Greetings. February has been designated as Black History month in the United States and Canada and, as such, we’ve been paying homage to trailblazing black notables: in the civil rights movement and politics, such as Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Barack Obama; in the arts, including Harry Belafonte, Diana Ross, Sydney Poitier, Michael Jackson and Prince; and sports, including the likes of Muhammad Ali, Jackie Robinson, Jesse Owens, Jim Brown, Bill Russel, Arthur Ashe and Althea Gibson.
Pro wrestling also played its part in the “we shall overcome” movement, with a myriad of talented and exemplary black wrestlers raising the bar, including the likes of Luther Lindsay, Seelie Samara, Ernie Ladd, Bobo Brazil, Sweet Daddy Siki, Bad News Allen and my old friend Abdullah the Butcher, all raising the bar in the ring and raising public consciousness outside of it.
I’m proud to relate that, back in the dark days of racial segregation, liberal thinking promoters, such as my father and others, like Paul Boesch, Gust Karras, Morris Siegel and Don Owens, helped break down the barriers of racial prejudice, by pushing many of the above mentioned black stars, when other narrow minded and bigoted promoters in Canada and the United States refused to even have them on their cards.
To their credit, many of the other major sports in North America, including boxing, baseball, basketball, football and even ice hockey have knocked down most of the prevailing barriers that used to exist as far as showcasing black athletes. This is reflected in the number of black superstars who have won world championship titles, most valuable player, most outstanding player and other awards that recognize them as the best of the best.
I hate to be, once again, railing on the enlightened despots in the WWE for their shortcomings, but, as a longstanding member of the wrestling fraternity, I’m somewhat embarrassed and chagrined to note that pro wrestling – specifically the WWE, to date, has had only one black world’s heavyweight champion that I know of – that being, Dwayne Johnson (who, I might add, is actually only half black and half Samoan). Other than him, I can’t recall any other blacks wearing the WWE’s penultimate title, although a few of the other lesser titles, such as tag team belts, divas and cruiserweight titles, have been worn, on occasion by blacks.
I’m honestly not sure what to attribute the dearth of black world heavyweight champions to. It’s certainly not because there’s been a shortage of talented or charismatic black wrestlers, as there have been all kinds of superlative black stars more than worthy of wearing the world title. It also can’t be attributed to the lack of black wrestling fans out there, because there are probably as many, if not more, avid black fans attending live wrestling shows in major cities across the United States, such as Atlanta, New Orleans, Dallas, Kansas City, Detroit, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York than there are white fans.
I’m sure that those orchestrating the schematics in the WWE are well aware of this and, as such, I’d like to inquire why they haven’t seen fit to put the world heavyweight strap on more African Americans.
Aside from the dearth of black world heavyweight champions to date in the WWE, perhaps even more disturbing has been how many black wrestlers have been stereotypically cast as pimps and low I. Q. “jungle bunny” types, including the likes of the Godfather, Slick, Sapphire, the Boogeyman, JYD and Kamala.
To be fair, Hollywood, back in the day, to its discredit, used to feature similar black stereotypes such as Amos and Andy, Uncle Remus, Butterfly McQueen and Al Jolson (with his face painted black). They’ve long since abandoned such dubious vestiges of racism however and many of their best movies have since served to enlighten people about and to condemn discrimination and racial prejudice and to promote equality.
I hereby throw down the proverbial gauntlet to the WWE to follow suit, because, correct me if I’m wrong, the WWE does not stand for White Wrestling Entertainment, but World Wrestling Entertainment. We are the world and here’s hoping that Hunter, Vince, or whoever else, sees fit to pick up that gauntlet, because I have no doubt that it would be “what’s best for business!”
On that note, I’ll call this a wrap but will look forward to catching up with you all next time for more perspectives on the wrestling scene.
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