Wrestling — why all the fuss?

Press, 28 July 1989, Page 11

Wrestling — why all the fuss?

Something rather interesting is going on in New Zealand and I suspect that it is unique to this country. We’re told that “Superstars of Wrestling” has become, for a brief cult period, the focus of playfantasy for young males. It’s also become the focus of considerable press interest. The press sense, and contribute to the appearance of, a community divided over the rights and wrongs of the phenomenon.

My parish-pump networks indicate to me that there is something worth exploring in the way people judge this television circus.

"Superstars of Wrestling” is, for many Americans at least, billed as family entertainment. The shots of the audience are full of boys and girls licking ice creams and waving banners and wearing T-shirts covered with

mugs of their unlovely favourite hero.

So why does transportation turn a tawdry entertainment into a national media cause celebre that many parents and teachers apparently want taken off the schedule? Is it the attraction of ritualised combat of ani-mal-like warriors? Is it the simplicity of battle between Hulk Hogan and Macho-Man versus big Boss Man and Akheem? The Romans knew that trick. The gladiators were oiling and flexing their muscles in hope of financial favours (or their freedom, or life!) 2000 years ago.

Is the problem, as “Countdown” magazine put it, that parents hate it because it’s revolting, violent and crude and kids love it because it’s violent, revolting and crude?

The debate certainly turns muddy here. On the one hand, we have the view of the head of the

Emergency Department at Christchurch Hospital that alleged follow-on injuries are part of an urban myth. On the other, there are plenty of parents and teachers who can attest the opposite. They’ve seen the terrifying play. Many an injury, I’m told, presents as an honourable rugby wound when it is a "Superstar of Wrestling” atrocity dressed up respectably.

Is it the Americanness of the programme which alienates many local adults? After all, New Zealanders put up with violent physical contact on the rugby field with equanimity (and even pride). The show’s revivalist pitch; combined with side-show entertainment, is perhaps worrying to those brought up in the indigenous traditions. Is it the disrespectful treatment of authority figures? The sadism of the Big-Boss-Man’s police

figure certainly raises ugly questions about American attitudes to the police force and maybe provides some uncomfortable clues to urban America’s images of heroism.

On the other hand, is it the crude sexual stereotyping? There’s Ravishing Rick Rude, swivelling his hips, yelling out, “None of you fat Missouri cows is worthy of me.”

Or maybe it challenges the honourable tradition of amateur sport in this country. This entertainment industry just doesn’t encourage the plucky endeavour of local lads in amateur wrestling; all it demands is a captive pair of eyes in an armchair.

Or could the controversy hinge on the way our local network can play a double game, on the one hand playing pious and tagging the programme as for adults only, and on the other hand permitting the ad-

vertising of spin-off wrestling dolls in the children’s programme? Does Daddy collect all 30-odd dolls?

And, who knows, for some the issue may even be about local identity. Do the Bushwhackers, with their black singlets, camouflage pants and feral grunts represent all that is finest about our country to America?

"Here are our two dumb animals from Noo Zealand, that ex-penal colony in the South Pacific,” yelled one of the commentators one night. Does this count as local content? Does anyone remember who our ambassador to America is? The lack of media research in this country means that we can only speculate. But I submit one very simple reason why the programme has had such a push from TVNZ and such a unique impact on New Zealand when compared with elsewhere in the world.

Ruth Zanker

on television

It is a reason that should die with the new multi-channelled choice of the future. You can still hit every school playground with a programme fashion because TVNZ, Ltd, has an extraordinary monopoly. It has no rivals. Yet.

Postscript: I am devastated that “Max Headroom” is ending. Why no warning?