I’m fascinated by the similarities I see between the political spectrum and pro wrestling. At face value I’m sure you’re wondering “what the fuck are you talking about Matty?!” Shit, you probably ask yourself that any time you read my pieces. But when you break down the two arenas, you’ll find many a comparison.
The Republican debates in 2015 were where I first noticed this. The Donald went full heel and it surprisingly resonated with audiences across America. Enough so that despite not winning the popular vote, he still won the electoral college to take office. You know, kind of like how a heel will steal a championship win in wrestling by bumping the ref and hitting his babyface counterpart with a steel chair to score the pinfall?
Sidebar: in the wrestling world the “good guys” are known as babyfaces (or just faces) and the “bad guys” are referred to as heels. Try to keep up.
At least in terms of political speeches and pro wrestling promos, it all boils down to rhetoric and timing. The ability to connect with an audience, or even piss them off through language, in a limited amount of time. This past week’s democratic debates involved so many (way too many) candidates that they had to split the pool in half for two separate nights of what I saw to be a clown show train wreck of sorts. Much like WWE’s “Money in the Bank” ladder matches.
With ten people debating each night it reminded of said ladder matches in regards to timing. If you’ve got eight men or women in a ladder match and you’ve allotted say 35 minutes for the match, then each guy or gal has between three and four minutes to get their shit in. Obviously you’ll have some time for everyone to be in the ring at once, but the rest is allotted for each wrestler to hit their high spots and moves on everyone else in the match before failing to climb the ladder and retrieve the briefcase atop. Until of course the winner is successful at the end.
With these particular debates I notice a lot of speakers rush their thoughts and talking points and most hit us with prepackaged political bullshit that just doesn’t fly with educated Americans anymore. But never underestimate the stupidity of the American people, or humans in general. There’s so much acting involved in both which is why the realness and raw emotions of some political speeches and wrestling promos captivate the people watching and/or listening.
Likewise with politicians who in this era appear to rebel against the establishment. You can’t tell me that Donald Trump didn’t earn himself a few (million) extra votes because he deviated from the norms of politics in a time when a ton of Americans are frustrated with the state of politics and what was deemed before 2016 as politically acceptable. You also can’t tell me that The Donald didn’t learn some of the rhetoric he uses today whilst embedded in storylines with the WWE in 2007.
Sidebar: The Donald is currently the first, last, and only American president who can say he’s been hit with a Stone Cold Stunner!
You know why The Rock and Steve Austin were so popular with fans? Because The Rock rarely ever flubbed a line and his promos felt unscripted because he had such phenomenal charisma and the athleticism to back his words up. Stone Cold on the other hand rebelled against his boss and was an American hero in the sense that Austin was the guy who stuck it to the man like we all want to do at some point or another.
Sidebar: I’m about to go on a political rant from here on out that has nothing to do with pro wrestling. Sorry, not sorry. Also, in terms of rhetoric there are three traditional appeals: ethos, logos, and pathos. Ethos is an appeal to ethics, logos is an appeal to logic, and pathos is an appeal to emotion. Speakers tend to ride with these to resonate in one way or another with an audience, that’s why folks always say “know your audience.” I’m probably not going to speak on Wall Street and use the pathos appeal, just like I’m probably not going to give an inspirational speech to a high school football team at halftime using an appeal to ethics. In wrestling it’s generally pathos that’s used most often in promos, wheras politics come from any which direction depending on talking points and audiences.
When I watched the Dem debates this past week it seemed to me that most of the potential candidates were incredibly scripted. And I found Pete Buttigieg most intriguing because he seemed to be the only one who was genuinely genuine and appeared to me to be the smartest potential candidate on the stages. He manned up and took blame for his own shortcomings as the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and I personally enjoyed his sentiments on making college more affordable and for also making it more affordable to not go to college in terms of what we’ve built up as a society to be a necessity in American life, a degree. Ah logos, an appeal to logic!
Sure, Kamala Harris spoke genuinely in using pathos appeals, which are appeals to emotion, with her stories of being a little girl on the bus. But it was her acting that ruined the appeal to me by making her own personal emotions feel disingenuous. Too much for the cameras around her. Oh, and maybe I’m biased here, but I can’t get over the fact that she claimed to have gotten baked and listened to Tupac in college despite the fact that Tupac wasn’t even on the radar until several years after she graduated.
Joe Biden was out there attacking Trump within his first set of talking points. C’mon dude, at least get past this “round of 20” before you start campaigning against the incumbent who sadly seems (to me) to be poised for another term if the Democrats don’t get their shit together, and fast!
I hear people in and around New York City denounce my statement that I think he’ll be re-elected in 2020. And believe it or not most actually rebuttal me with “I don’t see that happening.” Well I’m pretty sure y’all said the same god damn thing in 2016 when he ran against the female Frank Underwood, I mean Hillary Clinton, and look what happened there. And in 2019 as we prepare for Election Day 2020, Democrats can’t tell me they’re as sure today as they were a week ago, that they don’t see The Donald retaining his title. Not with what some of us subjected ourselves to on Wednesday and Thursday nights.
And a Sidebar Question: did Marianne Williamson win a radio contest to get up on stage and speak in the vernacular like she was Blanche Dubois?
2008 was the first election I was able to vote in and I voted for Obama. In 2012 I voted against Mitt Romney. In 2016 I couldn’t bring myself to vote for either in the race between the guy from the apprentice or (like I call her) the female Frank Underwood. It was also the election that turned me into an Independent, and made me a prime example of why the Electoral College is a flawed system. You see one of the reasons I voted in ’08 and 2012 was because I was going to college in Virginia and was registered to vote there. I felt my vote actually mattered because Virginia was I believe at the time considered a swing state. I moved back to New Jersey in 2015 and had I voted I more likely than not would’ve voted for Hilldog. To me she was the lesser of two evils and like that bowtie wearing douche bag, Tucker Carlson, recently said (I may be paraphrasing) “to be a world leader you have to kill people.” But I was banking on the fact that I had a strong feeling both Virginia and New Jersey would go blue, and they did. So evidently me not voting at all had the same outcome as me going to the polls on that November day.
Perhaps if we all stayed at home on that November day in 2020, the country would realize we need to change the system in place for electing the leaders of the free world. But what do I know…
Final Sidebar: don’t hate or love the man below but this is what I mean by politicians speaking with raw emotions that feel real.
As per usual, for those who give a shit, here are the next 15 songs on my Bipolar Time Machine playlist on Spotify:
- “Ninno Nanna Per Adulteri” – Ennio Morricone
- “Far Behind” – Candlebox
- “Wanted Dread or Alive” – Peter Tosh
- “It’s a Hard Rain A-Gonna Fall” – Leon Russell
- “Welcome to the Machine” – Pink Floyd
- “Good Times” – CHIC
- “Life Goes On” – Tupac
- “Mad World” – Tears for Fears
- “Rap Phenomenon” – Biggie featuring Redman and Method Man
- “Focus” – Joe Budden
- “breathin” – Ariana Grande
- “Mafia Music” – Rick Ross
- “A Little Less Conversation” – Elvis Presley
- “The Payback” – James Brown
- “Look I’m Down From a Bridge” – Mazzy Star
MattyMouthsOff 