Welcome all and one to the Writer’s Room, which is pretty much just a personal touch to Diva Dirt, where us writers can talk about anything and everything! I’ll be writing today’s edition but hopefully in future, Erin and Ryan will check in with ya’ll as well!
Anyway, I wanted to talk today about the Michael Hayes situation. Not a far stretch from the subject of this site, but more of a general wrestling topic. I wrote in my Ashley post today about WWE being a publicly funded company and as such, the corporation and employees should be expected to behave in a certain manner. Right after that post, I read the following:
As various other websites have reported Vince McMahon asked Brian Gerwitz to come up with a trade last year so that Elijah Burke could be moved to Raw. Gerwitz never did but the same was asked of Michael Hayes. Hayes allegedly told Vince McMahon something along the lines of “Why, we have enough N*ggers on Smackdown already” as a source inside WWE put it to me.
Are you freakin’ kidding me?! I’d love to see someone use that word to Donald Trump or any other major business mogul, that asshole would be out of a job faster than they could finish the word. The fact that an employee is able to say that word to Vince McMahon himself without reprecussions, just proves everything that is wrong with the WWE and it’s at times like this, I understand why the masses endorse the stereotypes of professional wrestling. Over the top, fake, a sport for hicks… I mean seriously, imagine being able to go to work and use racist, sexist and simply disgusting language without fearing you could be fired.
Michael Hayes is an A-grade asshole and should not even have a job. Being from the south or wherever he’s from and being from a different time, doesn’t cut it. Being stuck in your ways, doesn’t cut it. If he’s capable enough to be employed, he should be capable enough to know that kind of language is not acceptable. All these situations that are only now coming out show to me corrupt WWE is and as a publicly funded company, it’s highly negligent of Vince McMahon to keep this idiot on the payroll. They want to target a younger audience? Well any Internet-savvy wrestling fan could point out a billion and one things that suggests WWE is not at all kid-friendly, in fact far from it. When one of your leading shows is being written by a neo-Nazi, you’re not kid-friendly. When you hire girls who have had a history in pornography, you’re not kid-friendly. When you keep someone who may or may not have had sex for money, you’re not kid-friendly. When you promote Playboy, you’re not kid-friendly.
To be honest, all the attention based on the Ashley situation – even by us – is kind of over the top when there’s bigger fish to fry. I say, WWE need to fire the prick, those Superstars who’ve been racially abused by him need to file lawsuits. I don’t know how WWE does it, I really don’t know how they manage to save themselves from coming under scrutiny from the law on a more regular basis. In my eyes, they sure as hell deserve it. This industry has it’s positives and negatives, WWE may entertain you to a degree as a fan, but scratch away the surface and you’ve got a corporate tyranny.
– Melanie
