10 Problems Only WWE Fans Will Understand

It’s demonstrably unfair, but there’s no getting around it.

A pecking order exists even in the scorned and pitied bubble of pro wrestling fandom, and as a purely WWF/E fan (depending on your vintage, and whether you’re pre- or post-panda), you’re near the bottom of that order.

For years, you’ll have sat on the outside of the conversations of the so-called true hardcore fans as they talk in code about tiny indy promotions, or about the New Japans and the CMLLs. They’ll have gently mocked your stunted knowledge of actual wrestling history, indoctrinated as you are by the Stalinist revisionism of Stamford and the odd snippet culled from books by Foley or Jericho.

So what if you believe that Vince McMahon is the maverick genius that invented Hulkamania, beat the US government and won the Monday Night Wars? History is written by the winners, after all, and the WWE won. There’s barely anyone left alive who remembers the old days - people who were busy being born when Bret Hart won his first World title are now raising kids of their own.

So you cheerfully sit on the outside, expected to pay deference to the little federations with their unfamiliar initials and shoddy production values, and the proper, foreign professional wrestling for proper professional wrestling fans… because you’ve got SPORTS ENTERTAINMENT stamped on your forehead like your mama lost a bet with God, and you don’t care who knows it.