Elections Imitate Professional Wrestling

October 24, 2024

By Jim Towey

The campaign for the presidency of the United States finally draws to a close.

Most voters now see the race as good versus evil. The back-and-forth in the polls has been dizzying, with one candidate appearing to be ahead one moment and not the next. There has been a ton of outside interference, including special interest money, media meddling, and celebrity endorsements. Both sides already are crying foul, which means the loser will not likely accept the outcome.

I have seen these exact same dynamics at work before – not from past elections, but from my childhood when I watched professional wrestling. I learned early on that life imitates wrestling. This national election proves the rule.

Good guy-bad guy

The apocalyptic language from the Trump and Harris partisans about what is at stake in the 2024 election is to be expected. Elections, like wrestling, thrive on polarization and conflict. Donald Trump understands that it is the bad guy who fills the arena, not the good guy. That explains why he leans into the role and seems to delight in infuriating people. In contrast, in the opposite, blue corner, Kamala Harris has embraced her “baby face,” messenger-of-joy role.

Identity politics is dominant. The golden age of wrestling I knew – before Vince McMahon and the WWE ruined the sport with steroids and raunch – was centered on it. The Italian immigrant Bruno Sammartino and the Latino Pedro Morales were world champions who packed Madison Square Garden with their faithful followers. How could modern politics be any different?

Some tribes formed around wrestlers who made patriotic appeals in ways seekers of high office vainly emulate. “The American Dream” Dusty Rhodes and “U.S. Marine” Sergeant Slaughter literally draped themselves in the flag when they entered the ring, a tactic imitated by the more subdued backdrop of flags behind every Trump and Harris podium. Identities for the villains were dictated by U.S. foreign policy. Hiro Matsuda and Seiji Sakaguchi (Japan), the Great Malenko and Nikolai Volkoff (Russia), and the Iron Sheik (Iran), were heckled and booed simply because their countries were past or current enemies of America.

Life isn’t fair

And these villains won their matches by cheating and getting away with it. Wrestling taught me that life isn’t fair. If you think today’s mainstream media is corrupt and biased, you should have

seen the wrestling referees of yesteryear. They were no more a neutral arbiter committed to fairness than the NY Times or NY Post. Journalists today fake impartiality the way referees did. But without doubt, the man in the striped shirt, like the legacy media today, had an agenda. His job was to be biased, never admit it, and follow the choreographed script, which usually meant failing to see what the fans clearly saw.

Such gaslighting has always been a standard staple for a fake sport pretending to be real. I remember watching a TV replay of a match that ended with a wooden cane being broken over the good guy’s head just as the referee was “distracted.” The commentator pointed out this blatant violation of the rules to legendary bad guy Fred Blassie as they viewed the television replay together. Blassie was nonplussed. He simply responded, “What cane?” This technique has not been lost on the presidential candidates attempting damage control whenever an inconvenient fact from the past presents itself. What January 6th? What border czar?

How wrestling matches and elections conclude follow established tradition. All wrestlers have a signature hold that they employ to get opponents to concede defeat. Joe Scarpa used “the Sleeper,” a head-hold that rendered an opponent “unconscious.” Malenko had “the Russian Sickle,” where he sat on the back of his foe and pulled the guy’s chin with both hands until he conceded. You can’t carry the electoral college without a dominant finishing move. Trump has inflation and immigration; Harris has threat-to-democracy and abortion. No wonder the race is a toss-up.

Who wins?

Who will prevail? The “deep state” – the wrestling overlords – decided the fate of the two in the ring. Campaigns today follow suit, even if elections have the illusion of being decided by the voters. From now until November 5th, enormous sums of money will be spent to sway the electorate. Before it’s over, or when it is, we may even see allegations of cheating from the losing side. This is to be expected. The end of wrestling matches was seldom without controversy.

Shakespeare said something like, “All the world’s a ring, and all the men and women merely wrestlers.” I say amen! Life will go on regardless of who wins the 2024 presidential election. America will live to fight another day.

(The views expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Aging with Dignity and/or its Board of Directors.)