15 Things We Learned From Dark Side Of The Ring: Muhammad Hassan
10. His Scary Experience On Tour In Australia
During 'Dark Side', Copani remembered being with WWE in Australia and drinking at a bar with Gene Snitksy, Chris Masters and others when a group of men approached he and Daivari. They were Muslim, and things got heated. The men were angry that these guys were portraying Muslim characters on TV rather than living faith for real. If he was being upfront, Copani hadn’t even thought about that!
The penny suddenly dropped that Muslims would be offended by “a non-Muslim portraying that character”. This shows the other side of things. Copani and Daivari didn’t just have to look out for people in the United States who might've been tense post-9/11, but they had to think of the other side of the coin too. Some other Arab-Americans would be mad at what he was doing.
Deep down, Marc knew he’d be fine in Australia because he was surrounded by wrestlers (Snitsky told VICE he was prepared to fight if he had to), but it was one of the first times Copani had second thoughts about the Muhammad Hassan character. “That’s when the lines between wrestling and reality no longer existed”, he said.
It came as a real shock to him that Muslim people would even react this way at all. That's rather silly looking back, but he genuinely hadn't paused to think of the impact on a certain demographic of people other than those showering him with boos or telling him to "go home".
Somewhat ironically given the surroundings, this was a sobering wake-up call for Copani, but he was already in too deep.