There is a lot rattling around in site co-founder Brandon Andreasen’s head. He can’t spend 5000 words on everything that he wants to, because it would heavily interfere in his time normally spent drinking, watching King of the Hill reruns, and just generally being lazy. So every week, Brandon is going to do a scattershot of smaller stories he won’t commit to writing full stories about.
Vince McMahon is a monster/wrestling fandom is toxic
Over the past month, World Wrestling Entertainment CEO and primary shareholder Vince McMahon has been outed by the Wall Street Journal as having covered up four affairs with women within the company with hush money over the past decade and a half, while he was running a publicly traded company. All told, he spent over 12 million dollars making sure that his tv image of being a womanizing asshole who never suffers any actual repercussions for his actions wouldn’t be sullied.
McMahon is of course married to Linda McMahon, as he has been since 1966. You might remember Linda for being one of the less scandal ridden people to serve in the Trump administration, and more recently, selling out her prior beliefs of being pro-choice for the sake of making sure white christians think they are the only people that matter. (This, of course, is because wrestling is a form of entertainment inherently enjoyed by white guys who, for the most part, have no idea what a woman’s reproductive parts even look like, let alone have the thought process that women should have their own right to them, and Linda isn’t going to piss off her main fanbase).
If you have followed wrestling with anything even close to a critical eye over the past several decades, you will know that this isn’t actually a shock. Every couple years, Rita Chatterton’s story comes back into the forefront. If you aren’t aware, Chatterton was the first female referee in WWF in the 1980’s. She has been alleging for three decades that she was sexually assaulted by Vince in 1986.
It is also a known fact among wrestling circles that former announcer Mel Philips was accused for sexually grooming underage boys, fired, then later brought back onto the job when the smoke had settled. This doesn’t even begin to go into Pat Patterson, a former wrestling champion and McMahon lackey that had any number of accusations tossed his way among fellow wrestlers and employees of the company. Not only was Patterson never punished tangibly for his actions, he was consistently on television during the Attitude era, the apex of WWF’s popularity.
While similar situations have caused the fall of powerful people (Bill Gates comes to mind), wrestling fans have been quick to rush to Vince’s defense, with Stockholm Syndromesque zeal. The general tenor has been that since Vince paid the people off with his own money, it’s not a big deal. That this is natural behavior. That he is too big to be taken down. Every time you think this, it is just reiterating the fact that white men with money don’t have to suffer the same consequences as normal people.
Everything detailed above would get normal people fired from their position, and ostracized by their peers. But as footnoted above, more often than not, wrestling fans are not the type of people who treat women as human beings because their heroes on television never had to. Seriously, watch WWF programming from 1996-2016. Women are nothing more than scantily clad side pieces for their male counterparts.
For two decades, be it lingerie matches mud pit matches, battle royals won by men in drag, or quite literally having to kiss Vince McMahon’s ass on television, the treatment of women on WWF/WWE television has lead to the fan base believing that Vince is some sort of deity, above the law or common decency.
While he has technically stepped down as CEO during an internal investigation that will inevitably lead to nothing, McMahon is still involved in every day to day decision and is still in charge of creative. He will reinsert himself as CEO eventually, claiming vindication whenever the sham investigation is completed. He will blame cancel culture and wokeness for the fact that he was ever forced to step down in the first place.
It will be neither of those things, though. Vince McMahon is just a piece of shit.
The Bear geographical backlash is whiny and unnecessary.
FX recently released the show The Bear, about a Michelin star chef brought back home to Chicago to take over his brother’s restaurant after his death. It is chaotic and sensitive. Fast paced but pleasant. All in all, it’s an awesome show with a great, diverse cast that speaks to the ever growing diverse food scene in Chicago.
That hasn’t stopped critics from saying that it isn’t an accurate representation of the city. Specifically the complaint is that the location of the restaurant, which is River North, is too gentrified to be accurate. There is complaining that you can’t make a show that doesn’t accurately represent a Chicago neighborhood unless you are making it for people who aren’t in the city and don’t know otherwise…
Yes, that’s exactly what is being made. While the show is based in Chicago, it is not a documentary. Obviously, the show took aspects of a much broader sense of Chicago rather than isolating the neighborhood. Nobody wants to watch a show about a bunch of CBOE bros getting kicked out of Boss Bar, which is the more accurate representation of River North.
While city pride is important, we really don’t NEED to be bragging about the Chicago accent. It sounds like someone is choking on a polish sausage at literally all times. We don’t need to get on actors for not dead nuts nailing the accent. While the city tends to think it’s good natured when people mock or parody the accent, they are still mocking and parodying the accent.
I can only speak from my experience, but whenever I see a website or twitter feed or podcast that has “DA” in it, I know i’m about to read/hear some full on stupid takes.
I can’t tell if Snowflake Mountain is fake, but I still love it
Just in case you missed it, Nextlix debuted a new show straight out of every middle aged man’s fantasy, Snowflake Mountain. The premise of the reality show is that 10 twenty somethings who haven’t had to experience any difficulties in life are put out into the wilderness and forced to live off the land with the help of three survival experts.
The premise is to teach the people on the show how to chase dreams, push through difficulties, not give up, and develop a work ethic. The actual output is watching millennial suffering porn.
As a mindless show that helps fill the hours of your evening, it is a pretty stellar time filler. But I can’t help feeling like the setup and execution is heavily staged. Unless Netflix cast the show with the explicit purpose of tracking down the most over-the-top people to participate in the show, casting continuity be damned, some of the characters feel like they are playing the role of a spoiled millennial, rather than an actual millennial reacting to problems put in front of them.
Of the people on the show, Deandra should have her own show yesterday. She actually acts as the chaotic neutral of the show. She both does as little as possible, while still being a scene stealing support system for the other characters on the show. Solomon, on the other hand, plays it so over the top that you want to physically punch him in the face at all times. His lack of self awareness is so absurd that is hard to believe he is a real person and not doing this intentionally.
Randy is a prototypical “Florida Guy” who comes off a bit like a professional wrestler, which makes sense after you see his Instagram and realize that he is ACTUALLY a professional wrestler.
Aspects of it feel pretty contrived, but it is perfect background television. I can assure you that you don’t have to pay too close of attention to it. Fold clothes. Do Wordle. Make small talk with a loved one. Whenever you refocus on the show, it will be right where you expect it to be.
Feud Of The Week
Elon Musk vs. Donald Trump
Elon Musk is a mega-billionaire. Donald Trump is a pretend-billionaire. They are both incredibly polarizing and you could argue society would be better off if neither existed.
The problem is, the feeling seemed to be that there was mutual admiration there. Elon talked endlessly about free speech being disrupted thanks to Donald and his roving group of anti-vax, racist, and generally cringe interlopers getting kicked off Twitter. Elon swung in, pretending to buy Twitter. He was never actually going to. The amusing thing about his crusade against Twitter bots is that it will most likely show that most of the bots are from countries like Russia that have very heavily influenced recent elections in favor of the exact conservatives Musk now seems to be courting.
Using the bot excuse is a whole mess that Musk knew he was creating. The right wing media has decided over and over that Twitter is a liberal echo chamber in spite of the obvious existence of far right mouth pieces getting amplified on it. It’s the whole “let’s call liberals pedos, even though we are the ones that keep getting caught doing it” gambit.
With all of the support he was getting from Musk, noted liar Trump decided to go to one of his “not a presidential rally but probably a presidential rally” and say that Elon told him personally that he voted for Trump in 2020. Trump blows smoke up his constituents asses constantly, and this was just another one of those things. Except this time, Musk decided to respond.
Even by Musk standards, this seems pretty innocuous. But oh man, did it start a thing. And you start a thing with an “increasingly more time on his hands” Donald Trump, you better come correct. Trump changed his tune at his next Klan Rally supporter meetup. At this point, Trump decided to call Musk a bullshit artist.
Then Musk came back by saying that Trump was too old to run for president, again. This is a very correct point. Donald Trump would be 82 years old by the time his next presidential run ended, and he is a barely functional adult now. Of course, then Musk went on to say that he thinks that Ron DeSantis would win against Biden without even campaigning. That’s basically like saying you don’t think people should be allowed to use handguns, but should be able to use high powered machine guns made of bibles…though the right is fine with either one killing children.
Trump got all lathered up today and decided to fire off his response on MySpace or whatever place that he is pretending is popular.
Ok. In terms of rebuttals, this is Trump firing on all cylinders. He checked all of the boxes. Saying Musk would be worthless without him? Check. Belittling his company and everything it does? Check. Implying that he can make Musk do whatever he wants? Check.
This is like watching an aging baseball player hit a long home run. You are never quite sure if it will be their last long ball, but it brings back memories of when they were great at it. This is 2011 on Twitter Trump. Back when Trump was the Mike Trout of randomly starting pissing matches online. He was truly at the top of his game back then. Now? He is pushing up on being an octogenarian, ranting on a second class social media site. Clearly past his prime. But Donald still managed to barrel up one. Truly magical to see.
Musk’s response felt very much like a 50 year old trying to pretend he is younger.
It’s all there. The extra o’s in LMAO. Grandpa Simpson waving his fist at a cloud. He really just needed to put “Oh the irony.” Oh trust me, Elon, we definitely all see the irony in a legendary con artist implying that you are a con artist.
Here is the truly beautiful thing about this feud. It will not end anytime soon. Neither person is going to just let this go. Donald will keep forcing some Liberty University intern to craft official looking photoshops with what he believes are just absolute top notch zingers, which will then be posted on Trump’s Xanga account and then picked up by other sites. Musk will take around 45 seconds to respond, in between talking to a curiously large amount of people on Twitter who have things related to Dogecoin in their bios.
This could go on forever. I hope this goes on forever.
Top Three Prolapsed Anuses of the Week
3: Jill Biden-Maybe lets just have nobody in this family talk. Like ever again.
2: Jerry Reinsdorf-Tony LaRussa still hasn’t been fired. Reinsdorf will stay on the list until he is.
1: 2021 QM1-Fuck you, asteroid. I don’t care if you aren’t supposed to hit earth for 30 years, Bruce Willis is no longer in any condition to blow you up.
Dead Person of the Week
George Steinbrenner! George died on this date in 2010. But his legacy has carried on. Why? Well that’s obvious. Comedy Central has begun playing old episodes of Seinfeld, giving us the joy of the boss of the assistant to the traveling secretary George Costanza on basic cable everyday!
For those more sports inclined, Steinbrenner was the longtime owner of the Yankees and somebody who I loathed when I was younger, but have grown an immense amount of respect for in my old age. George had this weird, esoteric desire as a sports owner, and that was to win every year. He didn’t care what it cost. He was willing to spend the necessary money to field a winning ball club. When I was young, I hated that the Yankees won every year while my Kevin Maas and Brien Taylor rookie cards continued to not gain in value.
But now i’m forced to root for a baseball team in the middle of a shameless rebuild. And I root for a hockey team in the middle of a shameless rebuild. And I root for a football team in the middle of a shameless rebuild. I wish I had Steinbrenner as an owner of my favorite sports teams.
Whether you liked him or hated him, George completely changed the way professional sports teams operate. He was willing to pay for talent. He was willing to pay to win. Money was secondary. Championships were what mattered. Goddamn I miss having people who cared like that.
What Song Became Classic Rock This Week
It’s a known fact that music becomes classic after 20 years. Well, what song was released 20 years ago that is now officially classic rock?
Can’t Stop by Red Hot Chili Peppers. It seems like everything in the RHCP catalog has been classic rock since the day it was released. Under the Bridge is going to play forever alongside every godforsaken Led Zeppelin song. Give it Away, Scar Tissue, Otherside, they will all end up getting massive airplay in between whatever dogshit Bon Jovi song just played, and Life is a Highway by Tom Cochrane.
Can’t Stop is the Peppers trying to prove they are psychedelic and nu metaly and whatnot. It ended up just being another RHCP song that is rock without being edgy. The lack of edge is what will guarantee this song will live on in classic rock form forever.
What To Look Out For This Week
1: The James Webb Telescope will discover life in a far away galaxy. It will turn out that the alien life made brief connection with the United States in the early 90’s, but left after Perfect Strangers was cancelled.
2: A new episode of The Bachelorette will air. And I will die a little on the inside.
3: On the heels of their release of Flaming Hot Cheeto Mountain Dew, soda lovers will be clamoring for the brand new Carolina Reaper RC Cola.
Fancy Boys Club 