July 17, 2014
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No, I think professional wrestling offends the Priusati for different reasons.
Despite the fact that lots of what would back home be called “wicked smaht kheds” like it, wrestling is, above all else, a working-class form of entertainment. You might be able to intellectualize it, but it’s made for hoi polloi, much to the chagrin of the Internet wrestling community and, apparently, The Atlantic. Nothing infuriates the educated classes more than the simple and unironic pleasures of the world’s working people.
But in the final analysis, I think the problem writers and readers of The Atlantic have with professional wrestling is that it delights in its own lack of political correctness. The “Attitude Era” might be over, and with it the intensely bloody matches, women stripping each other out of bikinis, and not-so-thinly veiled double-entendres, but it’s still the sporting world’s answer to a trip to Hooters”only a couple steps removed from a hot dog eating contest.
With the progressive Gestapo’s intrusion into everything from IT to what a sports team is called, it would be sort of surprising if America’s hall monitors and scolds didn”t also try to muck up the world of professional wrestling.
To which I say “good.”
The more disapproval it gets from the self-righteous volunteer cultural hall monitors at The Atlantic, Slate, Salon, and wherever else, the better. The Internet outrage machine turning its eyes on the world of pro wrestling might just be a welcome infusion of energy. Leftist busybodies telling wrestling to tone it down is the functional equivalent of asking a school bully to please leave you alone.
