Morality and spectacle have a tradition of being loosely coupled. (Hear that PGA?)
I just finished the Behind the Bastards podcast series about Vincent K. McMahon. Besides confirming that many wrestling fans already knew about McMahon, I realized that Abraham Josephine Riesman’s new book The Ringmaster: Vince McMahon and the Unmaking of America is a must-read.
Courtesy Atria Books and Schuler Books
Our country was founded with many high ethical and moral standards, yet embedded within were numerous ethical compromises, immoral activities, and outright defiance of what we supposedly espoused. That says a couple of things about our culture and popular culture:
1) Many of us do not have the strength of conviction nor the discipline to adhere to the moral and ethical standards that we set for ourselves. Most of us are also too cowardly to resist the overwhelming tide to make something more ambiguous and subsequently operate within grey areas instead of standing up for what we supposedly value.
2) Two natural outcomes emerge from that in popular culture: a) we celebrate and elevate ambiguous anti-heroes while often using them as a justification (cudgel), and b) the elevation of anti-heroes and their inherent justification is nine times out of 10, usually based upon a “what about” logical fallacy that takes unrelated variables and says that because of variable x, variable y is wholly exonerated of accountability.
Wrestling is a scripted and contractually agreed-upon simulation of a real fight. In the carnival days, kayfabe (presenting staged performances as if they were genuine) was a way for business insiders to protect themselves and facilitate the willing suspension of disbelief in the authenticity of match outcomes.
Riesman and Behind the Bastards try to introduce us to neokayfabe, “where everything is fake, but viewers are teased with “assumptions” that there may be some truth.” I believe that’s incredibly relevant.
Abraham Josephine Riesman, writing in The New York Times, “The Best Way to Explain the GOP. Is Found in the WWE”: Neokayfabe rests on a slippery, ever-wobbling jumble of truths, half-truths, and outright falsehoods, all delivered with the utmost passion and commitment. After a while, the producers and the consumers of neokayfabe tend to lose the ability to distinguish between what’s real and what isn’t. Wrestlers can become their characters; fans can become deluded obsessives who get off on arguing or total cynics who gobble it all up for the thrills, truth be damned. Does that remind you of anything?
Since everyone is aware that wrestling is sports entertainment and the match outcomes are part of a larger story arc, the role of kayfabe has been diminished significantly. Intuitively and consciously, we can see the connection between spectacle and the simulation involved in wrestling. But Neokayfabe exploits the relationship between the spectacle and simulation, and it also blurs reality within the confines of the simulation. It is a form of self-awareness and a means of compromising ourselves for the sake of the spectacle.
This simulation and the “what-about-ism” allow us to begin to deny factual and material reality. A presidential indictment that once would have been a disqualifying and ethical crossing of a bridge too far is now a rallying point abridged with simulation and spectacle. For many, it is something to celebrate, fitting in our pop culture obsession with anti-heroes who only engage in immoral and unethical behavior because of provocation … as opposed to their own moral and ethical accountability.
