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Home , Attitude Era, Chyna, Jerry Lawler, Mark Henry, The Godfather (wrestler)

Running head: WRESTLING WITH MORALITY: A NARRATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE

WWE’S PORTRAYAL OF RACE AND GENDER

Wrestling with Morality:

A Narrative Analysis of the WWE’s Portrayal of Race and Gender

Thomas McIntyre

University of Alaska Anchorage Wrestling with Morality 2 Abstract

This study examined 12 episodes from the 1999 season of WWE Monday Night Raw. Using narrative analysis, the research identified the narratives of race and gender the WWE created during this time period. The research generated dozens of cases in which the WWE emphasized gender roles and racial stereotypes within its programming. The company used female performers in sexist character roles and portrayed African Americans in restricted, racially driven narratives. While the strategy was questionable, the company thrived from it and continued to ascend to new heights of popularity. Wrestling with Morality 3 Wrestling with Morality

A Narrative Analysis of the WWE’s Portrayal of Race and Gender

World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) and World Championship Wrestling (WCW) were engaged in a fight for viewership in 1999. The feud spawned what was known as the

WWE’s “” – the most successful stretch in company history. In the fall of 1999,

Vince McMahon – the chairman of the WWE – took the company public, and established the funds to finish the blow to the WCW. The WWE took control of the viewership totals, and went on to make $456 million in 2001. McMahon would later parlay the WWE’s earnings into creating the Extreme Football League (XFL), which was an attempt to counter the National

Football League (NFL) (Beekman, 2006). The WWE was a juggernaut, built on its weekly show, Monday Night Raw.

Monday Night Raw airs every Monday night of the calendar year. There were 52

Mondays in 1999, and 52 two-hour installments of Monday Night Raw. During that time, Raw was the WWE’s flagship television program. It housed the main storylines, and pulled in the big ratings. As reported by Newsweek in February of 2000, Raw was the most watched show on cable television (Leland, 2000). The popularity and profitability of the WWE was not in question; however, there was heat on McMahon for the content of the product that was raking in millions.

As the new millennium approached, the number of WWE critics grew. McMahon was facing criticisms from conservative and women’s groups, as well as wrestling fans. The company’s shift into an edgier and adult-oriented approach to wrestling is what sparked the meteoric rise in the late , but was also what generated a surge of detractors (Beekman,

2006). Wrestling with Morality 4 “Darwin proved there was a theocrat of evolution,” said former professional wrestler, Jim

Raschke, in a 2000 interview with Newsweek. “McMahon has taken us back to where we started.” Raschke’s comments backed the notion that the company was using an inappropriate method to get itself over. This was a time in wrestling when people saw the good guys and bad guys getting replaced with pimps, porn stars and sociopaths (Leland, 2000). In Steel Chair to the

Head, Nicholas Sammond (2005) described wrestling as “a hotly contested site for working out social, cultural, political, and economic ideals and desires” (p. 15). During the 1999 season of

Monday Night Raw, the WWE’s handling of those issues was controversial enough to inspire this study.

The questions being asked in this study are about the WWE’s portrayal of race and gender during that 1999 season of Monday Night Raw. By examining 12 episodes of Raw from the beginning, middle and end of the year, this study aims to explain the narratives behind the portrayal of race gender throughout that time period, as well as the impact those narratives had on the WWE audience. Other researchers have delved into similar projects, but have not specifically broken down a piece of the booming “Attitude Era” in this fashion.

Hart (2012) conducted research on the WWE’s treatment of race, class and gender through a textual analysis of broadcasts from 2010. Hart’s research focused on a time frame when the company had tailored its material to be more family-friendly. He found that, even when the WWE was operating with a censored approach, it was still behind the social curve in its representation of cultures, genders, and classes.

Petten’s (2010) research was done to create a theory about the narrative structure of televised . Petten was able to analyze the architecture of professional wrestling’s narrative style, which proved to be very formulaic. His work also discussed how the Wrestling with Morality 5 WWE influences the ways the audiences feel about wrestlers. In addition, it showed that fans’ relationships with wrestlers have become more interactive through platforms such as fanzines, websites, forums, and merchandise (Petten, 2010).

The purpose of this study is to contribute to an area of research that has been largely overlooked. It will put an important section of the WWE’s past under a microscope, dissecting the controversial tactics that formed the most successful run in company history. Using Foss’

(2008) eight dimensions of narrative analysis, this research will explore the storylines, angles, and characters that the WWE manifested in the 1999 season of Monday Night Raw.

The research begins by providing an overview of the WWE. It gives a brief history of the company, and describes the makeup and inner workings of the wrestling business. After that, there are sections explaining race and ethnic stereotypes, and gender roles and sexism. The historical roots of the categories will also be discussed. From there, the topic turns to television fans. The way in which fans interact, are affected by, and consume television is examined. The

12 episodes of Monday Night Raw will then be analyzed. Lastly, the conclusions from this research are presented, as well as suggestions for areas of further study needed.

Literature Review

World Wrestling Entertainment

The WWE has gone through several name changes since its origin. The company originally started as Capitol Wrestling Corporation, which was under the National Wrestling

Alliance banner until 1963 (Sullivan, 2011). In ’63, the CWC left NWA and formed the World

Wide Wrestling Federation. The name was shortened down to World Wrestling Federation in

1979 (Sullivan, 2011). The last change came in 2002 when it took on the World Wrestling Wrestling with Morality 6 Entertainment name, after a legal spat with the World Wide Fund for Nature over the trademarking of WWF (Sullivan, 2011).

The WWE currently produces 10 different shows, including 12 pay-per-view events per year. The shows air on a variety of networks and web platforms. The flagship weekly programs are shown on USA Network (Monday Night Raw), Syfy (SmackDown), and

(Main Event). The other content is hosted on WWE.com and Hulu.com, and is made up of both weekly and monthly programming (WWE, 2013). The shows range from one to three hours long, and house wrestlers and storylines that are exclusive to that particular program. The WWE is now broadcasting in more than 150 countries and 30 languages, and it reaches more than 650 million homes worldwide (WWE, 2013). And while its headquartered in Stamford, Conn., the

WWE has offices in New York, , Miami, London, Mumbai, Shanghai, Singapore,

Istanbul, and Tokyo (WWE, 2013).

In a 2008 piece for , Linda McMahon recalled the inception of what turned into the international empire that is the WWE. Vince McMahon’s father, Vince

McMahon, Sr., created the WWE in 1952 (Dempsey, 2008). The wrestling organization had its roots in Washington D.C., and operated solely in that region. It wasn’t until Vince McMahon and his wife, Linda, took over that the company began to branch out. The two saw an untapped area of the wrestling market and took advantage. They started by selling souvenir merchandise at live events, and would later venture into the pay-per-view business in 1985, expanding a revenue stream that was primarily coming from ticket sales (Dempsey, 2008). The snowball continued with the licensing of consumer products. Television aided the boom, as well, allowing the McMahon’s to take their product nationwide (McQuarrie, 2006). These strategic moves were a big part of building the WWE into a global business (Dempsey, 2008). Wrestling with Morality 7 During the interview with Bobbi Dempsey (2008), Linda McMahon also shed some light on the basic character roles the WWE utilizes:

Our fans are very passionate, especially when it comes to their favorite wrestlers. After

hearing just the first note of 's entrance music, for example, the audience

in an arena will immediately go wild. The fans also give you clear feedback by their

reactions while the match is in progress. Boos aren't necessarily bad, because that can

mean the crowd is reacting strongly to a "heel" – what we call a bad guy – which tells us

we've succeeded in creating a compelling character. (p. 9)

McMahon says their business is all about the content, and is driven by the creative development of their intellectual property. That intellectual property is the characters, and they are responsible for creating the compelling content that keeps people hooked (Dempsey, 2008).

While the wrestling requires athletic maneuvers, the WWE operates more as a modern soap opera than a sport, with its televised action being the cornerstone of the business (Hart,

2012). Events and conflicts are staged, the wrestlers are actors, and the audience is strung along using the drama of storylines and character angles, not the stats of each performer (Hart, 2012).

As Mazer (2008) stated in Professional Wrestling: Sport and Spectacle, “Its display of violence is less a contest than a ritualized encounter between opponents, replayed repeatedly over time for an exceptionally engaged audience” (p. 3). According to the WWE (2013), the product is

“scripted and carefully orchestrated” and the activities “do not represent socially responsible methods for resolving conflicts.”

McQuarrie released a study in 2006 titled Breaking : ‘The history of a history’ of

World Wrestling Entertainment, which detailed the inner-workings and complicated past of the

WWE. Part of the study revealed the way the WWE has managed to implement the kayfabe Wrestling with Morality 8 concepts (McQuarrie, 2006). To adhere to the principles of kayfabe, people within the wrestling industry must never reveal the secrets of the industry, for example the planned outcome for matches (McQuarrie, 2006). Not breaking kayfabe has allowed the WWE to have more control over its documented history, and public perception (McQuarrie, 2006).

McQuarrie’s research also covered the shift the WWE went through starting in 1995 when the -owned World Championship Wrestling created a competing Monday night show, Nitro. The move sparked an intense competition between the two organizations that would last for several years, and have an impact on wrestling that can still be felt today

(McQuarrie, 2006). The competition put pressure on both organizations to constantly up the ante, introducing dangerous matches that took the safety of wrestling to its brink (McQuarrie,

2006). While the ratings were higher than ever, the war between the two companies resulted in significant damage to both the WCW and WWF (McQuarrie, 2006). It’s believed that the pressure for extreme, high-risk matches was largely responsible for the death of a half dozen wrestlers during this time period (Mamatas, 2001). This includes the death of WWE’s Owen

Hart, who fell from the rafters of an arena attempting a spectacular ring entrance. His body was removed from the ring and Vince McMahon continued the show (McQuarrie, 2006). The

WCW-WWE match ended in 2001, but its aftermath eventually led to the WWE cleaning up its product, and moving to the safer family friendly model that is still being produced today (Hart,

2012).

Racial and Ethnic Stereotypes

Stereotypes can be defined as widely held societal beliefs and expectations; generalizations applied to individuals who share common characteristics or a social group such as ethnicity, race, gender, social class, or nationality (Stagnor & Schaller, 1996). For example, Wrestling with Morality 9 African American youths are often stereotyped as being lazy, dumb, and loud, but having rhythm and athleticism (Way, Hernandez, Rogers & Hughes, 2013). And when someone is “acting

Black,” it usually means they are speaking in urban slang, dressing in urban style, and listening to hip-hop music (Way, Hernandez, Rogers & Hughes, 2013).

Ghavami and Peplau conducted research to better understand the perceived cultural stereotypes that exist (2012). They asked 627 U.S. undergraduates to generate 10 attributes for 1 of 17 groups: Asian Americans, Blacks, Latinos, Middle Eastern Americans, or Whites; men or women; or 10 gender-by-ethnic groups (example: Black men or Latina women) (Ghavemi &

Peplau, 2012). There were 39 different attributes listed for “Blacks.” Ten of the most frequent

(frequency being the number of times the attribute was listed) attributes included criminals, gangsters, ghetto, poor, having an attitude, and unintelligent (Ghavemi & Peplau, 2012). For

“Black men,” violent, dangerous and rapper were a few of the most frequent. On the flipside,

“Whites” received these attributes the most frequently: high status, rich, intelligent, arrogant, and privileged. The terms redneck, ignorant, and All-American also charted in the top 10 (Ghavemi

& Peplau, 2012).

Another stereotype tied to African Americans is that the males are pimps (Rose, 2010).

In Rose’s study, Pimp juice: Profiles of the African-American pimp in popular culture, it’s shown that the African American pimp emerged as an iconic folk hero in 1970, right at the intersection of the Civil Rights and Black Power movements (2010). The pimp stereotype – which was born from minstrel traditions that were essentially racist images of blacks created by white people – was adopted by the black community and proudly perpetuated within pop culture

(Rose, 2010). The abuse of black women and the criminal activities of pimps have not stopped Wrestling with Morality 10 black audiences from celebrating what Rose describes as an illusion of victory over white oppression that the pimp projected (2010).

In addition to the pimp stereotype, African American men – both gay and straight – have been perceived as having a violent and destructive sexuality. The beliefs have been developed and applied through racist practices and ideologies (Husbands, Makoroka, Walcott, Adam,

George, Remis & Rourke, 2012). The stereotype was reaffirmed in the Ghavemi and Peplau study, as the student participants used the term hypersexual to describe “Black men” (2012).

The racial and ethnic stereotypes reach far outside of the African American community.

Many Hispanics have been presented as lazy, deceptive, clannish, and untrustworthy in the depiction of them in the mass media (Bresnahan & Lee, 2011). Asian Americans are represented as the model minority – they are stereotyped as intelligent, industrious, and competent, but also socially inept when communicating with members of the dominant group (Bresnahan & Lee,

2011). Bresnahan and Lee back up the information gathered by Ghavami and Peplau in regard to the general stereotypical perception of European Americans (i.e. Whites) in their analysis of racial stereotypes on Survivor: Cook Islands (2011). They noted that European Americans are typically portrayed as competent, intelligent, motivated, and productive (Bresnahan & Lee,

2011).

Gender Roles and Sexism

In Handbook of Multicultural Measures, Gamst, Liang, and Karabetian (2011) outlined the deep-seated part gender plays in our society:

Along with race, gender is a visible trait upon which individuals make judgments of

others that impact their relationships with others and themselves. From the moment a

young boy or girl is born, she or he and her or his parent(s) are inculcated with messages Wrestling with Morality 11 of appropriate behaviors and style of dress. Throughout their lives, boys and girls are

reminded of the roles to perform and the ways to look and express oneself lest they be

marginalized. (p. 335)

The authors go into the various challenges both men and women face due to gender role expectations. Women deal with pervasive sexism at cultural, institutional, and interpersonal levels, and are pressured to maintain the ideal body type and nurturing behavior (Gamst, Liang &

Karabetian, 2011). Men are expected to be strong, successful (in sports, their careers, and sexual relations), independent, in control, and void of all feminine behavior (Gamst, Liang &

Karabetian, 2011).

Gender roles have created societal issues for gay and lesbian individuals, whose masculinity and femininity levels tend to have a different relationship than the average heterosexual man or woman (Choi, Herdman, Fuqua & Newman, 2011). Gay men are shown to have normal amounts of masculinity, but a higher amount of femininity. Lesbian women have normal amounts of femininity, but higher amounts of masculinity (Gamst, Liang & Karabetian,

2011). This causes the homosexual population to diverge from the socially accepted gender roles.

Sexism refers to negative attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors that degrade, stigmatize, or restrict females or female-related characteristics (Szymanski & Moffitt, 2012). It has been proven that sexist and negative attitudes toward the feminist movement were also associated with negative attitudes toward lesbians and gay men (Campbell, Schellenberg & Senn, 1997). Sexism can manifest itself in a myriad of ways. Examples include believing women are inferior to men, workplace , gender inequity in salaries, and media depicting females in a way that emphasizes their body parts and sexuality (Szymanski & Moffitt, 2012). Sexism is a form of Wrestling with Morality 12 oppression (Remer, 2013). In the August 2013 issue of the New Statesmen, Penny made the case that culture hates women (2013). Penny believes that men have grown up in a sexist culture, which influences them to do and say sexist things without even meaning to. She argues that sexism has taken on such a prolonged and impactful life because men as a group have failed to understand the implications of it (Penny, 2013). She states that sexism has created an unfair world for women, and will continue to unless those who are not being oppressed help change course (Penny, 2013).

Television Fans

Television has been identified as a source of entertainment, relaxation, and information

(Clancey, 1994). It has been suggested that television allows – or induces – people to ignore the real world (Clancey, 1994). Connectedness is a concept that measures the level of the relationship(s) that a viewer has with the characters and contextual settings of a program in the parasocial television environment (Lu & Lo, 2007). A viewer’s connectedness is determined through the Second-Order Factor Model of Connectedness, which is made up of six categories: escape, fashion, imitation, modeling, aspiration, and paraphernalia (Lu & Lo, 2007). Escape characterizes the cathartic element that connects the viewer to a television program; fashion is about how much a viewer is influenced by the characters’ appearance; imitation addresses the inclination for people to imitate the characters; modeling gauges how heavily the viewer relates their own life to the lives of the characters in the show; aspiration diagnoses how people reach a level of connectedness that they aspire to be on the show or meet the characters; lastly, paraphernalia represents how people collect items to bring to the television program and to the characters in real life, such as posters, and magazines (Lu & Lo, 2007). A viewer that scores high in these six categories has a strong level of connectedness. Lu and Lo concluded in their Wrestling with Morality 13 study of television audience satisfaction that a television program eliciting high connectedness scores is rare (2007).

The audience satisfaction and engagement in a show can also be explained by determining the audience’s expectations (Dennis & Gray, 2013). The audience’s expectations can change from episode to episode, depending on how they responded to the most recent airing

(Dennis & Gray, 2013). Elspeth Howe, chairman of the UK’s Broadcasting Standards

Commission, addressed the audience’s expectations in regard to sex on television in a 1999 letter to The Times. Howe referenced research that was done that same year by the BSC, which concluded that the audience expects sex to be justified by its context, in both dramatic and factual programs (Howe, 1999). It was also revealed that viewers expect different standards from free networks, and cable networks that are accessed through payment (Howe, 1999).

Television networks use sex as a means to attract the audience demographic of young men (Bozell, 1999). Marketing Evaluations released the first ever Cable Q rankings in 1999

(Katz, 1999). Up until that point, Q ratings were used to measure the popularity of television shows. The Cable Q showed how much viewers liked – or disliked – the programming

(Katz, 1999). The initial rankings showed that the 18-49 male demographic responds well to sex, and that was clearly established by the high scores of sex-laden shows like The Sopranos,

Real Sex, and WWE Raw (Katz, 1999).

Research Questions

While there are previous studies that have examined the portrayal of race and gender in the WWE, this research is unique in its concentration. Rather than looking at the current televised product, it analyzes a historically significant time in the wrestling industry. In 1999, the WWE was a pop culture phenomenon. Monday Night Raw was the engine of the vehicle, Wrestling with Morality 14 earning the highest cable ratings in the U.S. at the time (Katz, 1999). This was the WWE’s boom period. Other researchers have explored the company as a whole or looked at more recent offerings. But none have applied research of racial and ethnic stereotypes, and gender roles and sexism to the WWE during its heyday.

In addition, there is a large void in the amount of research that focuses on the audience as well as the in-ring action. It was rare for the prior studies to observe the effect the narratives had on the WWE fans. Insensitive characters and storylines were presented, but the reception to them was mostly an afterthought. This research will cover that area. It will use the material collected on audience behavior to understand the impact.

The results and conclusions drawn from this study will provide new perspective on the

WWE. Taking the previously reviewed literature and research into consideration, this study will address the following questions:

RQ1: What is the narrative of race/ethnicity as portrayed on WWE?

RQ2: What is the narrative of gender as portrayed on WWE?

RQ3: What is the impact of these narratives on the WWE audience?

Methods

This study used narrative analysis to examine the research questions. The artifacts for this research were acquired through various Internet media hosting sites, such as YouTube.com and Dailymotion.com, and from the researcher’s video collection. A total of 12 episodes of

WWE Monday Night Raw were examined. Each episode was 90 to 95 minutes long

The artifacts were pulled from a yearlong span of WWE programming, with airdates ranging from January 4, 1999, to September 27, 1999. The set of data was reviewed over the Wrestling with Morality 15 course of two weeks, from October 14, 2013, to October 28, 2013. Foss’ (2008) eight dimensions of narrative analysis were applied to study the material.

Setting was the first aspect to be studied. The researcher noted significant location changes and details. After that, the characters were determined. There were a wide variety of characters within the WWE. During this time, the chairman of the WWE, Vince McMahon, was established as the lead character. The secondary characters included professional wrestlers, ringside announcers, and members of the WWE creative team.

Identifying the narrator was the next step. The ringside announcers – , Michael

Cole, and – helped drive the narrative during the televised broadcasts. They were setup as a third-party commentating crew to guide the audience through different storylines and angles the WWE was presenting. On-screen actions were rarely shown without the influence of the announcers.

The fourth dimension was events. The events that played out created the substance for this study. The researcher looked closely at how the characters behaved and were presented during both the satellites and kernels.

Temporal relations were examined next. The WWE displayed and narrated the program in present tense, while also using flashbacks and foreshadowing. The bait-and-switch structure of professional wrestling made for complicated temporal relations. Events happened at a fast pace, and the over-arching storylines played out at different rates. The causal relations were then studied, with a focus on the cause and effect of actions within the storylines.

The audience followed causal relations. In particular, the role of the audience was studied. The researcher had to pinpoint the intended audience, how the product was tailored for that demographic, and how the audience responded to the WWE’s narratives. Lastly, the theme Wrestling with Morality 16 was analyzed. The researcher used all of the previous seven dimensions to uncover the theme of the reviewed WWE Raw episodes.

Results

Race and Ethnicity Narrative

RQ1 inquired about the narrative of race and ethnicity in the WWE. Twelve episodes of

Monday Night Raw from the 1999 season – roughly 18 hours worth of programming – were examined to develop an answer. Events, narrator, and characters were the major dimensions in play for this narrative. The structure of wrestling has a lot to do with these particular dimensions being amplified. The shows were character driven and built around the interaction of those characters. Additionally, there were always two announcers calling the events being broadcasted. Though – unlike a traditional sports broadcast – these narrators had biases, agendas, and inside information that was used to push the storylines the WWE creative team had assembled. The portrayal of race and ethnicity within these categories ended up fitting into many of the stereotypes that were covered in the literature review.

There was a distinct absence of variety in races that were represented on Raw – African

American and European American were the primary races. During this time period, Asian and

Hispanic wrestlers were not a part of the roster. The main African American wrestlers that appeared were The Rock, , D Lo Brown, Jacqueline, Godfather, Farooq, and D-Von

Dudley. The remaining wrestlers were European American, with the most significant ones being

Vince McMahon, Shane McMahon, and . Nearly all of these wrestlers fell into racial and ethnic stereotype roles.

African American characters shared many of the same personality traits. The most common traits were urban, loud, big attitudes, sexually promiscuous, and violent. The listed Wrestling with Morality 17 attributes were five of the most frequent stereotypes that came up in the Ghavemi and Peplau

(2012) study. The European American wrestlers took on a much wider range of attributes, as they made up a higher volume of characters, and played roles with more variance. However, the three most prolific wrestlers at the time embodied many of the stereotypical European American traits discussed by Ghavemi and Peplau (2012). High status, rich, intelligent, arrogant, privileged, redneck, and ignorant were all prevalent traits among those three characters.

The narration and events shared a close connection. As previously stated, the narrators injected their opinions and beliefs into situations. This was done to shape the perception of the viewers at home. As far as the racial narrative was concerned, the narration and events were critical. In the January 11, 1999, episode of Raw, The Rock comes out to the ring and starts making fun of a wrestler named Mankind. He is bombastic and loud, calling Mankind a “piece of feces” and talking himself up. Jerry Lawler – who acts as the pro-heel commentator – reacts to the in-ring work in a positive manner. Lawler agrees with The Rock, while – the pro-baby face (good guy) commentator – plays the other side. This portion of action presents many different dynamics. First, The Rock is fulfilling stereotypes of African Americans being loud and having big attitudes. And secondly, the narrators are helping to define what the viewers should think of The Rock’s actions. The example shows all of the cogs moving at once, and is only a fraction of the full story.

Overall, the scope of racial stereotyping that occurred was vast. Some examples of this stereotyping include the following: Mark Henry – also known as “Sexual Chocolate” – was easily manipulated due to his sexual desires; Godfather played the role of a pimp; D Lo Brown was booked as being dumb, and spoke in Ebonics; The Rock was boisterous, athletic, and urban;

Vince and Shane McMahon ran a high class stable of wrestlers called The Corporation – both Wrestling with Morality 18 were wealthy, arrogant, and intelligent; Steve Austin was a redneck who drank beer and fought against the upper class (McMahons).

The way the WWE structured its society of wrestlers created a negative narrative when it came to the portrayal of race and ethnicity. Through the characters, events, and narration, the company represented races in ways that mirrored deep-seated stereotypes that exist in America.

Gender Narrative

RQ2 pertained to the gender narrative established by the WWE. This question was researched with the same group of episodes as used for RQ1 and also examined portrayals using characters, narrator, and events dimensions . The research showed the WWE perpetuated gender role expectations and sexist beliefs through its portrayal of gender.

The WWE was not afraid to push the boundaries during this span, especially in regard to its handling of female wrestlers. The majority of females were used as eye candy – not just for the audience, but for fellow wrestlers as well. Debra – a busty blond who did not actually wrestle – accompanied to the ring for his matches. Time after time, the outcome of those matches was determined by Debra undressing outside of the ring to distract Jarrett’s opponents so he could land a cheap shot and win the bout. As Gamst, Liang, and Karabetian

(2011) explained, women have been marginalized with gender expectations that they will be nurturing and supportive of men, who are strong and in control. This theme was reinforced by the WWE.

Gamst, Liang, and Karabetian (2011) also discussed the idea that men are expected to be void of all feminine behavior and traits. When Goldust – a wrestler who wears makeup and feathers, and has an ambiguous sexuality – playfully licks the ropes while entering the ring, Wrestling with Morality 19 narrator Jerry Lawler exclaims that he is twisted, perverted, and sick. Within the WWE world, there is little space for men who function in a grey area sexually.

Godfather is the aforementioned wrestler who plays the role of a pimp. A part of his routine is coming out with a group of his “hoes.” The narrators openly discuss how much they are attracted to the females, reacting to them like giddy young boys. On the September 13, 1999, edition of Raw, Godfather completes a transaction with D Lo Brown for his “hoes.” He sells

Brown the group of women for the night. Moments after the purchase takes place, a secret backstage camera feed comes up on the arena’s video screen and shows Mark Henry – whom

Brown bought the women for – getting a lap dance from them. Objectifying women in this manner was commonplace in the 12 episodes that were reviewed.

Szymanski and Moffitt (2012) examined sexism and how gender equity influences the relationship between men and women. Jeff Jarrett was involved in yet another storyline that negatively depicted females in comparison to men. Jarrett became entrenched in a battle of the sexes. He boasted that women are weak and men are the dominant species. His goal was to give women the equality in the workplace they had been demanding. This led to ,

Fabulous Moolah, Luna, Debra, and all getting beaten up by Jarrett. The only time he lost a fight with a female was when Chyna – billed as the most powerful female wrestler – pinned him after someone interfered and knocked him out with a guitar. Jarrett’s record against women when they did not get help: undefeated.

The episodes were laden with female wrestlers playing demeaning characters and engaging in degrading events. The narrators also consistently applauded the excessive sexuality.

Female matches were rare – one of the few pitted (a female who became a villain because she didn’t want sex objects to hold the championship belt) against Mae Young and Fabulous Wrestling with Morality 20 Moolah in a “strip match,” where the first to get stripped to her bra and panties was the loser.

Both Young and Moolah were in their 70s when this took place.

These are the other events that displayed the WWE’s treatment of gender: Val Venis – a character playing a pornography star – seducing women in the crowd and making sexual innuendo jokes; Mark Henry taking a trip to a strip club; Henry puking after he finds out he was kissing a cross-dresser named Sammi; and Jacqueline going by “P.M.S.”

The WWE used its narrator, characters, and events to create a product that was not favorable to women, and the result was a derogatory theme. It ramped up sexuality, put women in marginalized roles, and kept females from getting over as serious professional wrestlers.

Impact on Audience

RQ3 examined the impact the prior narratives had on the WWE audience. The narrator, characters, events, and audience dimensions were investigated. The audience plays an important role in the WWE television tapings. If they do not respond with enthusiasm, the show can lose steam quickly. Much of the entertainment hinged on the audience reaction.

The biggest takeaway from the research was that the audience very rarely objected to what was occurring in front of them. Objection to a villain character was common, but objecting a storyline’s appropriateness was not. The one time during the 18 hours of footage that the audience vehemently disapproved of the events was on September 6, 1999, when came to the ring pretending to be a Japanese wrestler. Snow used a mocking imitation and made a joke about protecting the WWE from Godzilla. The crowd rejected the entire segment by giving it scattered boos and a non-reaction. The narrators realized it was falling flat and proceeded to pan it. Wrestling with Morality 21 While there is that one opposition, there are dozens of examples that show the crowd going wild for segments that could be received as being equally offensive. For instance, the audience chants, “we want puppies (breasts)” when Debra begins to undress during her distraction teases for Jeff Jarrett. This chant is not limited to that circumstance, though; it can be heard over and over when attractive females are involved in the action. There wasn’t a single instance in which a woman’s undressing – however it came about – received a negative reaction.

The audience was in favor of ’s shtick, too. He would do a call and response with the fans where he would ask them to say “pimping ain’t [sic] easy,” and they would happily oblige. The crowd does the same thing when Steve Austin asks them to give him a “hell yeah” – it comes off as a way to support and engage with a wrestler they like.

The Lu and Lo (2007) study detailed the way television fans respond to programming when they feel a certain level of connectedness to it. Using that metric, the audiences at WWE tapings are extremely connected. Fans wore all of the merchandise (shirts, foam fingers, hats, signature props), brought posters, dressed up as wrestlers, and took every opportunity to be a part of the entertainment. They were deeply engaged with the product, which is one of the reasons the WWE had the highest cable ratings at the time (Katz, 1999).

The at-home audience was always being manipulated. The bait-and-switch approach to stories was carried through with help from the commentators. When Mankind was given a chance to win The Rock’s championship belt on January 4, 1999, Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler spent the whole night laughing at the possibility. Their antics made the Mankind victory even more shocking. This formula was executed every Monday, although not always to that degree.

The controversial narratives never held back the WWE from being successful or the audience from engrossing themselves in the action. The audience cheered for the good guys over Wrestling with Morality 22 the bad guys, and the characters that filled those roles sometimes blurred the lines of morality.

The WWE was always working to control the audience perception, and it appeared to have convinced them that the rules of right and wrong wash away as soon as you walk through the arena doors, or turn on the television. As the audience grew, the content became more irresponsible in its portrayal of ethnicity and gender. The company used its power to promote a show that reinforced racial stereotypes and sexist beliefs.

Discussion

The results of this research have highlighted how recklessly the WWE dealt with race and gender. It unapologetically used females as pawns and sex objects. In addition, it failed to book

African American wrestlers in progressive roles, shoving them into stereotypical archetypes instead. And through all of this, the audience was accepting. The WWE’s choices had no immediate . The fans watched more than ever and the revenue shot through the sky with the help of these characters’ merchandising sale figures. It is not that the WWE did not clearly understand the potentially offensive situations it was creating; rather, the company was given no incentives to cease the activity.

The season of Raw was examined in three parts containing episodes from the beginning of the year, post-WrestleMania, and post-SummerSlam. The latter two time frames were chosen because that is when new storylines were being rolled out. There was one tangible change in the product from January to September: it got edgier. September provided more matches between men and women, more scantily clad females, and more racial stereotypes. Jeff Jarrett was attacking women, and The Undertaker had kidnapped Vince McMahon’s innocent daughter to use as leverage against him. Wrestling with Morality 23 The narratives that manifested for the topics chosen in the research questions were far beyond politically correct. The WWE tended to play up the stereotypes and sexism in exchange for shock and awe. Consequently, the gender and race narratives became: stay in your lane and you are what you are. It was not uncommon for the winner of a match or a belt holder to have earned success through questionable means, which was a parallel of the WWE’s climb to the top.

But, asking the WWE to stop functioning in this manner would have been like asking a veteran bank robber to stop robbing banks. The company saw no repercussions from benefitting off this outrageous world of wrestling it created. Like the bank robber, the WWE must have thought it would eventually catch up to them – but not tomorrow.

Limitations

The greatest limitation to this research was the volume of material that the researcher could examine. The length of the Monday Night Raw episodes created a hurdle. The original plan for the study was to dissect every episode from the 1999 calendar year. Due to time and schedule restrictions, the researcher was forced to re-focus that plan down to 12 episodes. The smaller size was not ideal, but supplied enough footage to draw results from. With unlimited time, the research could have been expanded to cover all of the WWE programming that year, including pay-per-views and web content.

The other limitations came from technical downfalls. The video of the episodes tended to be grainy with low quality audio. Having re-mastered versions or official DVD releases of the episodes would have made them easier to study. Accessibility proved to be a factor, as well, since the WWE has yet to put full archives up for the public. Wrestling with Morality 24 Future Research

This study was inspired by the fact that there is a scarcity of academic work related to the

WWE. Because of this, the future research that can be done is essentially endless. But in terms of analyzing the WWE’s portrayal of race and gender, there are more obvious steps forward in research that can be taken. As previously mentioned, increasing the amount of research material would provide a clearer picture of the company’s history with race and gender portrayal.

Approaching this topic from a content analysis angle could also yield informative results.

Future research could try to shed light on the wrestler’s point of view. Interviewing the men and women who brought the characters and events to life could add a new perspective on the way the WWE operated. There are also other eras that can be inspected through the same lens as this research. With WWE research still in its infancy, there are many fascinating avenues for academics to head down.

Conclusion

By casting women in marginalized character roles and pigeon holing performers due to their race, the WWE perpetuated plenty of stereotypes, sexist beliefs, and gender role expectations during its 1999 season of Monday Night Raw. However, the product’s popularity didn’t suffer a bit. If anything, the ratings suggest the risqué approach helped lift the company to new heights. Although, the past bears new meaning because of the present: after going too far left, the WWE reeled in the sex and violence, and is now in the midst of the “PG Era.”

This study illuminates why the WWE eventually reached a breaking point. It explored the product while it was simultaneously at its hottest and most self-destructive. There is only so far the envelope can be pushed in the wrestling business before the audience becomes Wrestling with Morality 25 desensitized. The study showed what it looked like when the WWE ignored its conscience and put the pedal to the metal. It was out of control. Wrestling with Morality 26 References

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Airdates of the WWE Monday Night Raw episodes that were reviewed:

Jan. 4, 1999 Jan. 11, 1999 Jan. 18, 1999 Jan. 25, 1999 April 5, 1999 April 12, 1999 April 19, 1999 April 26, 1999 Sept. 6, 1999 Sept. 13, 1999 Sept. 20, 1999 Sept. 27, 1999

Foss’ eight dimensions of narrative analysis (setting, characters, narrator, events, temporal relations, causal relations, audience, and theme) were used to examine the artifacts. The Foss categories were applied during the viewings of the episodes. The researcher took notes for each category to determine which were the most prevalent. The researcher also adapted to the most prominent categories, putting more focus toward them as the research progressed. The research was conducted over a span of two weeks, from October 14, 2013, to October 28, 2013.