On Episode 40 of The Wrestling Culture podcast, Dylan Hales and I are joined by friend and filmmaker John Philapavage to discuss his newly released documentary "Barbed Wire City" examining defunct wrestling promotion ECW. John is a great guest talking about a great film and it is a pleasure as always to have him on.

 

Wrestling Culture Episode 40

Just listened to this and it was informative, as usual. I haven't seen the film yet, but wanted to comment on something that was discussed on the pod.

 

Dylan mentioned that one of the criticisms of the film popping up was that it relied too much on comments from journalists and should have focused more on wrestler comments. Dylan and John seemed to have a hard time figuring out why. Without seeing the film, I probably know why.

 

It's the same reason TV networks throw huge sums of money at ex-athletes to provide commentary and "analysis" for sporting events. Never mind that the former athlete rarely says anything useful and insightful, for some reason that recognizable name and face connects with Joe Sports Fan much better than a non-athlete who might actually provides meaningful perspective and commentary. There's a vocal group of sports fans who are sick and tired of hearing ex-athletes spew mindless drivel on the airwaves, but we're a minority and likely won't become a majority any time soon.

 

I'm sure the same applies to wrestling fans watching a wrestling documentary. They want to see the names and faces of the people they recognize, not some dorky looking journalist they probably never heard of. Perspective and insight doesn't register with them as much as "Hey look! It's Raven! Awesome! I remember him. Wow, look at him now!" I'm not saying that's always the case, but it's probably the reason why you're getting the journalist vs. wrestler criticism.

 

Another reason could be the "You've never played the game so what do you know about it?" mindset. Sports journalists get this often from rube fans. For some reason, because Bob the Sportswriter never played an NFL game, a segment of fans view him unqualified to write about it or have an opinion.

 

Yet another reason could be the "Why do you hate (insert the name of your favorite sports team) so much?" If a sports journalist writes something critical of a fan's favorite team, that journalist automatically hates your favorite team, is biased against it, and will do anything to bring it down. Same rules apply for segments of the population in political journalism, movie reviews, business reporting, and just about anything else. If a journalists says something that isn't all duckies and bunnies about ECW, well, he must hate ECW and is biased against it.

 

I'm glad a filmmaker like John recognizes that former ECW wrestlers are not the only people qualified to provide insight into ECW and I look forward to seeing the film for that reason.