Wednesday, November 23, 2005

I'm A Scorpion, It's My Nature

Once again, I find myself writing about professional wrestling. Don't ask me why, I just do.

A scorpion and a frog meet on the bank of a stream and the scorpion asks the frog to carry him across on its back. The frog asks, "How do I know you won't sting me?" The scorpion says, "Because if I do, I will die too." The frog is satisfied, and they set out, but in midstream, the scorpion stings the frog. The frog feels the onset of paralysis and starts to sink, knowing they both will drown, but has just enough time to gasp "Why?" Replies the scorpion: "Its my nature..."

Close on the heels of the tragic death of Eddie Guerrero (preliminary autopsy reports indicate that Guerrero died of heart failure, likely due to years of drug abuse), Vince McMahon has announced a strict new drug policy which will affect all wrestlers in the employ of Titan Sports, or World Wrestling Entertainment, or WWE, if you prefer.

According to Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer newsletter; "Vince McMahon announced to all the talent this afternoon in Sheffield, England, a new drug policy, which would include performance enhancing drugs, recreational drugs as well as abuse of prescription drugs...In addition, the company is going to mandate more comprehensive cardiovascular examinations for its athletes. All performers under full-time contract will be subject to frequent, unannounced and random testing."

Here's the link to the announcement on WWE.com.

I want to say thank you to Vince McMahon. I really do. I want to sing Vince McMahon's praises from the highest mountaintop. I want to tell the world that Vince McMahon has seen the light, that this new policy will make a dramatic change in the lives of so many wrestlers, their families and their fans.

But I can't.

Not yet, at least.

Because I don't think this policy is going to come into effect. Not completely. And I think that if it does, the ripple effect will prove so catastrophic to the wrestling business that the entire matter will be quietly backed away from, and eventually forgotten, just another failed attempt to bring reality into the spectacle that is pro wrestling.

I'm not saying that is what WILL happen. But I think its a good possibility.

The reality of the situation is that drug use is not the real problem in professional wrestling. Drug use, and drug abuse, is a symptom of a greater problem. Spectacle. The image. And spectacle in the service of capital. The overlying narrative that structures and defines professional wrestling. Therein lies the real problem.

These guys aren't using 'performance enhancing drugs' because they enjoy injecting stuff in their buttcheeks or like swallowing horse pills. They're taking this stuff because it will help them get a better physique, either in muscle tone, definition or size, or even all three. Particularly when they don't have the time to get to the gym as often as they would like. So they take shortcuts. Like Lattimer in The Program, they're taking this stuff to get that little bit of extra advantage, to get them over the hump. To get them their "Place at the table!"

Because wrestling fans have been trained to demand these spectacular mesomorphs.

So I'll hold off on praising Vince McMahon just yet.

Okay, so I wrote all of the above at the end of November, and then got busy with papers (both marking and writing) and all that other exciting school stuff, and just sort of forgot about it. But then I remembered, and thought I should post it.

Which is kind of fitting, when you think about it. Because after that initial announcement about the drug testing, not much was heard about it. Then, this past week, the following statement was released on WWE.com. It reads,
"WWE has been working diligently to complete its new wellness program for talent, which includes an aggressive drug and steroid testing program and heightened cardiovascular monitoring. The company believes it has identified a third-party that will be able to implement the program, which will be done independently of WWE, and is going through final phases of its due diligence. WWE believes the program will be ready to implement before the end of the first quarter of 2006."

So, it looks like Vince and Co. haven't forgotten about their announced drug testing policy. They've just been working on it and perfecting it.

But I'm still holding off on praising Vince McMahon. This is the man who got GLAAD to endorse the Billy & Chuck 'gay wedding' knowing full well that the angle would NOT result in a 'gay wedding' but would also feature Billy and Chuck denying any homosexual desires.

But can you blame Vince for doing this to GLAAD? Can we blame him if certain highly placed, well-physiqued wrestlers are not subject to this new testing policy? Can we blame him if, as with the last WWE drug policy, changes are only made for a short time, then is swept under the rug and forgotten about?

Because Vince is the scorpion. Deception seems to be in his nature. The business of sports entertainment is premised on lying and deception. And yet we, the fans continue to believe him.

Professional wrestling is, as Barthes described it, a "spectacle of excess." Whether that excess be the bodies of the wrestlers, or the lies told, or the ludicrousness of the storylines, the "spectacle of excess" is what drives professional wrestling. It is what motivates the promoters, the bookers, the wrestlers, and perhaps most importantly, the fans.

I promise to write more soon. I'm currently reading Steel Chair to the Head, an excellent collection of essays on professional wrestling. It has the Barthes, the Jenkins, an excerpt from Mazer, and some other excellent pieces. I think I'll do a review, for those of us who like to destroy what we love.

Monday, November 14, 2005

Lyin' Cheatin' Stealin' Cryin'

Those who know me, know I'm a wrestling fan. (See my previous post on CM Punk for details.)

Those who really know me will know that one of the few things that really makes me angry is the high number of deaths of professional wrestlers when they shouldn't be dying. Even excluding Owen Hart's tragic death, the number of pro wrestlers who die young is out of proportion. And this weekend, we lost Eddie Guerrero. And I mean we. Because we, the pro wrestling fans, establish connections, however imagined, with these people.

Eddie was only 38 years old. You're not supposed to die in a hotel room when you're 38 years old. And you're certainly not supposed to die after you've managed to clean yourself up, get free from drugs and alcohol and stay clean.

Eddie was not supposed to die. He had turned it all around. He had made the sacrifices and did what he needed because he wanted to live. And yet, I'm sitting here, knowing that his wife and kids, his friends, his family have lost someone close to them. And we, the wrestling fans, have lost one of the greatest talents of our time.

Eddie was gifted in the ring. He wrestled in Japan, Mexico and the United States, and succeeded everywhere he went. He was charismatic, he was entertaining. There were times when Eddie could make a terrible show into Must See Television, just by being Eddie. He was funny, he was intense, he was great.

I always got emotional watching Eddie and Chris Benoit at Wrestlemania XX, both holding championship gold, basking in the cheers of the crowd, knowing that what I was seeing was two friends, whose paths were almost identical, sharing a perfect moment. And now, that footage, which had previously make me think of redemption, validation and perseverance, will now forever remind me of just how fleeting those moments are.

If there's a heaven, and I have to believe there is, I'm sure Eddie is there. And what makes me truly sad is that Eddie has been reunited with the rest of Los Gringos Locos, Art Barr and Louie Spicoli, and they're probably wrestling Owen Hart, Brian Pillman and Davey Boy Smith.

Its not fair that heaven gets all the good people before we're ready to give them up.

RIP Eddie, and thank you. Thank you for doing what you did, and for being who you were.

Friday, November 11, 2005

Death Is Lighter Than A Feather, Duty Heavier Than A Mountain

So I'm in school. Still. 32 years old, and I'm still in school. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be in school until I die. So thats like another 8-10 years. There's only one problem.

I hate it.

I really fucking hate it.

But sadly enough, its better than any of my other options.

I had a year off between finishing my undergrad and starting grad school, and I got a job that paid badly, treated us badly, and had no room for advancement. And because I have a meaningless piece of paper for a BA, thats about the best I can expect.

Not only do I have a "Liberal Arts" degree, but my BA is actually MORE useless than any of your standard BAs. If you get your usual BA, you know, English, History, that kind of thing, you always know that you can go to Teacher's College and get a nice cushy teaching position.

Which I would love.

The only thing I enjoy about my program right now is being a TA. Not because of the power (although that is pretty cool), but because I feel like I am doing something. Granted, all I'm really doing is leading a bunch of young people down the same useless path I just finished, but its still something. If I could go to Teacher's College, I'd be there in a second. But my BA, besides having a fake word in it (Technoculture is not a fucking word), is also not considered a teachable subject. So the most I'd be able to do is teach like K-3 or something like that. Maybe not even Kindergarten.

So really, I can't do much.

Every day I go to school, I seriously consider just going to the office and quitting. Some days, the only thing that stops me is a sense of duty. I don't want to abandon my professor or my fellow TAs with a bunch of extra work that they weren't expecting. I don't want to let my family down. I don't want to let down the few people who believed in me.

But at the same time, I just want to leave. This place has some posted positions that I may be able to get. And its like a fucking dream job for me. Seriously, getting paid to watch wrestling, boxing and MMA? Throw in porn and horror movies, and thats pretty much my DVD collection.

I'm going to have to think seriously about this.

And, in honour of this weekend's UWO Fall Preview Day, I just want to make this Public Service Announcement.

Kids, if you're thinking about going to the Media, Information & Technoculture program at UWO, think carefully. It won't leave you many options when you graduate. If you want to get a job, you're likely going to have to go to college AFTER finishing university. Your degree alone won't be enough to help you. Make sure you have parents who have connections who can help you find a job. And don't make waves when you're at school, cause those fuckers will blacklist you faster than Joe McCarthy.

I'm not saying DON'T do it. I'm just saying think very carefully. If you're not sure what you want to do with your life when you graduate, go for one of the more traditional programs. The program, however innovative and trendy, is not worth the risk.

Sunday, November 06, 2005

Who Made Who?


So, in my capacity as a "Grad Student" (don't ask why I just put that in quotes, but I'm sure, like mashed potatoes, it means something) I get to be a Teaching Assistant (T.A.) for an undergraduate course. In my capacity as a T.A., I get to run a weekly tutorial for about 1/4 of the students in the course.

Now, the course I am a TA for is a technology course. Not Comp Sci or anything particularly intensive, just a course that gives the students a sense of the major issues in technolog, what we are capable of, where we're going, and where we're totally lost.

Each week in my tutorial, a group of 4-6 students gives a presentation on a particular technology, and talks about some of the issues involving that technology. This past week, the larger theme of the week was "Computers That Feel", and the group took the approach that they were going to prove that, at some point in the future, computers will have the ability to feel. (It was a really good presentation, just in case you were wondering.)

Anyway, one part of the presentation was a timeline featuring a comparison of human evolution, computer evolution, and affective computing (the preferred term for emotional computers) evolution. Their point was the computer evolution, and affective computing evolution, was at a much earlier stage than we humans were.

Then it occurred to me. They were, albeit unintentionally I'm sure, promoting the intelligent design argument. And what is even more interesting, is that the professor had done the same thing. Because the professor herself had mentioned the same thing in her lecture on the subject.

Their argument was that we humans had evolved and developed our emotions over a long period of time (millions of years, to be preciseish.) And that computers and affective
computers were at a relatively infant stage by comparison. But computers aren't following an evolutionary process. We, or at least computer people, are constantly guiding and shaping how computers develop. Some developments are made for consumers, some for the business side, some for the technological side, and some are made just for the pure and simple joy of making a change. But no matter what changes are made, or what the rationale behind making such decisions, the fact remains that humans are guiding the evolution of computers.

If we are guiding the evolution of computers, then to use that comparison suggests the concept of intelligent design. And, in the world of technological evolution, we are gods. And if we are gods, and technology is our creation, then what does that say about our vision of
what God is, does, and wants?




Sunday, October 23, 2005

Sadness In Joy, Joy In Sadness

See this guy here. This is CM Punk, former ROH champion, and now working in the OVW developmental system. But I'm not writing about wrestling.

This is from Punk's final ROH match. Look at the man's face. The fans, knowing full well that this man is making what will likely be his final performance in a Ring Of Honor (a double entendre if I've ever typed one), are flooding the ring with streamers, a Japanese tradition that ROH fans have adopted to honor those wrestlers who deserve their affection.

The fans know that Punk is leaving their small, closeknit community, and moving on to a larger stage. And they love him. And he knows it.

But the look on Punk's face is what really gets me. So much can be seen there.

Pain - you can see the pain in Punk's face, knowing that he is leaving a place where he gave, and received, so much. You can see how much it is hurting Punk to leave this place.

Joy - Punk knows that he must have touched the ROH fans to receive this kind of treatment. And he knows that to have made that kind of impression is a demonstration of his own abilities. And he is joyed to know that he had the chance to make that kind of connection with his audience.

Awe - Punk is overcome with the reaction he is getting from the crowd. I'm sure he expected something, but I think this is beyond what he expected.

I'm not writing this just to do an analysis of what I see in Punk's face, but to say what a lucky man he is.

Not just because he is getting a chance to do what he loves on the grandest scale possible. Not just because he has the chance to make a living while fulfilling a dream that many never will.

No, Punk is a lucky man, because, for one night, he got to know just how important he was to others. He got to go out in front of the crowd, and feel their affection and appreciation, and know how much he meant to them. And there are times when that is what I want.

Not to be the centre of attention. Not to have my ego stroked. But to have the opportunity to know that what you do is making a difference. Maybe not curing cancer. Maybe not saving babies or doing what some people (mainly those who are so myopic that they cannot accept anything they themselves don't understand) would call "important."

For this one night, a night he will probably always remember, CM Punk knew that people appreciated him, and what he does. Sure it required him to go through a certain amount of emotional pain. But I think the pain is worth it. Because the rewards, the feeling of acceptance, of accomplishment, of appreciation, are ones that will always be with you.

On this night, these people loved CM Punk. But it was more than that. They didn't just love CM Punk the wrestling personality. They loved the man behind the personality. They loved the man who gave his all for them, and they wanted to tell him how much they appreciated that.

I may never get to experience that feeling. But I think that, if I do, I will be a lucky man indeed.