Cageside Seats article:TKO makes Vince McMahon’s resignation official
(From my blog)
As I have repeatedly mentioned, I became a fan of professional wrestling in the early nineties. It was a slow process but by the depths of the Monday Night Wars, I rarely failed to watch Monday Night Raw and then Thursday Night Smackdown. I fell off from my WWE fandom at some point but returned eventually. I was one of the first subscribers of the WWE Network. The idea of a pro-wrestling streaming service of that magnitude was amazing. By that point I had already been a fan of TNA Wrestling and the WWE Network introduced me to WCW. I also started watching ROH Television. I was starting to see the alternatives when I was not pleased with the WWE product. That has turned out to be a real asset.
I was watching the WWF product when Vincent Kennedy McMahon grew to become a household name. He had been part of the product for quite some time before ascending to become a great power in pro-wrestling. His father Vince Sr. was a promoter back in the territory days when companies controlled actual geographical territories instead of national airwaves. Vince Jr. bought his dad out and took over and, like Genghis Khan, started to conquer the other territories to be reorganized under his banner. The WWF was literally built on crushing competitors. Competitors are a good thing in wrestling. They make a company try harder to put out a better product. In Ted Turner’s WCW, he finally discovered an opponent who could push back. At least, they could for a little while.
Through the so-called Attitude Era, Vince McMahon developed his evil boss persona. Whenever a babyface was doing well, the boss would arrive to crap all over their day. It was a great story element because we have all had bosses we hated. However, as the character became more prominent, he was able to use it to live out his fetishes. He was part of a lot of scenes that I would have been embarrassed to have family or friends walk into the room during. He got to demean women on screen by writing them into embarrassing moments. He also used his status to make out with female wrestlers constantly. He made grown men and women literally kiss his ass on camera. He even allegedly pitched an incest storyline with his own real-life daughter Stephanie. These are just the sexual moments. There were plenty of racist and classist ones too.
Stories started to come out as soon as the Internet was really up and running detailing how bad a boss Vince was. He treated people well if they were making him money but gleefully punished those who crossed him. Even Jim Ross, legendary commentator and backstage staff, was continuously embarrassed on live television year after year. He would make wrestlers take on embarrassing character gimmicks to make himself laugh or to punish them. Famously, he put Dusty Rhodes in polka dots because Dusty used to work for WCW. Vince McMahon was not a nice person. On top of this, even weirder stuff came out about him freaking out when somebody sneezed or when certain words were said.
Vince made really bad deals. Of course, these were good deals for Vince and his shareholders but they were not good for the wrestlers or ethical. There was a lot of noise about enacting a rule where wrestlers working with the WWE could not profit from third-party sources. Many wrestlers were streaming video games on Twitch and YouTube as a side hustle and that was suddenly shut down. Some female wrestlers were getting popular on OnlyFans. The problem with this is that wrestlers who work for the WWE are independent contractors. They are not employees and they should be allowed to supplement their income with such projects. These projects also set up wrestlers for a better transition into post-wrestling careers.
This deal paled in comparison to the deal that Vince made with Saudia Arabia. He entered into a very lucrative deal to put on shows in Saudia Arabia. More than that, the WWE would become part of the propaganda project to whitewash the human rights crimes of that nation. The WWE started to go on and on about how great the Saudi Arabian regime was and how much they were improving. That improvement has yet to be seen in any major way. WWE was the first step and have since been joined by professional golf and boxing. Of course, he made this deal around the time that journalist Jamal Khashoggi was murdered by the Saudi Arabian government. Even Vince’s Republican allies were telling him it was a bad idea to go. The State Department was practically begging the WWE to not go. They not only kept to the deal, they doubled and tripled down on it.
Fast forward a few years and stuff starts to come out about Vince’s sexual assaults. Nobody is surprised. However, I was shocked and sickened that the company decided not to deal with it. The allegations came out and Vince disappeared for a bit but then he came right back. There were no repercussions. This is the point where I fully gave up on watching the WWE. When UFC’s parent company Endeavor bought the WWE, there were hopes that they would eliminate McMahon. They decided to keep him on. I was once again disgusted but not surprised. Finally, allegations of sex trafficking have been filed against Vince McMahon. Endeavor says “Vince Who? We don’t know any Vince.” Vince is forced to resign and may be out for good now.
After decades of misusing his power in one way or another, Vince McMahon may finally see some consequences for his actions. He is a scumbag and I really hope that he is fully investigated and that he receives what punishments he has earned. I have little hope that he will be punished. I would not be surprised if he was back working for WWE sooner than later. Uber-rich white people do not have the same moral responsibilities as the rest of us. They have no code of ethics because they have no concept of either compassion or consequences. Neither the carrot nor the stick will not work on them. They are eternally broken. So if Vince McMahon is gone, good riddance.