Un-professional Wrestling

Courtesy of Courtesy of The Dark Match's Rick Ryder:

Since everybody's blogging this week, I guess it's kinda my turn. These last few days, as I read everyone's blogs, I find myself longing for the old days of wrestling. Days before the internet and Vince McMahon took this business and shoved it in the toilet. Days when people like me and most of the workers that read this were able to work a territory and travel the loop and make a decent living doing so. The old days are a thing of the past, never to return, and it seems as though the "boys" of that era are a dying breed. Basically, what I'm getting at is that there is a whole new set of values, traditions, and just a way of thinking in general that's evolving amongst the latest generation of performers. Now, those in the business who know me, know that I'm as Old School as Old School can be when it comes to this business. My style, my image, and more importantly, the way I conduct myself when I'm not performing. I'm finding the emergence of this "new generation" to be very disheartening. Back in the glory years of wrestling (before internet), the things that were meant for the fans to see were displayed in the ring or on the tv screen and the things that weren't were taken care of in the locker room or in the promoters/booking office. Where ever, it wasn't done for everyone to see. It seems as though the growing practice these days is to settle your problems and differences by spewing trash all across the internet for not only everyone in the business to see, but for the fans to see also. In a buiness where the word "Professional" gets thrown around like dung in a monkey cage, the vast majority of the young performers are acting in every manner but. The most common is a worker not being happy with his position/storyline and then proceeding to go online and trash the promotion he's not happy with, be it on message boards and even here on Myspace. Even after all that, they seem to feel the need to take it one step further and turn it into a personal attack on select people and hurl countless insults which have absolutely nothing to do with why they're pissed off in the first place. When I first broke into this game in 2000, I began under the tutelage of WWE Hall of Famer Afa the Wild Samoan. There are people who will read this who were there with me and can attest to the fact that this is NOT the way we were taught. Now my question is: Are these kids just that fucking ignorant or is this actually the way they're being taught the business? Everyone wants to be a "Superstar" and nobody wants to cut their teeth and pay their dues. They expect to be "over" and be automatically pushed in every promotion they walk into. What happened to the days where a young guy would get his ass whipped night after night by the veterans and be thankful just to have the opportunity to be in the ring and when his break came, he was more than happy to give back to the business. When I first started to see this kind of nonsense, I just passed it off as an isolated incident, but it's almost become an epidemic. I know I'm gonna piss a lot of people off and I expect to get a lot of negative comments, but ya know what? I really don't give a fuck. Ask your trainers and if they're anyone to be respected in the business, they'll tell you I'm right. It's time everybody grows the fuck up and handles their problems privately, out of sight of the "marks." Let's take Un-professional wrestling and turn it back into Professional Wrestling.