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Stephen Harper

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IF IT'S SO STUPID, WHY DO WE LIKE IT SO DAMN MUCH?

Everytime I hear a perfectly intelligent person tell me that professional wrestling is fake, I feel kind of embarrassed for them. As someone who has enjoyed wrestling on TV since I was a kid and my older brother was testing out the "Figure 4" on me to see if it really hurts (it does), it is hard for me to believe that anybody who actually watched, ever thought these performances were anything other than scripted. But apparently there were once many such people. And it would seem that the exposing of this "fraud" was such a shock to so many of our ancestors (maybe they were wagering on the matches), that their bitter, all-consuming rage has been passed on through the generations. And it's just too bad, because today, those residually enraged folks are really missing out on a kick-ass show.

Sometimes you might lose a date or two when a girl asks you what your favorite show is and you say "Oh, Monday Night Raw, no question." But for me, to say anything else would be a lie so ridiculous I don't think I could pull it off. If you are a male age 18-34 (or a female with an open mind and a sense of humor) Raw is without a doubt the most entertaining two hours on television. It's really not even close. And I guarantee you that George Clooney never got anybody to leap off the couch and spill a beer by saving some kid on "ER" the way a suicidal swan dive senton bomb from the top of the steel cage could. Nor could he generate that brief moment of real fear we all got (admit it) when Buh Buh Ray Dudley power bombed little Terri off the top rope and through a table, just before we realized that the big lug was actually protecting her through the stunt as if she was his own sister.

The WWF's recent ad campaign summed it up pretty well when it asked, "Get it?" I guess to not "get it" is to see bad actors playing to an arena full of morons. An extremely closed minded approach, to say the least. One look at the demographics will tell you that the fans are not morons. Nor are the wrestlers "actors." They are a different creature altogether, part (sometimes bad) actor, okay, but also part daredevil, part acrobat, part Hollywood stuntman... You only need the sense to ask yourself one pretty obvious question, to begin to see what you are missing. That question? "If this is so stupid, then how come all those people are having so much fun?"

If you have the wherewithall to ask that question, then you're probably not as dumb as you look, and what's better, you might just be smart enough to really dig this show. But I won't hold my breath, because wrestling definately ain't for everybody.

Even as I write this, there are a whole lot of tv and film executives trying to figure out why all those people are having so much fun, and how they might cash in on it. It's easy to spot the ones that don't "get it." The ones that don't get it sign on to make movies about fictional wrestlers in WCW. The ones that don't get it create network tv shows about monster truck rallies wherein the participants all have characters, cut interviews, and tell stories (set within the confines of montser truck rallies, of course) based on theme of "Good vs. Evil." Some of them, may or may not even flirt with the idea of starting a new promotion built around "Hulk Hogan." Although I think that last one has been largely if not entirely fabricated by a certain very old orange man whose profession has passed him by.

The people in the entertainment industry who do "get it" are easy to spot, too. They are talented and well paid writers working near the top of their field for men like Conan O'brien and Martin Short, who have packed their bags and gone to work for the WWF.

So what's to "get" then? What's the magic here? That's a damn tough question, actually, but I'll take a shot at it. First of all, to even begin to understand it, you'll need to recognize that Pro wrestling, unlike monster truckin', is an art form. You might never see it in a museum, but it is every bit as legitimate a 20th century contribution to art as television or film. And it is just as unique. And further, it is this very uniqueness that makes it so difficult to explain to the uninitiated. Again, you either get it or you don't.

Are you still laughing at the my "Art form" contention? Okay, just give me a chance to explain. There are two different categories of art, that apply to everything from music to sculpture, to literature, to drama, etc... The first of the two is the most common and easiest to produce, and it's sometimes referred to as "Low Art." Low art is also sometimes called "didactic," meaning that it is designed to teach something. Art work in an advertisement teaching us how good a frosty Budweiser would be right about now is a good example. But this type of art is very wide reaching, too. For instance, a morality play on stage, or in a movie, or in a book, teaches you some history of or how to live in a given society or culture. That's low art, too. "High art" on the other hand, is less common, and takes a special kind of insight to produce. "High Art," whether it comes in the form of a poem or a painting, or even a good episode of "The Twilight Zone" does not try to instruct it's audience, but rather speaks to the human condition. Both "high" and "low" art can deliver a message to the heart and mind, but only "high art" speaks to us on an intuitive level with an understanding that goes beyond moral conventions and communicates just as well to any culture in any era. It short, this is why we still read and produce the works of Shakespeare today. "Hamlet" ain't about Denmark, at all.

A lot of people think that the story lines in pro wrestling are about Good vs. Evil. Well, they're not. And therein lies the connection that the audience feels. They can laugh at the funny parts, they can ogle at the T&A (of which there is plenty for both sexes), but what they are really there for, is that moment when they connect with one character or another, rise involuntarily to their feet, and just "Get it." In the days when the fix was a secret, the old carney term of "Mark" applied to these people. Now, however, the audience is in on the fix. But to "mark-out" or just be carried by the moment the performers create, is actually what they are looking for. At least that's what keeps them coming back.

Wrestling stories are not about anything as obvious as Good vs. Evil. They are about the battles of (in the industry's own terminology) "Babyfaces vs. Heels." And that is not the same thing. Not by a long shot. Although sometimes it may look that way, Good and Evil have nothing to do with it. The "face" is the guy the fans cheer, and the "heel" is the guy they boo. It's as simple as that, and if you give it a little thought, as enormously complicated as that at the same time. Stone Cold Steve Austin vs. Vince MacMahon was a story about one individual man (and a "bad guy" by any ethical standards you care to apply) against the ever present enemy of all individuals, the unfeeling, omnipresent crush of collective society (represented in this story by a massive "Corporation," headed by a bitter and nasty man who, more than anything else, just wanted that sonofabitch Austin to conform). And ol' Stone Cold never did. Folks, that's not a morality play, that's not G vs E, that's a representation of the human condition. As sure today as it was during the Roman Empire, that's the human condition. And guess what? That makes it not only a work of art, but a work of High Art. I kid you not.

After all, what was Stone Cold really fighting for all that time? I may just have been for the idea that a one individual, beer swilling red-neck could exist as champion in a corporate world out to prove he can't, just as much as Professional Wrestling can move and delight crowds of 20,000 at a time and pull down the highest numbers ever seen on cable television, despite the fact that the rest of society would have us believe that it is "fake and only watched by morons."

Stephen Harper
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