Hashtag IWA MeToo: Match 2 - Add a Pound Sign or Names of Jerks?

Do not look at your blogger stats when you are looking for motivation to write.

I am starting to think that writing maybe nothing more than practice. Too bad I need a better work situation to just take a day or two to devote writing my next work of fiction. If it is any comfort to my tens of readers, management positions at my day job are something that I am pursuing which is a first. As for freeing myself from the overnight drone work, that will have to wait for a relationship building trip to Vegas to pass, a long with my anti-anxiety and sleep aid.

May be I cannot do anything right. My third trip to Sin City is being planned, and yet again, I cannot enjoy all that the state of Nevada has to offer. Granted, I have out grown wanting to visit the adult entertainment facilities outside of Clark County, but they turn around and legalize cannabis. How do I always miss out, be it blogging or partying?

It is sad to say that it seems that you have to shock people to get a response to your posts. If memory serves me right, (and after checking out the stats from Harshside.com, it does) calling out pit bull owners in a title and referring directly to Peoria wrestling seemed to have resulted in my biggest numbers of views. On this website, people were not reading “Racism Can Play in Peoria. What About Your Local Wrestling?”, but they had a response…oh did they have a response. Either everyone’s social media feeds lean so far left or right that those people who defended the absolutely wrong ideology of Tracy Smothers are not aware of the last blog post (to my credit, I found out about Ian’s insensitivity), or they have just become too jaded to even think about somebody suggesting they are assholes.

Damn people basing philosophy from novelty tees (“Mom told me I could be what ever I wanted, so I became an asshole” for example). It may inspire me to take a motorboat engine to those GEICO matinees.

Or if I infer from Ian Rotten’s Facebook feed, the man who is excusing the awful, just does not produce enough interest for Twitter’s wrestling pundits to care about his reckless posting.

See the conclusion to this blog at Rip 'Em System Tumblr.

Hashtag IWA-MeToo: 1st Match

Sometimes I feel satire is dead. I suppose the Internet is to blame. It is great that everybody is reading, but if you do not have the ability to comprehend, what is the point? November 8, 2016 is evidence of that.

I think back to my intro to literature class at Illinois Central College in 2007 when we were assigned to read “A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift. My best friend and I were the only ones who spoke of thoroughly enjoying it. Everyone else in the room who had an opinion questioned how someone, an Irishman at that, would dare suggest the English eating the children of McImmigrants. That is Peoria for you, and sadly since it is the premier test market in the country, that is a reflection of the rest of the country, at least the cities and suburbs that lack major league sports franchises…and Indianapolis…Mike “Fucking” Pence.

I bring up the rest of the country because population density suggest that they do not truly have neighbors. They only have themselves to care for. So they lack any thought to being empathetic because everyone around them looks or acts just like them. If you cannot understand how other people feel, how are you going to comprehend a joke about how ridiculous one group of people were treating another? To them it is a tale of the evil British eating the white babies that we all identify as on March 17 instead of a statement about how people do not care for the marginalized.

It is these kind of people who are fine with a Tracy Smothers’s wrestling school, School of Smothers, using the Confederate battle flag as part of the logo. I have fought this battle before and was shat on for by the likes of Christian Rose for reminding Tracy he was a Full Blooded Italian. With the training center being in Lincoln, Illinois, a town named after the President who destroyed the identity of the Southern States, it is fair to mention him in a blog that is about excusing awful people or, at the very least, awful acts.

Without a college newspaper to write for, anything non-wrestling related that I have written, may have fallen on blind eyes. Hence, if you have not been keeping track of my blogs since November 2016, I have been trying to call for change to the misogynistic patriarchy, but with my long-winded nature, I was trying to be clever working through my observations while I was trying to come up with my satirical solutions. In the meantime, society listened to the right people and was allowed to catch up. Losing the race is the story of my life, thank the gods I just love to chase, fight and complete.

But, the United States of Whiskey City is my audience, and you cannot unfollow everyone who says hateful, uncaring or ignorant things, so you are going to find some stuff you must write about. Sadly, you have to state your opinion before you can give it a comedic spin.

See the conclusion to this blog at Rip 'Em System Tumblr.

#MeToo and the Disgruntled’s Real World Champ Part 4

Simon's Cat

Damn, it has been a tough week. Joe Madden may have over thought the Cubs last two games. “Venom” is a so bad it is good movie which leads me to fear the fate of the Sony franchises. I seem to be getting ahead of my blogs by one week, hence I may be working too much.

And then you have the all but certain demise of the country with the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation. How do you tell a happily married man who takes you to sporting event and respects his Nike-boycotting wife that there is no way I want to stand for a flag that represents a dead country. But I respect the man, so I should not embarrass him despite his wife has said that we cannot fault powerful men for abusing their power, unless they were communist revolutionaries.

I never got away with anything growing up. Being too honest has plagued me. Striving for decency deters me from a negative path. The point is, if I screwed up, I paid, and have always paid. If we have learned anything from the Me Too Movement, is that everybody should answer for their indiscretions. It is not vengeance, it is a means to encourage protecting those whose safety is the target of those in power.

Thus, I am pondering if I should make this rant relevant to the current theme of the blog by exploring the incidents of sexual assault and harassment that I have experienced from my time in professional wrestling. You could call it hazing bullshit, but the fact of the matter is if I broke these guys faces, I risked never being booked again by that promotion. What really hurts is that the promotion never used me again. To their credit, I was booked and wisely ended up being a healthy scratch on my last trip to Southern Wisconsin for a last minute appearance by Silas Young, so at least the promotion remembered me.

It was 14 years ago. I was victimized. You cannot hold it against me if I was bumped from the card for someone less prestigious that The Last Real Man in Professional Wrestling (do not hold the gimmick against him). The culprits and facilitators are remembered, especially those who boasted about it. The stories were something I laughed off with the guys in the business like it was just a permanent marker stunt on my face, but when normal people ask for crazy and obscene stories from the business, you realize that the ones that come to immediate mind demonstrate behavior that is not acceptable. You realize that you were abused and you feel you can only blame yourself since you still want to be a part of the business. You cannot blame the sport.

But, these guys (for the most part) are friends and a couple of them have kids. There is a slim chance their life could be ruined since I am already wrestling’s persona non grata south of I-80. Why be afraid of going national? Should I wait till I hear about their next job opportunity? I have not killed their present, but why do I feel like I have paid for their constant happiness I have perceived?

I suppose I should just be happy not having post traumatic stress in regards to this issue, or am I just now showing that I suffer from these stunts? Time does not heel all wounds. If this would have been realized when I was in therapy in regards to abusive relationships and and failing to prevent a gas station suicide, perhaps the Supreme Court fulfilling the wills of sex offenders for the next 20 years would not leave me considering snuffing myself (I really needed a better therapist, so probably not).

Hopefully, Ronan Farrow gets wind of this blog and helps me decide if I will name names. Provided that we get over the mess of me being a Woody Allen apologist of course. Time wears away, it does not heal. So I guess the moral is not to wound in the first place.

With that said, I would like to apologize to “Lauren” at Big Al’s in Peoria (2015) if I was too handsy to begin with. It was me testing boundaries, and regardless if I stopped when told, I did wrong to begin with.

I gotta at least answer for my indiscretions, before I get this blog back on track. If only I could hold off on the posting till WWE’s Evolution for the sake of cultural relevance. But, releasing this a week later may be too much time from when I wrote this.

Anyhow this blog has all the stuff marks want in bold, so the intro and transition do not matter to anyone besides me I suppose. More reason to try and be brave about abuse and the regret that people may have givien a shit about me if my struggles were more relatable than just being in my head.

Pardon the dark tone. It makes me hope a lot of the visitors just paged down to The Disgruntled’s Real World Champion content.

66th Real World Heavyweight Champion - WWE Champion John Cena (2) - 5/11/2001 to 7/17/11

Edge had forfeited the Big Gold Belt due to a career-ending injury. Christian and Randy Orton’s battle for that belt was full of stipulations and swaps to please the fans who thought it was ridiculous for Christian to only have a two-day reign after succeeding the man he broke in to the business with.

Davey Richards aloofness toward Ring of Honor and wrestling in general always left a bad taste in mouth, and until Kevin Steen came into the title picture, his challengers, like him, lacked personality to match their in ring talent. If you thing that in ring ability trumps personality, then you would be ignoring the wrestler of the summer.

67th World Heavyweight Champion - WWE Champ CM Punk (1) - 7/17/11 to 8/14/11

68th World Heavyweight Champion - NWA’s Adam Pearce - 8/14/11 to 4/8/2012

Before “All In” there was “Seven Levels of Hate,” the story of two wrestlers (Pearce and Colt Cabana) wanting to do right by the business. That has never been WWE’s prerogative. Fearing a drop in ratings, WWE had Alberto Del Rio cash in Money in the Bank on Punk so that he could drop the belt to Cena. Realizing it did nothing for the long term, Cena would drop the belt back to Del Rio. Del Rio would then drop the belt to Punk and avoid making THEIR star look bad by losing to his rival thrice.

69th World Heavyweight Champion - NWA’s Colt Cabana - 4/8/12 to 7/21/12

70th World Heavyweight Champion - WWE Champ CM Punk (2) - 7/21/12 to 1/27/2013

It is tempting to give the belt to ROH’s Kevin Steen since he was the headliner during Richard’s reign without even wrestling. Him winning the title proved his importance to the business. But, WWE has gone out of their way to make us forget the 434-day reign of the predecessor to Steen. In the end, NWA fell from relevance not committing to Pearce and Cabana efforts to elevate their title. WWE chose stock over substance having Punk drop the title to a part-timer in the Rock.

71st World Heavyweight Champion - ROH’s Kevin Steen - 1/27/13 to 4/5/13

Just because WWE chose their stock, does not mean I have to.

72nd World Heavyweight Champion - WWE Champ The Rock (5) - 4/5/13 to 4/7/13

And then indie wrestling shoots itself in the foot. Jay Briscoe had the resume to be ROH Champion, but in what were progressive times, he was not meant for the REAL champ title. This reign brought us the personalized world title belt featuring Confederate battle flags. The injury that ended his reign may have been legitimate (Wikipedia says no), but I think his babyfaced character’s pro-gun, anti-marriage equality tweet during his championship was the reason his reign did not make the two-month mark.

73rd World Heavyweight Champion - WWE Champ John Cena (3) - 4/7/13 to 8/13/13

74th World Heavyweight Champion - WWE Champ Daniel Bryan (2) - 8/13/13

75th World Heavyweight Champion - World Heavyweight Champ Alberto Del Rio - 8/13/13 to 10/27/13

Randy Orton had cashed in Money it the Bank to start the “brilliant” storyline for Daniel Bryan’s Wrestlemania moment. I still believe this narrative was not going to happen until Punk left and the Bootista backlash occurred. Alberto Del Rio’s reigns with the Big Gold Belt had everything. He beat the Big Show as a babyface. The break in his reign was a raw deal with a Money in the Bank cash in, so he became a vengeful heel to regain it.

76th World Heavyweight Champion - World Heavyweight Champ John Cena (4) - 10/27/13 to 12/15/13

The original formatting of this blog post actually allowed me to conclude this list. But with the title and the downer nature of the intro, I think it is best to conclude this with my next post. This blog’s title may get more eyes on it, and the feedback to make the post more fun. Or more insightful if the focus will be on the intro. If I want to get the most out of my writing, gotta make it so it encourages more.

Hashtag IWA MeToo: Match 2 - Add a Pound Sign or Names of Jerks?

Do not look at your blogger stats when you are looking for motivation to write.

I am starting to think that writing maybe nothing more than practice. Too bad I need a better work situation to just take a day or two to devote writing my next work of fiction. If it is any comfort to my tens of readers, management positions at my day job are something that I am pursuing which is a first. As for freeing myself from the overnight drone work, that will have to wait for a relationship building trip to Vegas to pass, a long with my anti-anxiety and sleep aid.

May be I cannot do anything right. My third trip to Sin City is being planned, and yet again, I cannot enjoy all that the state of Nevada has to offer. Granted, I have out grown wanting to visit the adult entertainment facilities outside of Clark County, but they turn around and legalize cannabis. How do I always miss out, be it blogging or partying?

It is sad to say that it seems that you have to shock people to get a response to your posts. If memory serves me right, (and after checking out the stats from Harshside.com, it does) calling out pit bull owners in a title and referring directly to Peoria wrestling seemed to have resulted in my biggest numbers of views. On this website, people were not reading “Racism Can Play in Peoria. What About Your Local Wrestling?”, but they had a response…oh did they have a response. Either everyone’s social media feeds lean so far left or right that those people who defended the absolutely wrong ideology of Tracy Smothers are not aware of the last blog post (to my credit, I found out about Ian’s insensitivity), or they have just become too jaded to even think about somebody suggesting they are assholes.

Damn people basing philosophy from novelty tees (“Mom told me I could be what ever I wanted, so I became an asshole” for example). It may inspire me to take a motorboat engine to those GEICO matinees.

Or if I infer from Ian Rotten’s Facebook feed, the man who is excusing the awful, just does not produce enough interest for Twitter’s wrestling pundits to care about his reckless posting.

So after quite a few shows with unsatisfactory houses (meaning they did not pay the bills), we have to switch some things around in order to keep this Thursdays show at $15.

I am not saying he is being a bad promoter, he just does not have the resources to affect the business. That is something I can definitely relate to. Hence, when I thought about a shocking blog title to sell this, I came up with “Redefining Rotten.” That that may be redundant. His further digging of his trench with those who permit a sexually dangerous environment shows how he wants to be defined.

If I have to give more credit to Rotten, I have to acknowledge that he has a better clue of what his audience wants. But with fans like the ones who immediately responded to my first response, why would you want to keep them?

Tonya Heath: I don’t give a shit about who’s cheating on who. I wanna see someone get their ass kicked and bleed! If that makes me sick and twisted, fuck it.
Esequiel Mark Gonzales: That’s kind of why I don’t give a damn about what’s going on in WWE any more and prefer to support my local Indies. It’s pretty much the only environment I can just sit back and be a fan like it was meant to be

Some may say that these folks are just ignorant. If that is the case, they are impressionable, so they can be educated through your product to be transformed from not only being lost, but from being douche bags. I did offer an education to these two.

It’s kind of embarrassing to find out that certain Indie fans are feeling disenfranchised by WWE’s efforts to keep rapists and and domestic violence out of their company, which is still affiliated with Donald Trump. If an ally to the autocrat is more socially aware and concerned about safety than these fans, you know these marks are on the wrong side of history.

If a promoter plays to the marks on the wrong side of history, it is hard to call them a good person.

This is where I left off with my Facebook fury for that day. I should be more optimistic. It was already posted on THE social network, why would they need two “PgDn” of explanation to why the misogyny that dominates it is so messed up?

With that said, I wonder if there are collegiate journals dedicated to the online society’s bullshit? I may just have to get over the possibility of being a college student in my 40's. It does not seem to be a stretch from what I am doing with my life now.

Here’s hoping for a few good nights at the tables come May.

Drools MacDougal went to work on his breakfast, landing most of it in his mouth. helladamnsquirrels.tumblr.com

Hashtag IWA-MeToo: 1st Match

Sometimes I feel satire is dead. I suppose the Internet is to blame. It is great that everybody is reading, but if you do not have the ability to comprehend, what is the point? November 8, 2016 is evidence of that.

I think back to my intro to literature class at Illinois Central College in 2007 when we were assigned to read “A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift. My best friend and I were the only ones who spoke of thoroughly enjoying it. Everyone else in the room who had an opinion questioned how someone, an Irishman at that, would dare suggest the English eating the children of McImmigrants. That is Peoria for you, and sadly since it is the premier test market in the country, that is a reflection of the rest of the country, at least the cities and suburbs that lack major league sports franchises…and Indianapolis…Mike “Fucking” Pence.

I bring up the rest of the country because population density suggest that they do not truly have neighbors. They only have themselves to care for. So they lack any thought to being empathetic because everyone around them looks or acts just like them. If you cannot understand how other people feel, how are you going to comprehend a joke about how ridiculous one group of people were treating another? To them it is a tale of the evil British eating the white babies that we all identify as on March 17 instead of a statement about how people do not care for the marginalized.

It is these kind of people who are fine with a Tracy Smothers’s wrestling school, School of Smothers, using the Confederate battle flag as part of the logo. I have fought this battle before and was shat on for by the likes of Christian Rose for reminding Tracy he was a Full Blooded Italian. With the training center being in Lincoln, Illinois, a town named after the President who destroyed the identity of the Southern States, it is fair to mention him in a blog that is about excusing awful people or, at the very least, awful acts.

Without a college newspaper to write for, anything non-wrestling related that I have written, may have fallen on blind eyes. Hence, if you have not been keeping track of my blogs since November 2016, I have been trying to call for change to the misogynistic patriarchy, but with my long-winded nature, I was trying to be clever working through my observations while I was trying to come up with my satirical solutions. In the meantime, society listened to the right people and was allowed to catch up. Losing the race is the story of my life, thank the gods I just love to chase, fight and complete.

But, the United States of Whiskey City is my audience, and you cannot unfollow everyone who says hateful, uncaring or ignorant things, so you are going to find some stuff you must write about. Sadly, you have to state your opinion before you can give it a comedic spin.

The following is a Facebook post from John “Ian Rotten” Williams, best known for being the promoter of IWA Mid-South Wrestling, a promotion that never booked shows in Bill Watts’s Universal Wrestling Federation territory (Mid-South Wrestling). To say that he has not allowed for great things to occur in pro-wrestling would be a falsehood. The man had something in the early to mid 2000’s that allowed the best talent in the Midwest to make it to the damn near the top of the business. But if you watched how any of his shows were structured, saying that he was a man of great ideas would be an overstatement. To his credit, he will give anyone an opportunity, but that is also to his detriment as shown by the following statement.

So, I have a great idea. How about wrestling fans go back to being wrestling fans? Don’t worry about who is cheating on who’s wife, who’s got a criminal background, how about worrying about if the person entertains you and works hard? In my opinion, and my opinion alone, as good as social media is for the wrestling business it is double bad. It amazes me how nosy people are nowadays and how much they can’t stay out of other people’s business. People never assume that anyone is innocent, they’re always guilty. Buy a ticket, sit in a seat, enjoy the show. Lose yourself for a few hours. You will be better off.

What can I say accept the greatest two-pack in DVD history was “Bloodsport” and “Showdown in Little Tokyo?” No, I am not protecting a potential love interest or the principles of Bushido. It may actually be more along the lines of “see something, say something,” but if I do not try and get his followers or himself to think like a better person, what kind of person does that make me? You can say someone who is only doing this for ego, and I will counter with a need to be someone I can respect. The response(s) to the blog will determine the ego massage.

Wrestling fans going back to wrestling fans is a promoter asking them to be sheep. How many bad people have gotten to make a living because of their talent? How many good people are kept from getting opportunities because a promoter allows assholes to thrive?

A stance like this also displays a laziness if coming from a booker. Why book around an issue if you can find marks who will ignore the issue?

Social media may not make it fair for the accused, but with so many incidents that are based on the words of the victimized versus the words of one with power who can control the physical narrative, it has to be a place where people must take responsibility for their actions and let the chips fall where they may. 

You maybe forgiven, you may never work in this field again. All you can do is you build a catalog while you can. People will ask, “why is this guy gone,” when we can all look back with 20/20 vision and rewrite the narrative accordingly. 

If you are not placing yourself in positions where your integrity will be questioned in the first place, your social record should be clean any how would you not say?

There are things that are no ones business like infidelity and I’ll say substance issues. But we know there are things that cannot be ignored. Not asking questions about those topics (harassment and abuse towards others, hateful beliefs, willful ignorance) permits a worst environment for everyone.

It sucks being an underemployed website designer. Not because of the lack on additional income, just that I know when a webpage is too long (NBC, CNN, NYT take note). I have got more to say about this, and plenty of Facebook comments and replies to see. And I might have some insights on my own experiences in terms of the current movement. This maybe a series of blogs that I can tie back to my “Schrodinger’s Cat” series or my own personal Supercard of Dishonor. If the episodes get the attention of the local bookers, maybe it will be a guideline to how to run shows.

Now, I’m hopeful to get that booking to call it a 16-year career. A nihilist with hope, this blog has done something at least.

Heidi Lovelace vs. Matt Cage 3--and a Podcast Pitch

I definitely need some feedback on this idea. Send it to russthebus07@gmail.com, @MainEventZombie, or just post a comment (I'm sure you have some kind of Google account). The idea is starting a wrestling podcast with an even nerdier take on pro-wrestling than the not quite "smart" enough (@RosenbergRadio is holding back @AKATheMaskedMan) "Cheap Heat" podcast. My goal would be to try to eventually get picked up by Nerdist (if you don't want me to bug you Hardwick, give me another chance at "Tag Team Thursday" [for alliteration, may be it should be "Tag Team Tuesday"] or stop seeming so accessible on the podcast), or maybe get in on the Grantland turf.

My nerdy gimmick to podcast is to perform a table read of a non-wrestling scene from my screenplay, going for the Cut Scene feel from the NES "Ninja Gaiden" series, after the first promotional break. I guess I'd be trying to top Colt Cabana's "Song of the Week" and trying to encourage more of his "65-year old Jewish Mother Recites a Classic Wrestling Promo" segments.

If Quentin Tarantino is still making "The Hateful Eight" after having a public table read of the script, my concept of broadcasting my story along side a more insightful view on wrestling might be the method to get "Main Event of the Dead" to a big screen. After saying that, I might need to throw in some N-Words to hedge my bet. 

Talking about wrestling, I was able to work up the nerve to conquer my anxiety to maintain my commitment to checking out "All Hail," All American Wrestling's poorly named show last night in Berwyn, Illinois (Western Chicago Suburbs). It was a pretty solid card with only subtle things to complain about. So if you're not subscribing to the WWE Network to catch up on your NWA/WCW matches and get WWE Shop promo codes during the "Raw PreShow," save the rest of your money and check out AAW instead of going to a bar with overpriced drinks to view a Pay-Per-View centering around a desperate women's feud between a wannabe fitness model and a wannabe wrestler.

I know that Brie and Nikki have been improving as performers (maybe wrestling talent is a sexually transmitted disease), but I won't call the Bella Twin wrestlers after their alleged treatment of Maria Kanellis and looking like vacant socialites during AJ Lee's Pipebomb Shell. If they're serious about wrestling, they'd let the promo put over the need for improvement in their division instead of whining and doing a "We can't hear you dance."

Sometimes, probably most times, I hate points when there are logical segues. They seem to be there to prevent me from going on rants about the spinebuster replacing the DDT as a transition move or how indie guys really despise Jim Ross's opinions.

Perhaps Dragon Gate and Ring of Honor fans have no endurance, so after the first pop, their wad has been blown and they fail to realize that the bigger pop is suppose to be after the finish. In defense of the match between Shane Hollister, Ethan Page, and Johnny Gargano, where the commentators went on their anti- "Ross Report" tangent, I don't know how in a cruiser-weight/X-Division style match you can actually slow it down.

Perhaps this is why I need my own podcast. Conversations aren't linear, so you can get side tracked and not risk distracting the audience from the point. The need for babyface short cuts must be addressed at some point, but it wasn't in the AAW main event.

The segue that I decided to waste was about how Heidi Lovelace and Matt Cage demonstrated how, in Lovelace's words, "You don't need balls to be a champion." My only issue with this inter-gender match (a side from Ray Rice's suspension still being a hot topic [wrong night to where Baltimore Ravens colors]) was that I believe it was supposed to be the blow off the feud. My belief is based on this being the third match between the two in their feud. The way the trilogy ended may suggest that you need testicles for a successful conclusion.

The two had a great match, and Lovelace demonstrated that if we are to believe in Rey Mysterio as a three-time world heavyweight champion, we should believe that Sara del Rey, Cheerleader Melissa, MsChif and Paige (a generation from a Shimmer Championship) can become the World Wrestling Entertainment World Heavyweight Champion. My issue is that I wasn't satisfied with Lovelace winning with a roll up (it didn't seem impactful enough to be a crucifix bomb).

Paige should be the face of the WWE. Imagine the ratings that the female demographics would bring to a promotions that marks are claiming is in dire financial straits. If only I had a good "Money for Nothing" play on words to place here. The best thing about this concept is they ladies will have someone else to cheer for instead of John Cena.

Unless the two combatants are being booked for a fourth match, her championship victory is just a fluke. What reason are we to believe she can repeat this feat again? This could have just been the law of averages proving evident.

This match needed to end with Heidi Lovelace proving she was unquestionably the better combatant. It is like the end of "Star Wars: Return of the Jedi" when Luke Skywalker freaks out and beats the hell out of Darth Vader. Luke was defeated once, is emotionally wrecked, but overcomes to be the last Jedi standing. This was repeated in the end of the prequel trilogy with Anakin vs Dooku, but who cared about little orphan Anni.

In Jean-Claude Van Damme films, the final fight (in my favorite films) are three act plays. He shows off his skills, the antagonist shows that he is craftier to virtually defeat our hero, Van Damme miraculously comes back and leaves no doubt that the villain cannot win.

My best feminine equivalent, that comes to immediate mind, is a low-budget film called "Fight Night (originally titled Rigged)" about a conniving manager and female fighter climbing the ranks of the underground prizefighting circuits. I don't want to spoil it, but it follows the formula I wanted to see used. If you want mainstream/nerdy, see the "Underworld" sequels.

In the match from August 15, Lovelace is beaten to a cinematic level of physical despair. She is always able to show that she is not finished, but it was constant heat. It may be considered realistic that her every comeback is thwarted by separation of the two opponents after her comeback. Cage's beating was so severe that she could never recover quicker than him, regardless of who scored the last move.

To conclude, this match was very realistic. Especially when indie fans start lending War Machine chants to Cage. I praise Cage for maintaining a heel role with the sickest chant I've heard at a show. For someone who never saw this pair face of, the finish to this match must be assumed as real as it could be.

But again, this was the end of a trilogy. A trilogy where a crowd is so into the action that they compare the heel to one of the most despicable men in the public light at this moment. I hated Cage in this match for what he was doing, and I wanted to see him broken. Not whining about the inconceivable, but broken, leaving the ring with a referee under his shoulder to support him.

Perhaps I should be further praising Matt Cage for his performance. Since pro-wrestling is dependent on having a good dance partner, Money could have made the protagonist look like a million bucks, but it was evident that Heidi Lovelace provided the best performance as a baby face who needed to tell a story that night.

It may just be the writer in me who just can't get over the story structure, but again I wasn't there for Cage/Lovelace 1 or 2. I just know this could have been the most dramatic trilogy I could have witnessed a part of if creative would have just followed the movies. Then again, if you watch WWE, that may just be considered the wrong approach since Vince has failed trying that at least 90% of the time.

#MeToo and the Disgruntled’s Real World Champ Part 4

Damn, it has been a tough week. Joe Madden may have over thought the Cubs last two games. "Venom" is a so bad it is good movie which leads me to fear the fate of the Sony franchises. I seem to be getting ahead of my blogs by one week, hence I may be working too much.

And then you have the all but certain demise of the country with the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation. How do you tell a happily married man who takes you to sporting event and respects his Nike-boycotting wife that there is no way I want to stand for a flag that represents a dead country. But I respect the man, so I should not embarrass him despite his wife has said that we cannot fault powerful men for abusing their power, unless they were communist revolutionaries.

I never got away with anything growing up. Being too honest has plagued me. Striving for decency deters me from a negative path. The point is, if I screwed up, I paid, and have always paid. If we have learned anything from the Me Too Movement, is that everybody should answer for their indiscretions. It is not vengeance, it is a means to encourage protecting those whose safety is the target of those in power.

Thus, I am pondering if I should make this rant relevant to the current theme of the blog by exploring the incidents of sexual assault and harassment that I have experienced from my time in professional wrestling. You could call it hazing bullshit, but the fact of the matter is if I broke these guys faces, I risked never being booked again by that promotion. What really hurts is that the promotion never used me again. To their credit, I was booked and wisely ended up being a healthy scratch on my last trip to Southern Wisconsin for a last minute appearance by Silas Young, so at least the promotion remembered me.

It was 14 years ago. I was victimized. You cannot hold it against me if I was bumped from the card for someone less prestigious that The Last Real Man in Professional Wrestling (do not hold the gimmick against him). The culprits and facilitators are remembered, especially those who boasted about it. The stories were something I laughed off with the guys in the business like it was just a permanent marker stunt on my face, but when normal people ask for crazy and obscene stories from the business, you realize that the ones that come to immediate mind demonstrate behavior that is not acceptable. You realize that you were abused and you feel you can only blame yourself since you still want to be a part of the business. You cannot blame the sport.

But, these guys (for the most part) are friends and a couple of them have kids. There is a slim chance their life could be ruined since I am already wrestling's persona non grata south of I-80. Why be afraid of going national? Should I wait till I hear about their next job opportunity? I have not killed their present, but why do I feel like I have paid for their constant happiness I have perceived?

I suppose I should just be happy not having post traumatic stress in regards to this issue, or am I just now showing that I suffer from these stunts? Time does not heel all wounds. If this would have been realized when I was in therapy in regards to abusive relationships and and failing to prevent a gas station suicide, perhaps the Supreme Court fulfilling the wills of sex offenders for the next 20 years would not leave me considering snuffing myself (I really needed a better therapist, so probably not).

Hopefully, Ronan Farrow gets wind of this blog and helps me decide if I will name names. Provided that we get over the mess of me being a Woody Allen apologist of course. Time wears away, it does not heal. So I guess the moral is not to wound in the first place.

With that said, I would like to apologize to "Lauren" at Big Al's in Peoria (2015) if I was too handsy to begin with. It was me testing boundaries, and regardless if I stopped when told, I did wrong to begin with.

I gotta at least answer for my indiscretions, before I get this blog back on track. If only I could hold off on the posting till WWE's Evolution for the sake of cultural relevance. But, releasing this a week later may be too much time from when I wrote this.

Anyhow this blog has all the stuff marks want in bold, so the intro and transition do not matter to anyone besides me I suppose. More reason to try and be brave about abuse and the regret that people may have givien a shit about me if my struggles were more relatable than just being in my head.

See the conclusion to this blog series at Rip 'Em System Tumblr.