Why We Can't Have Nice Things, or Stop Circulating Bad Rumors

Who cares how she got her push?
Photo Credit: WWE.com

People like to attack me when I write commentaries about the wrestling industry being latently misogynistic. It's like I make this shit up, even when WWE, Impact Wrestling and to an extent, various promotions who don't make television (like, I don't know, BLOW) give embarrassing amounts of evidence to support such claims. Maybe it's because there are even fans out there that harbor the kinds of shameful opinions that help keep women's wrestling a sideshow, intergender interaction a dream realized by a scant few promotions and women's matches on a random card have at least one combatant who maybe got a half-day's training at best who is there because she's got big tits or whatever.

Case in point, this tweet:

See, I knew AJ paid her dues on her knees. I know what I'm talking about, kids ;)

This is the worst chestnut ever, really. Men can get ahead in the wrestling industry through hard work, dedication, great matches, charisma etc. but if a woman gets over, bam, it's because she HAD to have blown someone. Because women are things, amirite guise? GUISE? The really galling thing is that the person who tweeted this is a woman. I'm not going to feed into any stereotypes about how women interact with each other, but the fact that women can themselves take such a stance baffles me.

Now, I know what some of you might be thinking. Why pay mind to some random Tweeter who may or may not be out of college yet? The fact that she'd make that generalization because she doesn't like her is really sad. It's also unfounded, given that AJ right now is linked to Trent Barretta. That's not the point though. The point is that promotions cater to the base instincts not just because they show those attitudes, but because those attitudes are present in the "marks" they try to get money from. If fans think women are pieces of meat or sex machines, then how are promoters going to market them? It's an endless, vicious cycle that can only be broken by us changing.

Yeah, it was one inconsequential person using social media, but sometimes, that ignorance causes countless more people to shake their heads until we all start making catcalls to AJ at house shows or something like that. Granted, I've been guilty of it in the past myself, only I accused Triple H of getting ahead only because of whom he was sleeping with. Yeah, it doesn't have the same latent sexism to it because guys seem to be allowed to do those kinds of things, but that's not the point, really.

What is the point? Well, who said sex was bad? Who cares if AJ blew everyone in the back to get her position? She's good at it! Who cares if Trips got ahead because he was shtupping Stephanie McMahon? The issue wasn't the sex, it was that he was a terrible lead character (at least to me he was). We have to stop treating sex as this bad thing, because it leads to this kind of polarization that in the end leaves everyone with bad tastes in their mouths.

So yeah, question whether AJ is actually good in her role or not (spoiler alert, she's really good). Don't make up shit about her needing to use "sexual favors" to get there.