The Origins Of The nation Of Domination

[asiatic7]

Can one of you smart, insightful, articulate, handsome/ gorgeous, charismatic guys...or gals enlighten me to this next topic. I was listening to Colt Cabana's podcast featuring that nutjob New Jack, he was talking about his stint in SMW. I didn't know how racist it was because I never watched the SMW program (I live in NY, I don't think it was available). I went to everyone's favorite visual encyclopedia... YouTube and dug up some old New Jack promos. They reminded me of Farooq and the NOD. New Jack's Smoky Mountain stuff was from 1994 and the NOD was in 1997. Can someone please share info on this. Was the SMW stuff inspiration for WWF to do their NOD version? Was Jim Cornette in anyway involved with the idea being that he was in both companies at the time these controversial angles were going on? Please enlighten me...

 

[Devlin]

While they may have been some similarities brought to the front due to both groups talking about racism and being held down, there were a lot of key differences.

While New Jack & Mustafa were portrayed more as thugs/gangsters, the NOD was more in reference to the Nation of Islam and to some extent the Black Panthers. Jim Cornette was in the WWF at that time so may have been involved, but the original concept seems to have been taken from The Nation of Domination faction in the United States Wrestling Association run by Jerry Jarrett in Tennessee.

 

[The Fabulous Rougeau's]

The Nation got their start in the WWE in late 96. Originally the group included Farooq, Crush, Savio Vega, Clarence Mason (some tiny black lawyer guy), D-Lo (this was before he was an ctive wrestler. Here he was just a bodygaurd type) and some white rapping duo who were not wrestlers. As Devlin said the group was some sort of combination of Nation of Islam and Black Panthers. The group started out by fueding with Ahmed Johnson (continuation of Farooq's singles fued with him) and eventually LOD joined Ahmed and they had a six man tag match at Mania XIII.

By the summer of 97 Farooq got rid of everyone except for D-Lo and made the Nation more of a black power group with all members being black. This was also the infamous gang wars time in WWE were The Nation, DOA (Crush's new group of biker dudes) and Los Boriquas (Savio's Puerto Rican group) fueded with each other on the regular. I believe it was Farooq's loss during a title match against Taker that lead him to break up the group.

 

[asiatic7]

The Nation got their start in the WWE in late 96. Originally the group included Farooq, Crush, Savio Vega, Clarence Mason (some tiny black lawyer guy), D-Lo (this was before he was an ctive wrestler. Here he was just a bodygaurd type) and some white rapping duo who were not wrestlers. As Devlin said the group was some sort of combination of Nation of Islam and Black Panthers. The group started out by fueding with Ahmed Johnson (continuation of Farooq's singles fued with him) and eventually LOD joined Ahmed and they had a six man tag match at Mania XIII.

By the summer of 97 Farooq got rid of everyone except for D-Lo and made the Nation more of a black power group with all members being black. This was also the infamous gang wars time in WWE were The Nation, DOA (Crush's new group of biker dudes) and Los Boriquas (Savio's Puerto Rican group) fueded with each other on the regular. I believe it was Farooq's loss during a title match against Taker that lead him to break up the group.

Yes. This I know already. My question was if the NOD was inspired by Yhe Gangstas in SMW. I'm well schooled in the history of the NOI and the original Black Panther Party, but I want to know what was the motive behind creating the group in WWF. Thanks for the info though.

 

[Afro-Ameri-Spawn]

To answer your question, they were not. The WWE wanted to be a little edgy and decided to go with this to appease Farooq aka Ron Simmons for that God awful Modern Day Gladiator gimmick they had him do when he first came into the WWE. They wanted to push him towards being their first black world champion and they needed something that would ignite the crowd and help people easily forget the stupid costume that he wore for that previously stated gimmick. When he first came out, they grouped him with a lawyer(every fans most hated figure) in Clarence Mason, a young impressionable lackey in D-Lo Brown, a hated contradiction in PG-13(the white rap duo who accompanied Farooq to the ring in order to make sure that they were not taken seriously that they would truly offend anyone with their "Nation of Islam" similarities, and a subjugated female member in Miss Jacqueline(the woman who would lay down in front of him during earlier entrances so that he could literally step over her on his way to the ring. The group was originally going to be a way for the WWE to raid the USWA to infuse it's roster with new talent to back up Farooq. Unfortunately, due to a D-Lo Brown injury and the undersized stature of PG-13, the group needed more members to be added in order to make it look like a legitimate forceful stable. Hence when Crush and Savio Vega were added. Unfortunately, it sort of diluted the group and made it look more like a joke than a REAL black power group. So the group was restructured with Kama Mustafa(The Godfather), Mark Henry, and eventually The Rock. The group never truly had the effect for Farooq that was intended, but it served it's purpose as entertaining.

But to truly answer your question, the group was NOT influenced by The Gangstas. It was more influenced by Ron Simmons past gimmick with Doom where and "Hacksaw" Butch Reed claimed repeatedly that they were being held down and treated unfairly due to them being black. I think if not for the fact that Teddy Long was just seen as being a referee at the time, he would have been the manager of the group like he was when e was the manger of Doom.