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Post by carp (SPC, Itoh Respect Army) on Jan 1, 2022 13:58:03 GMT -5
Wellllllllll but that's the problem, isn't it? This just provides them with an out, a reason to spin their wheels, feigning helplessness. Because it seems plausible a lot of fans (who Aren't Racist But Hate Virtue Signaling) will distrust and resist any black performer getting anything that looks like a push. And then TK just shrugs and says "We tried, but the fans Aren't Stupid and saw through us! Oh well!" And we'll just go back to black wrestlers having to get over "naturally," which always means "very very very very very slowly." And goes against the notion of if you believe in someone you are going to give them multiple chances to get over Britt, Dark Order, etc all went through diff chances to get over and stay at least somewhat prominent and in Britt case it allowed her to dominate the division Like Britt was forced into the top position but fans loved her so no harm no foul. Hangman Page was going to be forced but they had to pivot with him and he still had every chance to get over, he wasn't pushed down the card and now he is back on top Yup. This is a great example of something that seems innocent, and which can sometimes genuinely come from non-racist intentions, but when you think about it and untangle it, you realize it's leading to policing and judging black performers' pushes way more stringently.
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Post by HMARK Center on Jan 1, 2022 13:58:55 GMT -5
I personally don’t think either side comes out looking good in all of this. I think it’s pretty clear that a conversation was had behind closed doors, with the impression left that Swole’s departure from the company was amicable, but she still dropped a public grenade that cast some very serious aspersions on the company. From everything that’s come out since, I don’t think that grenade was thrown with entirely good intentions. But, Tony Khan is the owner of a multi-million dollar company that employs hundreds of people. Former employees are going to criticize the company they used to work for. It happens every day in every walk of life. And, in this instance, there’s some merit to the criticism. It’s great that TK is such an involved and approachable owner in a lot of ways, but he’s still the owner. There was absolutely no reason to come out and publicly drag a former employee through the mud like he did. She’s the disgruntled former employee who just lost her job, he’s the billionaire owner of the company. It just comes across as so petty to engage like he did. He’s in for a rude awakening if he thinks that everyone who ever walks in the door to work for AEW is going to think it’s the greatest company in the world and never have a negative thing to say about it. Amidst all of the commentary that’s gone on around this I agree with the sentiments of two people most. 1) Like Hobbs said, if you have a problem pick up the phone. These are not disputes that need to be held publicly, because the message gets lost when the perception is that it’s only being done for publicity. 2) Like Lio said, TK really needs to apologize and acknowledge that he mishandled this situation. If I were working for AEW right now I would be very uncomfortable with the fact that the owner of the company took a potshot at a former coworker’s wrestling ability just because she stated issues and criticisms she had while working there. 10/10. I don't feel like the former employee had good intentions in saying what they said...but the criticisms are valid. Comparing to WWE is weird to me, because it has seemed to me like they employee certain people from certain countries just to say they have a wrestler from that area. There doesn't seem to be any good will behind anything they do. They seem to have axactly ONE person from everywhere, and have for a long time. Eh, nah, it's a global company that wants talent from around the world since, well...that's the audience they want to reach, and representation matters. I don't see anything inherently wrong with that. If one did want to point out why a WWE comparison might be strange, I'd say there's two things that could be considered: one is that WWE literally took years to build up a lot of PoC wrestlers who are now in prominent positions - e.g. when focusing on the black members of the roster, Big E spent a long time not getting to show off a lot of his personality before the New Day became a thing, Kofi spent years seemingly in a series of never-ending dead end rematches with Dolph Ziggler, etc. Comparing that with "just started year three" AEW feels off, especially considering how young a lot of the more diverse side of AEW's roster is (again, focus here is more on black wrestlers on the roster, as guys like the Lucha Brothers are obviously highly featured). Second, there was a time when WWE did push someone to the title because they wanted to appeal to a specific segment of their audience, and it wasn't only poorly received, it did real harm to that wrestler's status: Jinder Mahal. Jinder's not even from India, but it was pretty clear he was being given a title push in anticipation of WWE trying to do more work directly in India, but the guy just wasn't suited for the spot. Honestly, I think that did real damage to Jinder moving forward; having that aura of "failed main event push" on him is a tough thing to shake and drags down his perception with the audience. Side note, I'm really, really not getting where the "AEW is too focused on appealing to 8channers" meme is coming from.
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markymark
Bill S. Preston, Esq.
Posts: 19,821
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Post by markymark on Jan 1, 2022 14:05:53 GMT -5
youtu.be/C40p6FH9oC4Shawn Dean is having a live discussion about this. Essentially doing damage control for what Tony Khan did.
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Fade
Patti Mayonnaise
Posts: 38,451
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Post by Fade on Jan 1, 2022 14:07:17 GMT -5
Swole hasn’t responded at all, huh?
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kidkamikaze10
Dennis Stamp
Trying to think of a new avatar
Posts: 4,332
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Post by kidkamikaze10 on Jan 1, 2022 14:08:36 GMT -5
As I said, asymmetrical. Not to mention, someone is handling this way better than the other.
Swole is handling this as nicely as possible, with receipts.
Now compare that to (mind you, this particular twitter is garbage and is totally on Tony's side on this, but the screenshot is real):
This is really bad. And there's clearly nobody in Tony's circle to tell him no.
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Post by 1 Free Moon-Down with Burger on Jan 1, 2022 14:09:39 GMT -5
Swole hasn’t responded at all, huh? Why should she? This billionaire man baby cried and talked shit about her wrestling ability just because she had the gall to criticize his company. She doesn’t need to respond to come out looking ok
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Fade
Patti Mayonnaise
Posts: 38,451
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Post by Fade on Jan 1, 2022 14:10:47 GMT -5
Swole hasn’t responded at all, huh? Why should she? This billionaire man baby cried and talked shit about her wrestling ability just because she had the gall to criticize his company. She doesn’t need to respond to come out looking ok I was curious but the post above yours answered it.
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Post by Captain Stud Muffin (BLM) on Jan 1, 2022 14:12:03 GMT -5
As I said, asymmetrical. Not to mention, someone is handling this way better than the other. Swole is handling this as nicely as possible, with receipts. Now compare that to (mind you, this particular twitter is garbage and is totally on Tony's side on this, but the screenshot is real): This is really bad. And there's clearly nobody in Tony's circle to tell him no. He is still liking tweets?
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Jan 1, 2022 14:14:24 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence but when Tony claps back and calls her a bad wrestler, its the end of the world?
Honestly looking at her feed, she seems to be more trouble than she's worth. And guys like Lio Rush suggesting Tony should apologise... Why? Swole was talking about diversity and in the same sentence of tweets, she's throwing shade at Jade potentially winning the TBS title. Irony.
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pinja
Unicron
Posts: 3,129
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Post by pinja on Jan 1, 2022 14:14:55 GMT -5
Nothing says good guy like closing off a restaurant for the peasants.
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markymark
Bill S. Preston, Esq.
Posts: 19,821
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Post by markymark on Jan 1, 2022 14:15:19 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence but when Tony claps back and calls her a bad wrestler, its the end of the world? Honestly looking at her feed, she seems to be more trouble than she's worth. And guys like Lio Rush suggesting Tony should apologise... Why? Swole was talking about diversity and in the same sentence of tweets, she's throwing shade at Jade potentially winning the TBS title. Irony.
Swole also was caught joining a Fk the Young Bucks space on twitter
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Post by 1 Free Moon-Down with Burger on Jan 1, 2022 14:18:08 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence but when Tony claps back and calls her a bad wrestler, its the end of the world? Honestly looking at her feed, she seems to be more trouble than she's worth. And guys like Lio Rush suggesting Tony should apologise... Why? Swole was talking about diversity and in the same sentence of tweets, she's throwing shade at Jade potentially winning the TBS title. Irony. Swole also was caught joining a Fk the Young Bucks space on twitter
Oh just throw her into the pit then.
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nate5054
Hank Scorpio
Lucky to be alive in the Chris Jericho Era
Posts: 7,016
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Post by nate5054 on Jan 1, 2022 14:20:02 GMT -5
Nearly 40 pages in less than a day...pretty hot topic here.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Jan 1, 2022 14:21:27 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence but when Tony claps back and calls her a bad wrestler, its the end of the world? Honestly looking at her feed, she seems to be more trouble than she's worth. And guys like Lio Rush suggesting Tony should apologise... Why? Swole was talking about diversity and in the same sentence of tweets, she's throwing shade at Jade potentially winning the TBS title. Irony. Neither one comes across looking good in this. It’s completely disingenuous to act like Swole was just innocently advocating for change. Her intentions were clearly not entirely good. That’s where I disagree with some people on this as a whole. But TK is the owner of the company. He’s not in a position to be “clapping back.” And that’s why I do think Lio’s right and he needs to acknowledge he let his emotions get the better of him and apologize.
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Post by Friday Night SmackOwn on Jan 1, 2022 14:21:44 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence but when Tony claps back and calls her a bad wrestler, its the end of the world? Honestly looking at her feed, she seems to be more trouble than she's worth. And guys like Lio Rush suggesting Tony should apologise... Why? Swole was talking about diversity and in the same sentence of tweets, she's throwing shade at Jade potentially winning the TBS title. Irony. It’s an incredibly bad look for the dude who owns the company to be using a public forum to air a grievance that could’ve been resolved in private.
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kidkamikaze10
Dennis Stamp
Trying to think of a new avatar
Posts: 4,332
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Post by kidkamikaze10 on Jan 1, 2022 14:22:37 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence In the history of entertainment, business, whatever, there has never, ever, been an instance where calling out a systemic problem in a company has not led to consequences on the person calling it out. Not for sexism, racism, etc. We literally see the E trash any big name trying to leave or critique the company. And now, because Swole brought up something that many others have, there's "zero consequence"? When you run a company, especially one worth millions of dollars, what you say publicly matters. This is basic stuff. It may not be the end of the world, but it's the first potential major PR disaster for AEW.
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Post by carp (SPC, Itoh Respect Army) on Jan 1, 2022 14:22:59 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence but when Tony claps back and calls her a bad wrestler, its the end of the world? I am going to make the mistake of taking you seriously and point out the things that are wrong with this one sentence. 1. She didn't call anyone racist. She pointed out problems with diversity in the company. 2. She did provide evidence at the lack of diversity, and there are plenty of people in this very thread doing the same. 3. Calling people racist is not something that, per se, should come with consequences, and I kind of am terrified to even consider what someone might think these consequences should be. 4. Given 1, he wasn't "clapping back," he was just attacking. 5. It's incredibly unprofessional for him to be reacting so personally in a public setting. 6. It's a self-own to call her a bad wrestler, since ostensibly he was involved in hiring her in the first place. 7. Given his position of authority, it's very reasonable to assume his immaturity is something that'll have further important consequences.
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Post by Friday Night SmackOwn on Jan 1, 2022 14:24:59 GMT -5
Will Hobbs had a good point in saying “if you have a problem, just pick up the phone”, which is advice TK really needed to heed.
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Post by Captain Stud Muffin (BLM) on Jan 1, 2022 14:25:17 GMT -5
At the very least, if you dont understand why TK was wrong and needs to apologize, there is something wrong
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jan 1, 2022 14:26:12 GMT -5
I guess Big Swole should be allowed to call people racists for no reason with zero consequence but when Tony claps back and calls her a bad wrestler, its the end of the world? Honestly looking at her feed, she seems to be more trouble than she's worth. And guys like Lio Rush suggesting Tony should apologise... Why? Swole was talking about diversity and in the same sentence of tweets, she's throwing shade at Jade potentially winning the TBS title. Irony. ................ She didn't call him racist. She even said there's no bad blood between them and then today she posted something else giving him a compliment. Like, if for some weird reason people are going "she said he's racist" then yall need to take a deep long look at yourself in the mirror and wonder why you think that. Where is this coming from and why do you think this way?
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