Partisan politics: Pro wrestling for grown ups

As a young man, I used to enjoy watching professional wrestling on TV. I loved the flamboyant characters and the epic battles. I loved how the "good" guys worked against the "bad" guys in the fight of good against evil. The good guys didn't always win but, it always make for some great drama. I grew up in the era of the likes of Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, The Ultimate Warrior and who can forget the recently departed Macho Man, Randy Savage!



As I got older, I grew out of professional wrestling. It got harder to believe that real people could survive those epic battles, week after week and even the greatest with the greatest effort at suspension of disbelief, I couldn't get past the fact that the whole thing was obviously scripted.

As I grew older, especially after I began having kids, I also became aware of how much effect the people in Washington had on my daily life; from the big chunk of money they took out of my paycheck in taxes to the "free trade" policies that drove all the good, middle class jobs out of the country. I began to follow politics and became interested in the conspiracy theories surrounding government, particularly the ones suggesting that communists were influencing things to make the US more like Soviet Russia. I became a die-hard Republican, believing them to be the only party capable of standing up to the communist menace.

Then, one day, something happened that changed my whole worldview; George W Bush got elected. Suddenly, overnight, the radio talk show hosts I followed began to defend the very policies that they had spoke out so hard against when a Democrat was in office. Things didn't get better, in fact they got a whole lot worse. Government agencies continued to grow at an even greater pace than before and the fiscal responsibility they preached about during the Clinton years was thrown out when they had their guy in office.

That's when I realized that I had been duped by the whole partisan political process.

One party wasn't really that much different than the other and it turns out that all that rhetoric about how evil and different their political opponents were was just a bit of showmanship to blind us to the fact that, after all was said and done, they were all pursuing the exact same policy.

How Pro Wrestling Works

It's true that the plots are predetermined and the moves are choreographed. Wrestlers aren't really trying to beat up and injure each other. Sometimes, the bitterest enemies in the ring are really best friends, and the outlandish stories surrounding the characters are usually not true. However, simply calling wrestling "fake" is like calling an action movie fake. When you see a movie, you know that the actor didn't really jump a burning car over an exploding bridge, but you're still entertained.

The whole partisan political game is just a more adult form of professional wrestling meant to keep us entertained while they slowly steal away our freedom.

If you look at the past few presidential elections, you can see how the results are per-determined; one side will run a strong charismatic candidate while the other side will run a wet fish, meant to de-energise the party base. McCain was a RINO who was despised by rank and file Republicans. Kerry was a joke with no agenda; the very embodiment of the slogan "ANYONE but Bush"; they took just anyone during a time when the country was ready to turn against him and Bush won. The Bush vs the uncharismatic Gore election almost upset their plans forcing the courts to intervene and the choice of unexciting-to-the-max Bob Dole against Clinton should show to anyone that the whole system is scripted, with the winners chosen in advance.

In order to distract us from the obvious scripting of the elections, they have increased the drama. They have moved the rhetoric of the parties so far apart, you would think that the two sides are ready to come to blows. Its always a battle to decide the course of the country between two very different extremes. No more compromise, not anymore in this political atmosphere; its always a fight to the death, winner take all!

Even when running against their own, they have to reach to new heights of histrionics and moon-bat crazy ideas in order to stand out in a field of ever more polarizing candidates. Make no mistake, its all about the showmanship of the professional wrestling ring.

And, while we're distracted by the big show going on in Washington, we pass up the opportunity to use our vote to make change right where it really counts; at home, in our local and state elections where the people we put into office will have the most effect on our lives. These are the elections least affected by the corrupting pro-wrestling attitude of BIG POLITICS and corporate money but they are the ones we pay attention to the least.

Take time, research your local candidates and push them to stand up against the Washington behemoth. If we can learn to not be distracted by the games in Washington, we can make real change in this country, change that might just break us away from the hold of the big corporations that run our lives.

If you think that voting the right corporate sponsored douche-bag into federal office will make a difference, you're just fooling yourself and ensuring the eventual victory of the powers that wish to enslave us all.

Makes me wanna go off the top rope...BOOM! Now I'm out in the audience and I have a chair: WHOMP! Take that you Republicans! WHOMP take that you Democrats!!...

Oops, er, excuse me: Did I do that?

I hear ya OP, I hear ya...

I am with you too my friend, neither side has the answers, but they both wish they could convince us they could. Unfortunately, the right has the advantage, they own the ring announcers.

Looks like I'm not the first one to make this observation. Here's the view of someone who writes about pro wrestling for his day job and acts as a political consultant in his free time:

Politics & pro wrestling: Two tastes that taste great together

When most of the people ask me what I do for a day job, they laugh. Wrestling is fake you know, as if someone with a Master's Degree like myself needed the tip. 'Believe me' I tell them; 'the jump from politics to pro wrestling isn't really that big of a jump.'

For one, campaign politics and wrestling, at their core, are essentially the same thing. Marketing a person by the values for which they stand for to get a desired reaction. In politics, we want people to vote for a candidate or an issue. Heck, sometimes we even want them to vote against something. In wrestling, you want that person to get booed or cheered.

Politicians even have their own catch phrases! John Kerry was “The Real Deal” and George HW Bush wanted us to 'Read his lips”. I'm sure if you asked him, The Rock would 'smell what they're cooking.”

Wrestlers often like to come out to music that encapsulates what they're all about. So do politicians. What do John Kerry and “Dr. Death” Steve Williams have in common? The same theme music (Born in the USA by Bruce Springsteen).

Feuds in politics are just as outrageous and petty as they are in wrestling. Wrestlers get up and give speeches about why they're right, and the other guy is wrong, even if they have to lie and engage in the not so sound practice of slander in order to make their point. I'm sure no politician would ever do something like that. Right?

Perhaps what ties them together more than anything, is that in both professional wrestling and politics, nothing is ever as it seems. There's the real and the surreal. The world that is presented on the surface, and the one that exists and makes the machine churn behind the scenes.

Examiner

Couldn't help but notice that he left out the fact that both pro wrestling and politics are scripted, with the outcomes pre-determined by scriptwriters who we never see working behind the scenes.

Guess he might lose his job as a consultant if he were to let that little tidbit of truth slip out...

OK, so maybe I'm not such an original thinker after all.


Here's Jesse Ventura acknowledging that politics, like wrestling, is fake. After making believe they hate each other all day in front of the cameras, they are best buddies behind closed doors cutting deals.

Skip to the 2:30 mark for the good stuff:



Here's the Southern Avenger who points out that it may be the wrestling fans who are more intelligent than the folks who follow politics; at least the wrestling fans know its all fake and just a form of entertainment. The political junkies still fool themselves into thinking that its all real.

What a bunch of rubes.

Lol I was just about to point out that Ventura said that
It is a great analogy though, and people eat up the act like they do their reality TV it seems

You mean...it's not real??







But...?

Really?

At the end of the day, they all go home richer then the people they are working for.

Well the major difference between CONgress and professional wresting:

Is that the Professional Wrestlers are entertaining, and do bleed if they screw up.


Unlike CONgress.

M.

This thread is brilliant!

I grew up watching (and loving) pro wrestling. Over the years, I went back and forth (internally) on whether or not it was "fake" (scripted) but I finally gave it and just accepted it as reality. Until I grew up. I just stopped watching it at some point and eventually accepted that I'd been duped all those years.

And then, years later I started trying to think of a way to explain how politics are scripted to people who are reluctant to consider it and it dawned on me that it's exactly like pro wrestling! The scripting is an open secret now but it used to be carefully hidden so any older person you're talking to is going to remember when people thought it was real and they worked to maintain the illusion. The main difference is that they manage to maintain the illusion with politics.

I have been printing stuff out that explains how wrestling really works and giving it to people who might be awakened by it.

What's really twisted is I don't think they really care if a few people here and there figure it out. They won't waste their time arguing with people who don't matter. As long as the illusion is maintained for the majority. If you try to wake people up, they can always fall back on their old standby and marginalize you with three simple words "Tin foil hat".