(Content material Warning: This text accommodates allegations of sexual assault, sexual coercion, and sexual harassment)
On the “Impact” part of its website, WWE touts its “Be A Star” (Present Tolerance and Respect) anti-bullying program as being developed alongside the Boys and Ladies Golf equipment of America and the Yale Heart for Emotional Intelligence, and claims the bullying prevention program, which was championed by former WWE exec Stephanie McMahon, “is available to 4,300 clubs and provides more than 4 million children access to tools and education materials that help create a safe and inclusive afterschool environment.”
Stopping bullying is, undeniably, an necessary trigger, notably because the worlds of high-speed web entry and unmoderated social media have mixed to take harassment and private torment for teenagers to a complete new degree. However whereas WWE may need wished one of the best for his or her under-18 viewers, it’s turning into more and more obvious that the identical degree of concern didn’t prolong to WWE staff, notably to the ladies who labored for former WWE co-founder and former Chairman and CEO, Vince McMahon.
Final week, McMahon resigned from his place at WWE, the second time he’s done so within the final two years, resulting from allegations of sexual harassment and assault. McMahon has denied any wrongdoing and has not been charged with a criminal offense, however current experiences have claimed that federal law enforcement agencies are investigating the allegations associated to intercourse trafficking in former WWE paralegal Janel Grant’s federal lawsuit in opposition to McMahon.
Grant’s allegations of assault by the hands of McMahon and former WWE exec John Laurinaitis (the step-father of each Nikki and Brie Garcia — aka “The Bella Twins” — Laurinaitis has denied any wrongdoing and claims he’s additionally a “victim” of McMahon) are hair-raising and upsetting, to say the least, however have considerably obscured the institutional reminiscence that this isn’t the primary time we’ve heard “Vince McMahon” and “sexual misconduct” in shut proximity. McMahon was additionally pressured out of the corporate in 2022, after a Wall Street Journal report that he had paid $12 million in NDAs to 4 ladies over 16 years, one in all whom was Grant. The WSJ claims that McMahon additionally paid $7.5 million to a former wrestler who says McMahon coerced her into giving him oral intercourse, after which demoted her when she refused his later advances. Nonetheless one other girl, a WWE contractor, got here ahead with unsolicited nude images she claimed McMahon despatched her whereas sexually harassing her at work. When McMahon initially stepped down within the wake of the WSJ report, his daughter, Stephanie, led the gang in a “Thank you, Vince” chant.
For her half, Stephanie McMahon has all the time been a bizarre mixture of “girl power!” whereas additionally seemingly protecting for the horrible habits of males. She deserves credit score for 2020 ladies’s revolution at WWE, which launched the careers of wrestlers like Becky Lynch, Mercedes Mone (then Sasha Banks), and Charlotte Aptitude. On the similar time, she gleefully cheered the election of former Barstool CEO Erika Ayers Badan (then Erika Nardini) to the corporate’s board of administrators, regardless of her historical past of seemingly not caring about Barstool’s long standing harassment of women, which Ayers Badan has been accused of utilizing to her benefit. Present tolerance and respect, certainly. Then once more, Stephanie as soon as needed to quash Vince’s pitch for a storyline the place he was the daddy or her unborn little one, so I suppose every little thing is relative. Ayers Badan has since left each WWE and Barstool Sports activities.
One factor that appears to turn out to be clearer by the day, although, is that Vince McMahon’s habits was information to nobody. Former wrestler Dutch Mantell spoke on his podcast about rumors of how exhausting Vince was on “the Divas,” the identify previously used for WWE’s ladies wrestlers, saying, “I did hear how Vince was around the Divas, he would have them sometimes in a manic state. They would come out of the room sometimes with him, shaking, then they would sit in the corner and not talk to anyone. You could tell something between them that upset them.” Mantell additionally stated he believes that “a lot more stories will come out now.” Previous to Grant’s 2024 lawsuit bombshell, former WWE author Vince Russo, who isn’t late to remark when WWE is concerned, stated he wouldn’t think about working for McMahon once more due to “morals and ethics.”
In the meantime, WWE hasn’t precisely impressed with its response to the allegations in opposition to McMahon. If the powers that be at TKO (WWE’s father or mother firm, shaped after they merged with UFC in 2023) thought having Cody Rhodes win the Royal Rumble twice straight and bringing The Rock back for Wrestlemania was sufficient to distract from the allegations in opposition to Vince McMahon, they want to return to the drafting board. Final week, my colleague, Sam Fels, rightfully lit up WWE for dropping the ball on responding to Grant’s lawsuit. Significantly galling was watching WWE’s Chief Inventive Workplace Paul “Triple H” Levesque admit that he hadn’t even learn the lawsuit. The shortcoming of Levesque to reply appropriately to the allegations in opposition to Vince McMahon ought to have been apparent, given his previous penchant for hanging out with Floyd Mayweather and his incapacity to correctly handle previous allegations of grooming in opposition to former WWE wrestler Velveteen Dream. I suppose nothing says “we take sexual assault seriously” like working the Cerebral Assasin on the market to not handle it. Not less than he wasn’t on a motorbike with Lemmy screaming someplace overhead.
I’ve been essential of the “Attitude Era” of WWE, an period many male followers lengthy for a return to, primarily due to its exploitation and remedy of ladies, each within the ring and backstage and out of the general public eye. And regardless of its clarion name to finish bullying by way of “Be A Star,” it appears the demand to deal with others with tolerance and respect doesn’t prolong to the adults at WWE, notably the ladies. Whereas ending bullying is definitely a valiant aim, demonstrating to younger ladies (and don’t child your self, there are many them watching WWE) that boundaries matter, particularly in relation to speaking about sexual assault and harassment, is equally as imporant. In keeping with the CDC, “More than 4 in 5 female rape survivors reported that they were first raped before age 25 and almost half were first raped as a minor (i.e., before age 18). Nearly 8 in 10 male rape survivors reported that they were made to penetrate someone before age 25 and about 4 in 10 were first made to penetrate as a minor.”
So how about if we embrace standing as much as undesirable sexual advances and coercion as a part of being a star? And what if WWE prolonged the message about respect and tolerance backstage, as effectively, together with its govt suite. And, whereas they’re at it, possibly get somebody certified to speak about sexual misconduct and intercourse trafficking to speak to youngsters and younger adults concerning the warning indicators? And possibly ship out somebody from the C-Suite who truly learn Grant’s lawsuit and took it critically to deal with followers about what WWE is doing to ensure that Vince McMahon doesn’t occur to their staff once more.
I can’t consider a greater method to spend Wrestlemania.
