Steve Austin was everything professional wrestling needed in the late-nineties. Its often been said that the term Attitude Era can be used to describe pop-culture as a whole for that time. South Park and Jerry Springer were two of the most popular shows on TV and Limp Bizkit were just about to become one of the biggest bands on the planet. Stone Cold had the swagger, the attitude and he had the sign language to fit right in as part of this zeitgeist. Its so simple that it seems genius looking back. Stone Cold flipping the bird was the quickest shorthand to let people know that this wasnt the wrestling they were used to. Austins devil-may-care attitude saw him clash with the likes of Sgt. Slaughter, Vince McMahon and even Mike Tyson and he had the same gesture for every single one of them. Its been written a million times, but the appeal of Stone Cold was that everyone wants to be able to flip off their boss and Austin was the hero who could. Fans lived vicariously through Austin and when he flipped off his boss, he was flipping off every boss in the country and catapulting himself to megastardom.
