What do you remember from the environment in which the Attitude Era blossomed?

[HBsam31]

Yup. "Suck it", "Lay the Smackdown", "Candy ass", "Hell yah" were all common phrases in my high school at the time. nWo shirts. 3:16 shirts. Middle fingers were all out in full force amongst the guys in the school.

But bands like Korn, Limp Bizkit, Slipknot, Rage Against The Machine were also the most popular bands amongst the same guys. Jerry Springer was actually popular back then on TV too. It was no doubt a testosterone fuelled age. And WWE took full advantage of it.

The attitude era wouldn't work today without all of these other factors. I don't know what happened in the late 90s that made teenage angst swell so much. And I don't know what WWE needs to do to get back to another boom period that reflects today's society..

I actually think UFC stole the WWE's chance at their next boom period. By then everyone knew wrestling was fake. There wasn't smut and swearing on TV in the current product. But young males still want to see people get knocked out. And UFC was edgy and it was real. And it blew up big time. Whereas in the past, this type of attention may have gone to professional wrestling.

This pretty much sums it up. I was a junior and senior in HS at this time, and the anti authority thing worked to perfection. We crotch chopped in the halls, flipped people off, told each other to suck it. It was a very very fun time to be a wrestling fan, and if you weren't you became one at that time because it was the cool thing to do. Even the girls knew who everyone was and would watch ppvs with us. The bands at the time were kind of the same style, and for the love of God Jerry Springer was a hugely popular show lol. WWE made their product to what was going on at the time and what the male demographic wanted, and it created the most popular time in wrestling history.

 

[TWJC: The Beginning]

At my middle school, a huge majority of the male's were into wrestling. Pretty much every kid on my sports teams would watch while about 50 percent were near obsessed. Even the ones who had not been into it before people like Kane, and Stone Cold made it popular. Stone Cold especially. I had one friend who literally went around stunning as many people as he could while Stone Cold was doing it one Raw weekly before the rumble. My buddy would kick a kid in the knee so they bent over, and then he would proceed to try to stun them. Ha after he finished we would discuss how good the stunner was executed. There were also certain kids who were higher on the list than others because of various real life reasons like "he was flirting with my girlfriend." I actually remember ONE friend of mine who didn't like wrestling, and even still would watch for Kane. It was so popular at the time that you felt like your were missing out if you didn't watch it.

I don't know what the guy above me is talking about, but in middle school in 1997 in Champaign Illinois, WWF and WCW were HOT.

I still remember specifically finding out certain friends of mine were watching wrestling weekly, while I thought they never would have been. I was in 6th grade in 1997. 6th, 7th, and 8th grade WWF had my middle school by the balls. From what I've heard from older friends from my town is that it was pretty darn popular around the High School at that time too.

One thing that was huge about the Attitude era was the gimmicks these groups were coming up with. The NWO wolf pack had the little Wolf Pac handshake thing that people did where they just touch hands or whatever with other members of the pack. That was big because you felt like you were in a group and it just felt really cool to do it.

Dx's suck it was also huge. At first it was the "Suck it" but not in the form of an "x." Then when they changed the suck it action to crossing your arms and then doing the "suck it," it seriously caught momentum.

The attitude era was great for kids who wanted to be "cool." All that mattered was being cool in middle school and being able to walk around with an attitude, and different slogans and things to bust out at your disposal are huge reasons as to why the WWF's attitude era was so priceless.

The Hulkamaniac era was great for young kids. All of those characters were catered more towards younger children than the Attitude era.

Right, well that's middle school. Pro wrestling is still popular with middle schoolers. It's crude TV. Kids/white trash love anything with cussing and boobies. It's not a sustainable model though because to keep that kind of appeal, you have to keep pushing the envelope. They could either reel it in and get over on something other than cheap pops (most of the tude era midcard was cheap pops, a pornstar, a pimp, come on). Unless you'd rather watch a show where Sable gets gangbanged by the nation of domination then Stone Cold leads a band of Texans to lynch them, the model of pushing the envelope probably wasn't sustainable.

 

[Waylon Mercy]

I am really enjoying reading this thread. It reminds me a lot of where I was at back in the mid-to-late nineties. Looking back, it truly was a phenomenal time culturally, and specifically in the culture of professional wrestling. I never really thought of how the background of politics, music and popular culture affected what I was watching both on Nitro and Raw on a weekly basis. I could never really put my finger on what made Stone Cold Steve Austin so huge. Part of me was thinking at the time that I wasn't supposed to be cheering this redneck who stuck his middle finger up and disrespected authority. That wasn't really who I was at the time. I didn't like authority, but I still respected it. My hero, the guy I could identify most with was Bret "The Hitman" Hart. Worked hard, was a good role model, put on great matches night after night. When these two icons clashed at Wrestlemania 13, that was probably the turning point for me that something amazing was happening in the business. In one fell swoop, the hero came out of a winning effort the goat, while the disrespectful S.O.B. barely walked out on his own accord the hero. I had never seen anything like that before. Immediately after that, Bret Hart transformed himself into an edgier, less eager to please character who was out for respect. Fans started to boo him. I really liked what I saw from Bret during this era, and at the same time I was starting to cheer on a guy I truly hated at first - Stone Cold. On top of that, there was Shawn Michaels, the Sexy Boy who was pushing the boundaries of good taste. His various clashes with Bret, both personally and professionally drew me in even more. We all know the history, but for this brief period between 1996 and 1997, I was never more transfixed by the world of wrestling.

 

[Moneyinc]

Right, well that's middle school. Pro wrestling is still popular with middle schoolers. It's crude TV. Kids/white trash love anything with cussing and boobies. It's not a sustainable model though because to keep that kind of appeal, you have to keep pushing the envelope. They could either reel it in and get over on something other than cheap pops (most of the tude era midcard was cheap pops, a pornstar, a pimp, come on). Unless you'd rather watch a show where Sable gets gangbanged by the nation of domination then Stone Cold leads a band of Texans to lynch them, the model of pushing the envelope probably wasn't sustainable.

From what I've heard it was pretty popular in High School's at this time as well. But yea, I see what you are saying.

 

[The Fabulous Rougeau's]

The attitude era will always be special to me because I was in high school (97-01) during the whole thing. Things that stick out to me are the music. Rap was huge, pop was huge, metal was huge and even though alernative rock fell off some after grunge, the late 90's was still a great time for alternative rock. As many have pointed out this was also the golden age of trash talk show tv. Also you had two of the most foul, inappropriate cartoons with south park and family guy get there start.

But what I remember the most is these were the last days of what I would classify as an acceptable level of political incorectness within pop cultue. After Columbine and especially 9-11, America changed. May aspects ofeveryday life before these events are just not fund nowadays.