WWE has pulled all of the Chris Benoit merchandise from the WWE shop (dot) com website, has removed mention of him from advertisements for Wrestlemania 20, changing the information to Triple H defending his title against Shawn Michaels, and has publicly stated that they would not be mentioning his name on their programs again, essentially disavowing any connection with Chris Benoit. In light of the tragedy that involved Chris and his family, and based on the fact that WWE devoted an entire show to him only to later find out that his death, and the deaths of his wife Nancy and son Daniel were linked to a sinister act perpetrated by Chris, I can understand why WWE would feel betrayed by one of their own. However, that does not take away the fact that Benoit was a spectacular wrestler, and no matter what his personal life consisted of, that is how he should be remembered.
Chris Benoit was a great wrestler, one of the best ever. Outside the ring, I did not know the man. I had never met him, had never spoken to him, and had never even been close enough to him to shake his hand while looking him in the eye. The only thing that I know about Chris Benoit is that he was a great wrestler, one of the best that I had ever seen in my 30-plus years of watching professional wrestling. That is all that I know and frankly, that is all that I want to know.
In 1993 Kerry Von Erich committed suicide by putting a bullet into his head in order to keep from being sent to jail for forging prescriptions, which was a violation of his probation. At the time, and during the heyday of World Class Wrestling, I was a big Von Erich fan. These days, with four of the five wrestling Von Erich dies before the age of 35, all under curious circumstances, I still pull out my old World Class tapes and watch the matches because I was a fan of the entertainment that they brought to me, not of their personal lives.
In the inside news, voyeuristic society that we live in, we get too caught up in the personal lives of the people that entertain us. Once that happens, it becomes difficult for some people to separate the television character that they are watching and the person behind the character who, like the rest of us, is just a person doing a job and struggling with the trials of being a human on Earth. The same problems that you or I face are the same problems that plague the rich and famous. The only difference is that if you or I get arrested for a DUI, we will not make the nightly new while once it happens to Paris Hilton, she is a front page story and gossip column fodder until the next celebrity tops her. We as people need to learn to separate the fact from the fiction, the television character from the real person.
In 1993, NBA star Charles Barkley became embroiled in a controversy that grew to include the Vice President Dan Quayle when he wrote the copy for and appeared in a Nike commercial in which he stated that athletes shouldn’t be role models. Charles was taken to task by society and by the government for his comments that athletes should not be role models for today’s children, but what was forgotten from the message was the call for parents and teachers to be role models for the youth of today and that parents should raise their children and not leave that to people on TV. This was a strong statement for separating fact from fiction because what Charles was saying was that since very few could do what he could do, children should idolize people that they could grow up to emulate. Be entertained by these people, but do not become so involved in their personal lives that they affect the way that you think about things.
When I am being entertained, I want to be entertained and I care about the person or persons entertaining me. I was a fan of Chris Benoit, just as I was a fan of Kerry Von Erich, because I enjoyed watching them do what they did. I will continue to watch his matches because in the ring, he is just Chris Benoit the wrestler and all of those matches happened before he became Chris Benoit the man who was believed to have committed a double murder before committing suicide. I do not care about what he does outside of his field of entertainment until it affects his ability to entertain me. Once that happens, then I have a problem and find it difficult to be entertained by that person.
Michael Jackson is an accused child molester. That is a fact that cannot be denied, but what many are trying to deny in connection with Michael Jackson is the fact that he was, at his best, arguably the most dynamic performer of his time (with the possible exception of Prince and MC Hammer). Michael Jackson could do any style of music and nearly all of his song spoke to people on levels that other performers were not able or willing to reach and this is what made Michael Jackson special. I continue to trot out my Michael Jackson CD’s from time to time because I was a fan of the music and of the performer. The man who allegedly molested children on his ranch would never be invited to dinner or to be around my own children, but that will not stop me from enjoying his music. Now, if he started doing music about molesting music, then I would have a problem with Michael Jackson and the music that he was doing, but that would still not change the music that he did in the past. I just would not continue to support him going forward
I am a fan of University of Southern California football, and I still believe that the 1967 game between USC and UCLA is one of the greatest college football games ever played. That game was turned by a 64-yard touchdown run by none other than Orenthal James Simpson, one of the greatest running backs in the history of football, college or pro. I am also a fan of the Naked Gun movies, all of which feature, Orenthal James Simpson. These things will never change because while he was doing these things, he was not killing his wife and a restaurant employee (allegedly). However, I cannot support the things that Simpson has attempted to do lately in an effort to cash in on the murders. That would be an example of the personal life affecting the entertainment and that I cannot allow.
I am also a lifetime fan of the Los Angeles Lakers. From West and Chamberlain to Kareem and Magic to Shaq and Kobe, right down the line, I was a fan. When Magic Johnson said that he could not play for Paul Westhead because Westhead’s style did not highlight Magic’s talents, he was saying that because the Lakers were a team full of gazelles being forced to play like elephants. Paul Westhead was replaced mid-season by Pat Riley and the Lakers won the NBA championship. Magic was speaking for what was the best way to use the team’s personnel and as it turned out, he was right. He was perceived as injecting his own agenda into the team’s structure, so he was vilified for his choices, which is as it should be. The fans felt that he was injecting their entertainment with his personal politics and he was scorned for his actions, when it turned out right, he was again praised. For me, when I thought that Magic was tearing up my team, I was upset because, as I said, the personal was interfering with the entertainment.
Kobe Bryant is a spectacular player, one of the best in the game today. The combination of Shaq and Kobe were able to, as a tandem, win three consecutive NBA championships and then compete for a fourth within a five-year span before Kobe’s personal agenda was allowed to take precedence. It is generally believed that Kobe Bryant’s desire to be the undisputed star of the Lakers was the central component in Shaq’s being traded following the 2003-2004 NBA season. Since that time, Kobe Bryant has lead the NBA in scoring twice, but the Lakers have become an abysmal team, failing to win playoff games and survive the first round of the NBA playoffs. These days, Kobe is expressing the desire to have the team’s General Manager replaced and to be traded to a team with a chance to win immediately unless the team can be instantly upgraded. Despite the team’s efforts at improving their roster, Kobe is insisting that he would like to leave the Lakers for another team, which would make the team worse than it currently is. I am having tremendous difficulty continuing to be a fan of Kobe Bryant because his personal agenda is negatively affecting my favorite basketball team, affecting the way that I am entertained. I would prefer to see him leave and to see the team rebuild around another star than to continue to have him there as a cancer on the team that would eventually spread to other players and would irreparably destroy the team.
What does all of this have to do with Chris Benoit? Well, it is simple; Chris Benoit was a great wrestling performer, and that is what we should remember. Shawn Michaels is a great wrestling performer, and that is all that we should care about. It shouldn’t matter if he is a Christian, as he says, or is a hypocrite hiding behind Christianity, as Bret Hart has said. It shouldn’t matter unless you were a fan of Bret Hart in the WWF and his leaving affected the way that you were entertained. Then, dislike HBK if you choose, but do not deny that his many other matches, with wrestlers other than Bret Hart, were spectacular and worth watching over and over. If John Cena were to suddenly become a Nazi sympathizer (in real life) and he were converting other wrestlers into Nazi sympathizers and other white wrestlers were suddenly refusing to perform with black or Jewish wrestlers because they were inferior people, I would be unable to watch John Cena perform and would stop. Since this has not happened, I will continue to be entertained by Cena and other professional wrestlers, until one’s personal life affected his ability to entertain. Then, and only then, would I care about his personal life.
Send comments, complaints or questions to me @ ericej@netzero.net
Eric E. Jenkins is an author who has written a semi-biographical book covering the last 30 years in professional wrestling through the eyes of a fan entitled “Reflections of a Professional Wrestling Fan: My 30 Years ‘In’ the Business”. He is currently writing “Dead Too Soon”, a book chronicling the careers of and paying tribute to many of the wrestling stars who passed away very young.
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