TNA Taking Shots at WWE

[InuJoshua]

If it is valid for discussion then why do you continually say I should not be talking about it? I did not change the conversation and never said one justified the other. In fact I specifically said they were not related. Remind me again why obsessing about ratings is not changing the conversation to fit your point? I do not think either of us did anything wrong btw. It is called a discussion because you are supposed to branch into arguably related concepts. Also, how is the discussion about TNA "attacking" WWE. Talk about loaded rhetoric. This is about TNA making jokes about WWE. One of my main points is why do people think these jokes are some vicious assault on WWE. That is a crazy overraction IMO.

The only reason I mentioned the word Justified is because you had brought it up here:

"My point is that justified is in the eye of the beholder and in the eyes of people that actually enjoy/support TNA I suspect the majority feel what TNA does is justified and amusing."

I see how it can be amusing. I don't see how it's justified. That was the only reason I mentioned it.

As far as going off subject, I was referencing this quote:

"Actually, whenever organizations are large and successful they tend to have a large anti-whatever they are crowd. There are a lot of Yankee fans and a lot of Yankee hating fans. Those fans do root for the orioles when they play the yankees. Those fans would love for an oriole to call the yankees out on something stupid they did. Just look at what happened when Braden had his little situation with Arod. He got more press over that than his perfect game. Yankees fans were never going to root for the orioles, or even the A's, so who cares what they think. A player or team can pickup the haters and the neutrals do not care about what either one does so no harm there."

The conversation at the time was about the Oreole organization attacking the Yankee organization. I could see if there was a transition into fan reactions, but if there was, I didn't see it.

In my case, I mentioned people changing the channel because it was brought up by numerous users, including yourself, that it shouldn't have any bearing on the ratings because people who it does affect probably were anti TNA to begin with. I was chiming in to that argument which was brought up prior and didn't just come out of left field.

As far as the loaded rhetoric, the name of the topic is "TNA taking shots at WWE." Most users refer to the comments as "jabs." Both imply a form of attack, so the word "attack," is as valid as calling them "jokes." Both would be correct, especially because the context is to mock the competition and make them look inferior, even if they don't outright say it. Plus, it rallies the anti WWE fans which can't be bad for those glued to impact. I'm just saying it has the potential to drive away unbiased fans who just want to watch wrestling.

Lets forget about the Kaz comments for a second and focus on the Tommy Dreamer promo. Would you not agree that that was an attack? Some might think it was a shoot, but do you really think he felt that way the whole three years he was working there, carrying around the "WWECW" belt for the time he did and collected their paychecks? Who's to say, but I'm more inclined to believe it was a worked shoot.

How is anyone justified for anything? I did not realize there were rules for who you can and cannot make fun of. I was using justified facetiously in case you have not figured that out yet. Do comedians that make fun of people more famous than them deserve such criticisms as have been lobbied here? Often jokes are just jokes. Either they entertain you or not. You can laugh or not then move on. That is the end of it. There is no way the average fan obsesses about a 5 second throwaway comment here and there. There is no way that is the deciding force in many peoples decision to watch or not. If they feel that strongly the comment was so wrong then they were a hopeless mark for the otherside anyway.

I mentioned above that TNA can attack whoever they want, and I also mentioned that the only reason I mentioned the word justified was because you brought it up above.

Comedians who make fun of people above them makes them look like they're crying for attention to me, just like with Kaz's comments. I have and will stop paying attention to comedians who constantly attack people for some quick, easy laughs because IMO, it means they don't have enough talent to make people laugh on their own.

The difference is that Kaz is a wrestler, not a comedian. Comedy can play a part, but wrestling is about one part in ring, one part acting and one part building a connection with the crowd. When he has trouble getting over as is, why have him of all people focus on jabbing at WWE instead of trying to get him to connect with the crowd? It might get him a pop from the TNA faithful, but how does that help him in the long term? How does that push Fortune? It doesn't.

I do think I could have done a better job of explaining about half my post was directed at a more general audience and about half directly at you. You are not a hopeless mark by any means and much less ill-spirited than others. However, I think you are a victim of something you admit, getting entrenched in pro-wwe stances just because you are sick of people knocking the product. That is fine, just realize it creates a bias and there is no reason for TNA to tailor every aspect of their product to appease fans that prefer the other company. They are targeting fans of the last generation of wrestling watchers, not necessarily the current WWE fans. It just seems ridiculous to say TNA should not make their comments because they might ruffle the feathers of people that prefer WWE.

I agree wholeheartedly with your comments about TNA not needing to tailor to diehard WWE fans. But I don't think the issue is ruffling the feathers of people who already perfer WWE, but ruffling the feathers of those who watch WWE and decided to give TNA a chance. If someone is diehard WWE, of course there's going to be a bias, but I highly doubt that there is anyone who watches TNA that has never watched WWE before. TNA is looking to grab some of the fans that WWE has disenfranchised with their recent booking decisions. I'm just saying that from my perspective, if I decided to give TNA a chance and Tazz made a joke about "vintage" or choking someone, it didn't effect the in ring aspect or an actual wrestling talent and brought up controversies that everyone in the wrestling world knows about or makes reference to him being partners with Cole for so long, so I would have gotten a laugh out of it. Now when a member of a brand new stable that needs to get over pokes fun at the competition during mic time... and when similar incidents happen nearly every week, it would make me feel that they're spending to much time reminding me of WWE instead of why I want to watch TNA.

One way or another, if TNA is targeting the last generation of fans who left after the Attitude Era and has no interest in targeting current WWE fans, they're not too successful at the moment and the ratings show it.

This is essentially a thread that will draw more negative responses towards TNA than positive ones, so I see why you might think I have a bias. I could name just as many reasons why I don't like the WWE product, but that's not the topic at hand. Lets just say that when I first "crossed the line" and was a huge TNA fan, I was in your position defending TNA when my friends would say things like, "the 6 sided ring is stupid," "Samoa Joe is too fat for me to care about," and "Who the f--- is AJ Styles?" Somewhere along the line though, I stopped liking the direction TNA took just like you don't like the direction WWE took.

I just love talking about wrestling and I happen to enjoy the WWE more than TNA now. WWE has more fans so it's almost a sure thing that they'll also have more ignorant fans that refuse to give TNA an honest shot, due to the amount of people as well as the WWE's legacy. However, that doesn't mean everyone who likes WWE is that way. The internet is a breeding ground for attacks and ignorance so I know why someone would be on the attack constantly. In the end though, we're all here to talk about wrestling. It's too bad that WWE fans put TNA fans on the defensive and vice versa. It's counter productive and really only hurts all sides involved...

 

[DangerousDave]

I like it, I got a good laugh out of Kazarian's "we aren't a bunch of rookies" comment. Any shot at WWE is good to me, its not like Vince has never taken shots at the competition.

 

[twentytwo]

TNA is run by 3 failures, jealous of the WWE's success: Russo, Hogan and Bischoff. And that's what jealous losers do. They talk shit about the ones they wish they could be.

Seeing a lifetime failure like Kazarian make fun of 7 rookies who already make more money than him, and are already 100 times more famous than him is laughable.

Jealousy is a bitch.

 

[shattered dreams]

The only reason I mentioned the word Justified is because you had brought it up here:

"My point is that justified is in the eye of the beholder and in the eyes of people that actually enjoy/support TNA I suspect the majority feel what TNA does is justified and amusing."

I see how it can be amusing. I don't see how it's justified. That was the only reason I mentioned it.

To be fair that one sentence was part of a larger picture. I said, "All I know is that based on what I see on here WWE marks are 300 billion times more guilty of making fun of the opposition than impact does of WWE. So to me it seems a tad hypocritical to have such a huge problem with such actions. I assume their argument is that in their case it is "justified." My point is that justified is in the eye of the beholder and in the eyes of people that actually enjoy/support TNA I suspect the majority feel what TNA does is justified and amusing."

By using justified how I did in the preceeding sentence I thought I was making it clear that justified was a vague concept that will contain inherent bias depending on what company you support and who is saying what in this case. Maybe it was not as clear as I wished that I was not using the standard definition. However, if you think people having cable (couldn't they just change the channel) or buying a PPV (not too many do this reportedly) gives them the right to "attack" a product, then I am confused why TNA management does not have the right to say what they want to from a creative standpoint. I mean that is their job and they are paying the talent. So if a financial attachment is all it takes in your opinion then they would be quite justified. I just do not think we know how this effects viewership. Too many are claiming it is obviously a problem. If it was why would the people that do this professionally and have access to the real numbers to evaluate such effects continually do it?

As far as going off subject, I was referencing this quote:

"Actually, whenever organizations are large and successful they tend to have a large anti-whatever they are crowd. There are a lot of Yankee fans and a lot of Yankee hating fans. Those fans do root for the orioles when they play the yankees. Those fans would love for an oriole to call the yankees out on something stupid they did. Just look at what happened when Braden had his little situation with Arod. He got more press over that than his perfect game. Yankees fans were never going to root for the orioles, or even the A's, so who cares what they think. A player or team can pickup the haters and the neutrals do not care about what either one does so no harm there."

The conversation at the time was about the Oreole organization attacking the Yankee organization. I could see if there was a transition into fan reactions, but if there was, I didn't see it.

I was under the impression that many people were saying that the way TNA was doing these comments was causing an adverse fan reaction that would effect the company. I also suspect you did not look very hard because I was clearly responding to what I quoted directly above the aforementioned "off-topic" paragraph of mine.

Like one of the posters said, its like the orioles making fun of the Yankees. The Orioles are in no position to make fun of the Yankees, their organization sucks. If they Orioles constantly took shots at the Yankees, they would look like minor league fools to everyone else except die hard Oriole fans, they wouldn't gain fans, but they might lose support from others that are on the fence about cheering for that particular club (even though their record wouldn't help matters either).

So in my opinion you missed it and it was in a pretty obvious place which has me questioning if you even looked in the first place.

In my case, I mentioned people changing the channel because it was brought up by numerous users, including yourself, that it shouldn't have any bearing on the ratings because people who it does affect probably were anti TNA to begin with. I was chiming in to that argument which was brought up prior and didn't just come out of left field.

So many mentioned people changing the channel but me talking about fan reactions is out of left field? Isn't a fan changing the channel based on what is happening a reaction?

As far as the loaded rhetoric, the name of the topic is "TNA taking shots at WWE." Most users refer to the comments as "jabs." Both imply a form of attack, so the word "attack," is as valid as calling them "jokes." Both would be correct, especially because the context is to mock the competition and make them look inferior, even if they don't outright say it. Plus, it rallies the anti WWE fans which can't be bad for those glued to impact. I'm just saying it has the potential to drive away unbiased fans who just want to watch wrestling.

If both are valid then choosing attack, the most harsh possible version IMO, is a little misleading. Mocking the competition sounds a lot closer to jokes than attacks to me. Regardless, what it is called is more or less irrelevant. I do like that you have now admitted it merely has the potential to drive fans away opposed to obviously doing it like some have claimed. I just have a hardtime seeing the casual fans being driven away by this. Casual fans probably do not even get the TNA galaxy comment. They certainly do not obsess about it. Only the hardcore fans spend a lot of time on the subtle references. The hardcore fans are not going to let something so trivial make up their mind, especially since most of the hardcore WWE fans have a poor opinion of TNA already.

Lets forget about the Kaz comments for a second and focus on the Tommy Dreamer promo. Would you not agree that that was an attack? Some might think it was a shoot, but do you really think he felt that way the whole three years he was working there, carrying around the "WWECW" belt for the time he did and collected their paychecks? Who's to say, but I'm more inclined to believe it was a worked shoot.

Whatever it was is not that important to me. What I think is important is that it played directly to the fans it was supposed to. The attitude era fans and old ecw marks. It spoke to them and it was true to what they have been saying for a long time about wwecw. So Tommy Dreamer is supposed to come out and say thanks for the paycheck WWE, I respectfully disagree with what your vision of ecw became. Sounds horribly boring to me. He has to mention that incarnation of ECW because the whole point of this story is he wants to send it out in a way that was true to the original. WWECW failed even by WWE's admission. Pointing this out is hardly an attack IMO. It is merely saying here is something WWE did poorly.

Comedians who make fun of people above them makes them look like they're crying for attention to me, just like with Kaz's comments. I have and will stop paying attention to comedians who constantly attack people for some quick, easy laughs because IMO, it means they don't have enough talent to make people laugh on their own.

See this is where I think thick vs thin skin comes in to play. Many celebrities enjoy the impressions of their foibles. They often want to go and see them. Many of them do not view it as some "attack." People talk about what is going on in the world, just like wrestling fans talk about what is going on in wrestling. Sometimes the joke just fits in with that. It is only an attack if you take yourself too seriously.

The difference is that Kaz is a wrestler, not a comedian. Comedy can play a part, but wrestling is about one part in ring, one part acting and one part building a connection with the crowd. When he has trouble getting over as is, why have him of all people focus on jabbing at WWE instead of trying to get him to connect with the crowd? It might get him a pop from the TNA faithful, but how does that help him in the long term? How does that push Fortune? It doesn't.

So a guy notoriously criticized for not getting a reaction on the mic gets one and this is a bad thing? He is supposed to connect with the crowd, which contains a lot of tna faithful but saying something that plays to that base is a mistake? If comedy can play a part and this is like 20 seconds of the broadcast, why can't this be that part? Fortune are arrogant people. You seem to be contradicting yourself here.

I agree wholeheartedly with your comments about TNA not needing to tailor to diehard WWE fans. But I don't think the issue is ruffling the feathers of people who already perfer WWE, but ruffling the feathers of those who watch WWE and decided to give TNA a chance. If someone is diehard WWE, of course there's going to be a bias, but I highly doubt that there is anyone who watches TNA that has never watched WWE before. TNA is looking to grab some of the fans that WWE has disenfranchised with their recent booking decisions. I'm just saying that from my perspective, if I decided to give TNA a chance and Tazz made a joke about "vintage" or choking someone, it didn't effect the in ring aspect or an actual wrestling talent and brought up controversies that everyone in the wrestling world knows about or makes reference to him being partners with Cole for so long, so I would have gotten a laugh out of it. Now when a member of a brand new stable that needs to get over pokes fun at the competition during mic time... and when similar incidents happen nearly every week, it would make me feel that they're spending to much time reminding me of WWE instead of why I want to watch TNA.

Like I have said before, agree to disagree. I just do not think casual fans get caught up in these things. It would not surprise me if there were a lot of wwe fans that did not even know what happened to danielson, let alone understand the significance of a much smaller story like "vintage." If you are saying these people are disenfranchised with recent wwe booking then how is poking fun (now pokes are attacks as well? that facebook is one giant battlefield..) at recent booking decisions in wwe going to turn them off again? Seems like they would agree with such things.

One way or another, if TNA is targeting the last generation of fans who left after the Attitude Era and has no interest in targeting current WWE fans, they're not too successful at the moment and the ratings show it.

The last desperate resort for anyone in a debate about TNA, "anything I say about TNA having a shortcoming is correct and anything you say in response is incorrect just because TNA has the rating they do." If it is that simple then why do we even have these debates to begin with. You can say whatever you want and it is right and everything I say is automatically wrong. Sounds like the society Kozlov grew up in.

I just love talking about wrestling and I happen to enjoy the WWE more than TNA now. WWE has more fans so it's almost a sure thing that they'll also have more ignorant fans that refuse to give TNA an honest shot, due to the amount of people as well as the WWE's legacy. However, that doesn't mean everyone who likes WWE is that way. The internet is a breeding ground for attacks and ignorance so I know why someone would be on the attack constantly. In the end though, we're all here to talk about wrestling. It's too bad that WWE fans put TNA fans on the defensive and vice versa. It's counter productive and really only hurts all sides involved...

Even though I dislike the majority of what you said, I repped you because this is a great paragraph. Sums up how I feel and it is a nice change to talk about the two companys with someone who is not one of the "flockers." Hope the MCMG entertained. I really wanted to get to one of the winston or fayetteville events but I couldn't make it fit my schedule unfortunately.

 

[Chauncy Talon]

TNA have been taking shots at WWE for years, but the WWE does not feel it. And when the WWE do get one of TNA former stars, they just bury them as if they came from NWA/WCW during the 80's/90's.

 

[Nada]

I like it, infact what i hated about the HoF ring angle was that it put over WWE, when in fact someone should have taken that ring and tossed it in a garbage can.

Bad taste? Yea but since TNA is trying to go for a more Attitude approach then its fitting.

TNA needs to make themselves seem important, big, their world champion should be presented as THE world champion. WWE cant do that because they have made rules never to mention TNA or even UFC and Strikeforce.

TNA dosent have those rules and they need to stress out that RVD today is the WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION, he is the man, not some Vanilla Ice knockoff or that albino Sheamus (no offense to anyone), sure its mean but it puts over their own stars.

TNA is more connected to the real world than WWE is, becuase TNA can mention UFC, Brock Lesnar etc they are more open and free. Whereas WWE really is a "universe" that is manufactored and unless you are 6 years old then you know its a bunch of tightly controlled hogwash, UFC does exist, Brock Lesnar does exist, TNA exists etc.

That is the kind of attitude they need to go after, say what they feel like saying, thats a great way to be different from the tightly controlled WWE, much better than having a 6 sized ring opposed to a classic one.