The Secret History Of WWE’s Ruthless Aggression Era | Wrestling Timelines
June 22-24, 2007 - The Chris Benoit Double-Murder Suicide
Chris Benoit, the wrestler, does not warrant the descriptor “ruthless”. He is by several accounts a sadist bully, but not a savvy, mercenary politician. He is however aggressive in his in-ring approach. He shows enough of that to win the World Heavyweight title at WrestleMania XX.
It’s a surreal sight - utterly ghastly to think of it like this in 2025, but in 2004, it’s moving. Benoit is never meant for this. He can barely cut a promo, he looks like a midcard hand built from the ground up, not a star, and he doesn’t radiate anything approaching superstar-level charisma. He is simply so electrifying at the craft of pro wrestling that he eventually commands the respect of a man, Vince, who has tried throughout his entire life as a promoter to banish that very word.
Tragically, this aggression and intensity results in countless agonising and terrifying shoot blows to the head, resulting in a posthumous diagnosis of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE). This is cited as one contributing theory to the horrific events of June 22-24, 2007.
It’s more complex and disturbing than that. The entire truth will never be arrived at. Chris Benoit took joy in tormenting people. He was a domestic abuser. He was so fervently dedicated to his craft that he knowingly destroyed his mind and body to continue doing it. The grief he endured as a result of Eddie Guerrero’s death, on November 13, 2005, caused a full psychotic breakdown.
Across June 22-24, Benoit murders his wife Nancy, his son Daniel, and then kills himself. WWE, per Irvin Muchnick’s book ‘Chris & Nancy’, knows of the timeline and the cause of deaths, but proceeds with a tribute show regardless. This horrific murder-suicide is incomprehensibly evil. It happens all too often, but rarely against such a public backdrop.
Everything changes after this darkest hour. WWE must cleanse itself - optically - to become an attractive proposition to sponsors and advertisers. A year later, after a nine year stint, WWE RAW is no longer rated TV-14 (a change that came into effect in January 1999).