closer to his real life personality) and it came off as dumb. The only wrestler I can recall who was British that wasn't portrayed foppishly was Chris Adams, and he was still a "Gentleman". Even Wade Barrett's NXT gimmick was of a dashing gent who wore his coat on his shoulders.

 

One thing that I did notice is that guys who are kayfabed to be from South Africa are usually military, Col Debeers types with underscores of pro-apartheid. Guys who are legit from South Africa seem to always be pretty boys (the Simpson brothers from WCCW, Justin Gabriel).