10 Times WWE Used Major News Events In Questionable Taste
2. Chris Benoit's Death
When Chris Benoit died on 24 June 2007, the WWE had to move fast to acknowledge the death of one of its most respected performers on the next day's Raw. Moving rapidly, it put together a three-hour tribute show of matches, clips and interviews with wrestlers who had known him.
They could have gone ahead with the planned show and added a mention of Benoit's death, then produced a fuller tribute once they had all the facts, but that might not have played too well. There was no way the WWE were going to risk being criticised for not putting out a full bells and whistles tribute to show how much they cared.
Shortly after the tribute show, the news broke that Benoit had murdered his wife and child before hanging himself. The WWE put the hammer down on anything mentioning Benoit and the man's name is still radioactive on WWE broadcasting today. And yet the WWE put out a tribute show to how wonderful he was, oblivious to the appalling tragedy surrounding his last days.