AS I SEE IT
Bob Magee
Pro Wrestling Between the Sheets
PWBTS.com
Congratulations to my Super Bowl Champion Philadelphia
Eagles! Looks like we can start getting used to winning in
Philadelphia...a strange feeling indeed.
To this week...
We now live in a post-truth world. That might seem an ironic
turn of phrase in a blog about professional wrestling... a
business and an art form based on a fiction. A related
problem is that the real world has come far too close to the
world of wrestling...but that's a story for another day.
The other problem is that we also live in a world of
tribalism. The tribalism of politics has sadly carried over
by a factor of ten into the fandom of professional
wrestling...a fandom that should be an escape from the real
world. That tribalism takes place in social media with a
viciousness rivaling the real world, including the threats
and bullying of fans of AEW.
Tribalism isn't entirely a new phenomenon. I wrote about it
in this blog decades ago about it, and how it was manifested
in independent wrestling in certain cities and regions
(wrestling wars, especially in Philadelphia and South
Jersey). Promotions ran head-to-head against other
promotions, tried to sabotage shows, tore down posters of
other companies, told talent they couldn't work for other
companies, contacted local/state athletic commissions,
police, and anyone else they could use to screw with
competitors. Fans of one promotion went at it with fans of
another.
Then came the Monday Night Wars between WCW and WWF. At the
same time, there came a new phenomenon called the Internet,
and IRC online chat groups, which allowed WCW fans in
particular to get together on their computers and talk
endlessly about how they hated the WWF of the day and talked
about WCW (along with picking apart WCW's product too). Wars
between promotions became wars between fanbases.
Then the Internet developed into an every day, every moment
part of life, followed years later by smartphones taking
tribalism further. Then came the dawn of social media, which
multiplied the ways to screw with companies and their fans
by a factor of 100,000.
Obviously here, I'm referring to the tribalism between AEW
and WWE fans. It started with the Wednesday Night Wars of
2019-2021 as WWE put their NXT show on USA Network on
Wednesday nights directly to compete with AEW's Wednesday's
Dynamite on TNT.
At the same time as WWE went to war with AEW (while denying
they were competition), WWE fans went to war on Twitter.
Anyone, including wrestling websites and podcasts, that was
the least bit positive towards AEW, get told "they're on
Tony Khan's payroll" (still waiting for my first check, just
like I'm waiting for my first paycheck "from the Russians" I
was supposed to get during my peace activist days).
That tribalism between AEW and WWE has yet again
metastasized in this post-truth world, where disinformation
and misinformation is routine and every day.
Too many wrestling fans are emulating a political/religious
extremist mindset; in the sense that any wrestling promotion
not fitting their narrow vision of what they like (in this
case WWE)...they hate with an unhealthy and obsessive
fervor. They engage in behavior online that if done on the
street would get them punched in the mouth...or far worse.
This mindset is fed into by the organized disinformation
campaign of podcasters and websites supported by WWE, and
the fact that engagement of any kind (directed hate and doom
posting, angry responses to said doom and hate posting,
etc.) is rewarded financially.
Most reading this know who the guilty parties are, with at
least one podcast mentioned openly on WWE television. Other
columns exist on major real world business sites with
blatantly false information in return for small favors
(while being laughed at by the WWE office behind their
back). Lots of others offer commentary based simply on what
will bring engagement.
All Elite Wrestling's perception by fans is affected
negatively by these attacks. Its reputation is hurt by these
attacks. AEW fans frequently defend the company against the
attacks, but responses by AEW itself are far too limited
(plus the fan traffic defending the company financially
benefits those attacking).
Tony Khan is aware of this. Back in December 2023, after a
post-show media event, he hit out in particular at “bad
faith posting” on Twitter: “There’s a reason that every
single person who stepped into my position until now has
gone out of business....For AEW, and I think Ring of Honor
because it falls under my ownership, to be AEW is to be
under constant attack. You do a great show and the next day
somebody’s saying something negative. You do five great
shows in a row. Somebody says something negative. You break
the ticket record for the most tickets ever sold for any
wrestling show in the history of the world, and somebody has
something bad to say about it. I just, at this point, I
don’t worry about it. We just need to go out and do great
shows week after week, like we did."....
So Tony Khan and AEW are more than aware of it. Even prior
to those comments, Khan talked about online bot and troll
campaigns that AEW has discovered and was ridiculed for the
statement. But anyone who spends more than a few minutes on
social media can see that very fact demonstrated for
themselves.
The latest was a campaign generated on Reddit regarding
Grand Slam Australia, claiming (with little proof) that
"many" fans in Australia were upset at this coming
Saturday's show and "felt cheated" claiming to have been
"promised a PPV and gotten an episode of Collision". The
fact was the show had NEVER been advertised, marketed, or
even implied to be a PPV. The closest to that was that it
was rumored to be a "MAX special", which it's more or less
become. But all the prior titled Grand Slam events were
Dynamites, Collisions or a combination of both. They were
never PPV events.
So, this campaign spread to Twitter and other social media,
even to the point of Dave Meltzer claiming this represented
some large group of dissatisfaction. This is just one
example of the efforts against the company Khan was
referring to.
AEW needs to respond to these organized efforts and engage
in an aggressive campaign of rebuilding the brand's public
profile.
Here's ideas on how AEW and its broadcast partner, Warner
Brothers Discovery, can do that:
1) AEW has to devote significant resources to producing
positive (and truthful) PR on a daily basis....and I mean
DAILY; such as promotion of major events, ticket on-sale
dates, gates for AEW PPVs, PPV buy rates, announcements of
appearances by AEW talent on local and national media,
business deals that benefit the company and so on.
You can only change the narrative of a conversation when you
enter the conversation. Communication to the fanbase and to
potential fans has to become a #1 priority, and as a barrier
to disinformation.
2) Thus far, Warner Brothers Discovery hasn't made MAX
numbers available (but have them internally and are reported
to be happy with what they're getting), But in a vacuum, the
public has no way to judge if this is true or is simply PR.
So AEW needs to push Warner Brothers Discovery to report MAX
numbers so the public sees a more representative number of
its viewership twice weekly.
3) Warner Brothers Discovery needs to promote AEW in
corporate PR they sent out on an ongoing basis, particularly
social media.
4) Warner Brothers Discovery needs to increase advertising
on TNT, TBS, and TruTV sports and other demographically
desirable programming. Once per game/event should be a
baseline, with advertising increasing as a PPV or major
event approaches.
Ask yourself this: why the hell would a wrestling fan want
another promotion to go out of business? Why would someone
attack TV shows of a promotion that employs wrestlers, some
of who were once their favorites in WWE?
I miss the days where wrestling fans were fans of
WRESTLING...where they grabbed each and every chance to view
a new and different wrestling show when it showed up on an
off hour on a local TV station on a weekend or late night,
or toured in their local areas.
I miss those days long ago when going to a wrestling show
could take you far away ..and even now when you hear a
certain wrestling entrance song, it could touch a certain
spot in your heart because of the memories it brought back;
and when we went to a show together...it was to have FUN,
rather than have it be just another forum for conflict.
If you'd like to contact me, you can do so at my
bobmagee1@hotmail.com account or to through Facebook
Messenger at https://www.facebook.com/bob.magee.180, direct
message me at https://twitter.com/BobMage70323520, or
contact me at BlueSky at
https://bsky.app/profile/bobmagee940.bsky.social
Until next time...
