The WWE Has Lost Their Collective Mind (Truth/Confederate Uniform)

Not exactly how I'd have dressed if I were Truth...
Photo Credit: WWE.com

Like I said last night on Instant Feedback, I very much enjoyed the opening segment to RAW. The promo work from everyone involved was good, even Cena being in smart-ass mode worked as he didn't get too smarmy. Every part of the segment worked except for one. R-Truth's wardrobe was really, really galling to me. I get the reason why they had him dress up in the grey jacket of the Confederacy, or why he himself volunteered. I don't know whose idea it was.

I do know it was a terrible one though.

There are certain things associated with the Confederacy that come to mind to anyone who is reminded of the Civil War. While they seceded from the union over states' rights, and the Civil War itself wasn't fought with the freedom of the slaves in mind as a primary focus (a common fallacy held by many today), it's still an undeniable fact that each one of the Confederate States was a slave state. It's also an undeniable fact that a vast majority, if not the entirety, of slaves at the time of the Civil War were black.

It'd have been in poor taste for someone who wasn't black to wear the uniform. It was not only borderline racist, but obliviously stupid to have Truth, or another black wrestler, wear it. Whether or not you thought the writers and Truth himself, by acquiescing to the request if he wasn't the one whose idea it was anyway, were being racist, and I fully believe they weren't, the actions still don't speak well of the intent, especially today. So much groundwork has been laid to try and create a post-racial society, but at the same time, you're never going to eliminate bad feelings between races, or ethnic groups or any kind of division. It's human nature to be somewhat exclusionary with people who don't look, talk or behave like you.

SO yeah, even if they didn't mean to do so, they offended some of their fans last night with that gesture. The sad part was, Truth could have cut the EXACT same promo last night without wearing the grey jacket and still had it come across as effective. That's where the idiocy lies in this situation. It's not like the Confederate uniform could be chalked up to "heels being heels" like, say, the Piggie James angle or other things that heels do that could be considered edgy. The lone exception would be if he was maybe feuding with another black wrestler, but even then, I'm sure I wouldn't be the only one to find it in poor taste.

The WWE put a huge blemish on their opening segment last night, a segment that otherwise might have been pitch-perfect, by the absolutely braindead blunder of outfitting R-Truth in a Confederate uniform. While they may not have intended to come across as racist, well, sometimes intent can be garbled within action. It's not especially wise, especially for a company that is already on thin ice with one minority lobby in the gay community.

Remember you can contact TH and ask him questions about wrestling, life or anything else. Please refer to this post for contact information. He always takes questions!

Instant Feedback: R-Truth, You Probably Shouldn't Wear That

Full disclosure: I thought the opening segment to RAW, which was really the closing segment to Tough Enough bleeding into RAW in something surreal, was entertaining as hell. I thought Truf's rambling was hilarious. I liked what I saw from Miz and Alex Riley. Cena was... Cena. It was clusterfucky, and reminiscent of 1999-2000 in a weird but good way. I dug it.

That being said, whose fucking idea was it to have R-Truth wear a Confederate soldier's uniform? There's edgy, and there's stupid. While I didn't have a problem with it, it's stupid to tempt outcry like that. Then again, it did lead to a really good main event with some really good moments, like Miz jaw-jacking with Austin, Riley getting a really loud chant followed by the most nuclear hot tag for Cena that I've ever heard in my life. The finish was... well yeah, it was fanservice. At the same time, they did it a couple of weeks ago with Bret Hart. A bit more creativity needed from WWE Creative... haha, yeah right.

I was pretty baffled though... why the fuck would the RAW GM give Austin his job right after undermining his decision? Christ, these writers were in rare form tonight. Ugh.

Anyway, outside of the main angle, this was an all-over-the-place RAW. There were good spots, like the wrestling, Punk's pre-match promo and Booker T (!) wrestling in a singles match for the first time in like five years in WWE. It was pretty nice too. Plus, they continue to build the Jack Swagger/Evan Bourne feud nicely. It's also always good to see Zack Ryder on RAW, even when he's jobbing, and Dolph Ziggler on commentary was really, really pointed and fit well. Seriously, talking about the US Championship like it's important? Tommy likey.

However, the bullshit parity booking reared its ugly head again, with a mini-program between CM Punk and Rey Mysterio wrapping up neatly in two weeks. We got two great matches out of it yeah. I'm not complaining about that. But would it kill them to use two of their strongest characters in something more than trading wins with no other storyline advancement? Weak. Then you have Alberto del Rio, who's usually on point. I got excited when I saw him, but then he rolled out Ricardo Rodriguez as a dimestore Big Show. No. People say feuds with Big Show are momentum killers. However, is it the act of feuding with Show, or is it that Creative doesn't give a shit with Show, since they know he's probably just going be in a tag filler match or wrestle in a celebrity match at WrestleMania, and thus his endgame is really, really unimportant. I don't know.

Mixed bag tonight, the very definition. Next week's a three hour RAW though, so you know it'll be heavy on the wrestling. At least we have that going for us.

Remember you can contact TH and ask him questions about wrestling, life or anything else. Please refer to this post for contact information. He always takes questions!