WWE’s Uneven Attempts to Reach Black Fans – Andscape

Pro wrestling has all the time had an advanced relationship with race, largely due to its history of using stereotypes and derogatory portrayals of athletes. For a long time, World Wrestling Entertainment, America’s largest pro wrestling company, has exploited offensive themes of black wrestlers in its programming while stifling the recognition of a few of its most talented black stars. In recent years, the corporate has showcased talents comparable to Kofi Kingston, Bobby Lashley, Bianca Belair and more, awarding them championships and mainstream attention for his or her efforts. However, there remains to be unrest amongst fans who proceed to demand more representation higher up on WWE cards. Last week, the corporate openly responded to these concerns by incorporating Black culture into its shows and tipping its hat to WWE’s most loyal Black fans. The results show how far WWE has are available Black representation and what obstacles lie ahead.

The first sound you hear while watching WWE’s October 5 premium live event in Atlanta is Future rapping the lyrics “my b— with it too” from the album “GTA” from his album with Metro Boomin. As the song plays over the State Farm Arena speakers, WWE announcer Michael Cole recaps the show’s matches and cuts to a video skit featuring WWE Champion Cody Rhodes and WWE Hall of Famer and the corporate’s Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque having Metro Boomin as an envoy series. The live event was hosted by Jade Cargill, Bianca Belair and Naomi, a triumvirate of Black female wrestlers who’ve develop into a number of the sport’s biggest stars, often gaining popularity with their Black Girl Magic brand of wrestling.

The event felt like a celebration of the Black fans who were there the idea of WWE’s popularity and current viewership and revenue growth – just take a look at all of the hashtags and comments on social media for a given episode , or . However, Bad Blood was not without justified criticism from Black fans. The show didn’t feature any black wrestlers in any matches. Cargill, Belair and Naomi are the one Black wrestlers to perform at top-quality live events in months, and there was no Black singles champion on WWE’s major roster throughout 2024. Black wrestlers have also been absent from major feuds within the WWE company.

The juxtaposition of a live event that brought together black fans in a black city with black entertainers from that city while there have been no black wrestlers within the ring was too obvious to ignore. At the post-WWE press conference, Levesque, WWE’s chief creative officer, was asked in regards to the lack of black characters within the series. His answer it was disappointing.

“I don’t see a difference in anyone. I don’t see color, I don’t see nationality, I don’t see any of that. I just see talent. I don’t see any difference between men and women. I see talent,” Levesque said. “We tell stories about these talents, how they handle them, how they can represent them and how we can develop them. I don’t follow all this. I do what’s important and what’s best, what’s best in storytelling and what’s best delivered, and that’s what happens. It is no different than the men and women who are the main events. Whatever the biggest stories are, that’s where we’re going to go.”

The response was immediate and justified. Levesque’s use of the “I don’t see color” trope was as lazy and dismissive a response as possible. Not seeing colours is just not seeing the experiences that make us who we’re. And not seeing color in an industry that relies heavily on degrading characters due to color of their skin is an insult.

If you squint, you may see the problem in highlighting Black talent from a WWE perspective. Some of this was down to bad luck: the corporate’s next big black star, Big E, in 2022, he suffered a profession-threatening broken neckderailing his profession and leading to the demise of his group The New Day. So much of the corporate’s television time is taken up by The Bloodline storyline, led by Roman Reigns and his Samoan brothers, leaving a live broadcast that does not engage them or the wrestlers of their ecosystem at a premium. At the identical time, there was an exodus of black talent from WWE, with wrestlers comparable to Ricochet, Lashley and MVP leaving the corporate and moving to rival AEW. However, it’s also a mirrored image of their dissatisfaction with being a component of WWE and the way they were treated by the corporate.

Still, Levesque’s comments stunned the corporate into realizing they needed to send a greater message. So on October 8, WWE opened the printed at showcasing every black champion in the corporate — Women’s Tag Team Champions Cargill and Belair, Champion Trick Williams and NXT North American Women’s Champion Kelani Jordan — stand within the ring at the identical time. Friday featured a women’s tag team championship match between Cargill and Belair and the tag team of Lash Legend and Jakara Jackson. This can be the primary time 4 black women competed for the tag team championships in WWE history, which was confirmed on-air by the announce team.

Bad Blood and Levesque’s follow-up to the disastrous press conference was an excellent-faith gesture from an organization that understands it must do right by its black fans, even when it has stumbled to this point. At the very least, the willingness to truly embrace black viewers is a step in the best direction for an organization that has long insulted black fans without even fascinated by trying to fix it. Still, WWE has a great distance to go to get to a spot where more black faces are more visible in major events with championships at stake. With a flood of black talent and an organization that could be very aware of the necessity to highlight that talent, it looks like it’s only a matter of time before black wrestlers return to the highest of the cardboard, however it needs to be an urgent goal that WWE needs to prioritize to ensure that potential stars to develop into mainstream players.