There are things in life that we can sit back and listen to, and allow to pass without conflict or incident. Then there are things where you want to say something but you know the person you say it would neither see your side of the argument or take any notice whatsoever, like the argument that drug addiction, alcohol addiction and obesity isn’t a disease it’s self inflicted, which it is. No one forces the crap into them, they make a conscious effort to put what is killing them into their system, be it drug, drink or food. Cancer is a disease, too many pies isn’t. Unless someone held them down, injected them with drugs, forced drink down their necks or piled pies into their mouths and taped them up then neither of the three are a disease. What is wrong with this world?
Anyway, after those things there are certain issues that you just can’t ignore. Things people say you just have to take a stand and get your point and the truth across. And this my good people, is one of those things. I will give you advanced warning. There are things you read from now on that may upset you, or offend you or because some people are so pathetically closed minded will refuse to take as fact.
July 25th 2007 was possible the saddest day in professional wrestling history. The day after Night of Champions 2007, police broke into the Benoit home to find the bodies of Nancy Benoit, Daniel Benoit and Chris Benoit all dead. Chris Benoit was suspected and later accused of murdering his wife and child before hanging himself two days later. Chris Benoit had passed away twenty four hours earlier, the day of Night of Champions 2007, on which he was scheduled to defeat C.M Punk for the ECW Championship.
steroids, the dark lives lived by some who step into the ring. We also see the tragic side. The failed marriages, the deep depression, the ruts that some get stuck and never return from. When one of our warriors is accused of what Chris Benoit was accused of then we willingly forget all of the good that wrestler did inside the ring, all the great memories they gave us and concentrate fully on the bad and what may have transpired.
I’m a firm believer that whatever happens outside the ring, be it backstage fights or untimely deaths and the circumstances surrounding it should never have a bearing on what happens inside the ring. A wrestler should never be judged on what he’s done outside the squared circle. Whatever the details are it will never affect their ability to do the job at hand. You can say whatever you like about Chris Benoit. The one fact you cannot dispute, is that Chris Benoit was the greatest technical wrestler that ever laced up a pair of boots. A triple homicide will never change that fact. Whatever Benoit was supposed to have done will never change that fact. And no amount of hiding away from this conversation will ever change that fact.
We like a bit of a double standard in this world. And particularly in America. Sorry all you people from across the pond, but it’s true. You see Gary Glitter and Michael Jackson were accused of fiddling with children. The most heinous crime known to man. Yet when Michael Jackson went to court, his moronic fans were outside the gates protesting his innocence. They don’t know what happened behind closed doors even if they like to think they do. Are you serious telling me that it’s fine for a paedophile to be known and remembered as ‘the King of Pop’, a man who on national television openly admitted that he thought it was ok for a suspected child molester to sleep in the same bed as a thirteen year old boy – yet we can’t remember Chris Benoit, solely for what he gave us in the ring and as the greatest technical wrestler in the history of our business? If you think that, then you’re off of your fucking heads. Jack the Ripper will always be remembered as the most infamous serial killer in history. Ever. You’re telling me that it’s fine to remember him, yet it’s a heinous act to remember Benoit for what he truly was? A gifted, talented professional who could light up a pay per view just by walking down the aisle? Grow up!
In a world where murderers are remembered and in some cases become famous by getting their act covered by newspapers and television (look at how badly the Batman shootings were handled. You don’t give people like that any news coverage. Because if you do they’ve gotten what they wanted) and people now kill just for the column inches, people are trying to say if fine for those people to get some fame for they did and be remembered, but not Chris Benoit? If and I will state again, IF, Chris Benoit did do what he was accused of, then he didn’t do it for the column inches or the news coverage or to be remembered in history because he already had that with his work in the ring. If Benoit did it, then he did it because he was depressed or he was brain damaged.
On the WWE 13 website, as I was browsing down the roster list, my internet decided to make my computer jump down to the bottom of the page where everyone leaves their comments. People were leaving their requests for their desired roster additions. And one person wrote, among other wresters, Chris Benoit. A while later, some absolute cock took it upon himself to write ‘Not him! Not that killer! Please no!’ A real wrestling fan. A proper wrestling fan would have known that Chris Benoit’s inclusion would have put pay to the claim that WWE 13 has the best roster of ‘Attitude era’ wrestler ever. This is just another example of people who think they should have their own way, not being able to separate what happens inside the ring from what happens outside of it. And if it was you that wrote that comment, then you should be appalled with yourself. A real wrestling fan would never have written that.
Also, after Benoit had gone, someone thought it would be clever to write a letter to a magazine stating that they’d never be able to watch another Chris Benoit match on the same way again. Why? It’s just people trying to sound big. And it’s pathetic. You won’t be able to watch a Chris Benoit match in the same way again, but you can listen to a Michael Jackson record without any problems! It’s just ridiculous!
Personally I think wrestling fans are the most critical and two faced people in the world. When Chris Benoit was giving us wonderful memories such as being with the four horsemen, to his ECW tenure, winning the World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania 20, applying his Crippler Crossface, his wonderful feud with Chris Jericho in 2000 – 2001 and generally putting his body on the line for us, night after night, he was ‘The greatest’. As soon as the accusations begin to fly and he was accused of murder, suddenly he’s a ‘monster’. I’m sorry but Chris Benoit’s matches were some of the very best you will ever find, anywhere. I challenge anyone to watch a Chris Benoit match and then turn around with any real conviction and say that Chris wasn’t the very best at what he did.
What we need to realize is that the good doesn’t always make the bad look any better. What he was accused of was the very worst thing imaginable. I will never condone what Chris was supposed to have done, not ever. Also, the bad should never ruin all of the good. The diving head-buts from the top rope. The Crippler Crossface, one of the most devastating finishing moves in WWE history. The hug with Eddie Guerrero at the end of Wrestlemania 20. Every match, in every company across the world, Benoit ever fought. And I’m afraid that if you judge Chris Benoit on the end of his life instead of what he gave us and left us in the ring then you’re not only an idiot, but you don’t belong in this business.
The way WWE handled the Benoit situation was appalling. I truly believe that WWE sunk to knew lows in 2007 after Chris Benoit had passed on. WWE took Chris Benoit’s face and image off of DVD covers. They plastered stickers over the picture of his action figure on the backs of packets, they withdrew his action figure from the shelves, Vince McMahon came out on WWE T.V and told the world that as from that night, Chris Benoit would never be mentioned ever again. WWE took Benoit’s name off of the World Heavyweight Championship record and also deleted him from both the Royal Rumble winners history and proclaimed Shawn Michaels was the only wrestler to have won the Royal Rumble match from entering at Number one (Benoit entered the Royal Rumble at number 1 in 2004 and won the match). The lowest thing they did in my opinion was, after everything had died down, Vince McMahon came out in public and blasted Benoit for running a storyline on WWE television. For this and this alone, Vince McMahon should be truly ashamed of himself and his company. In no time at all, it was Chris Benoit never existed. That is wrong.
By trying their best to erase Chris Benoit from history, they’re denying future generations his brilliance in the ring. And make no mistake he was that good.
If we’re looking for someone to blame for what happened, then I’m afraid, as much as you won’t like this, we have to look no further than ourselves and Vince McMahon. We demanded more and more from a man who was severely depressed and broken down. We demanded that Chris Benoit do the moves we loved to see him do, yet the moves which also tore his body apart inside, night after night. If he hadn’t. If Chris had have toned down his performances then it would have been us who would have come out and said ‘He’s not as good anymore’, ‘He should quit because he can’t hack it’. It was Vince McMahon that saw how bad Chris Benoit had gotten physically, how hurt and broken he was. It was Vince McMahon that saw how many drugs Benoit had to take just to walk that aisle and how hard Benoit was working to provide for his family. It was a well known fact that Benoit lived beyond his means. Yet it was Vince McMahon that pushed Benoit to his limits every night and offered him no help at all with his financial situation. As head of the company and the man that signs his pay cheques, McMahon should have insisted that Benoit take time off to heal his wounds. He didn’t. Tragically it was the same with Yokozuna. It was Vince McMahon who insisted and pushed Yoko to pile on the pounds so he could effectively portray the Japanese monster. It would be the same weight that Vince McMahon put pressure on Yokozuna to gain to his already massive frame that would end up killing Yoko at such a young age. Yet no one wants to stand up and take the blame.
After Chris Benoit died and the wrestling world was split between hating him and remembering him for what he gave us, a tribute went up on You-tube. It was a celebration of Benoit’s wrestling career. Yet the person who posted it wrote ‘You don’t deserve this!’ Why? Because he did something outside of the ring that should have had no effect on what happened inside it? What a ridiculous comment to make. Of course Chris Benoit deserved a tribute for his wrestling career. Undertaker or Rock could go on a killing spree and murder a hundred people. Yet they’d still be remembered as two of the greatest wrestlers ever. Despite what they would have done. You see how it works? If Chris Benoit doesn’t deserve to be remembered then Michael Jackson doesn’t deserve to be remembered as ‘the King of Pop’ a paedo! Seriously? The fact is this. If we can accept a paedophile as one of the greatest musicians of all time, then we can freely remember Chris Benoit as the greatest technical wrestler in history.
You see, Michael Jackson was never found guilty because he brought his freedom. It does seem that money can buy anything after all. Chris Benoit wasn’t alive to be tried in a court of law. If you can’t try someone then you can’t legally find them guilty. It was assumed that Benoit murdered his wife and child because no other evidence could be found. Now, I’m not saying he did do it, I’m not saying he didn’t do it. What I’m saying is that we’ll never know for sure. And as good people, I know that you can understand what I’m saying here.
The whole point of this is to try and get across that whatever you think of Chris Benoit he should always be remembered for his in ring talents. I’ve come across enough people in wrestling in the last five years, since Chris left us to know that people are easily swayed by what they have read. It might not be the truth, but people believe it nonetheless because they don’t have the truth readily available to them. What annoyed me most, was when non-wrestling fans got involved. People who had never seen a wrestling match or Chris Benoit perform in their lives. People who just wanted to label Chris with any and every tag under the sun. Can you imagine the uproar, if someone who had never seen Michael Jackson perform just label him with everything and anything they could think of? The Jackson fans would have lynched the accusers. And it’s the same with Benoit. If you never saw him, you can’t have an opinion on all of this. You can’t just come along and say ‘murdered’, ‘he deserves to rot in hell’ because you don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. Putting aside the incident in question, Chris Benoit was the god damn finest wrestler I have ever seen.
For five years I’ve sat back and tried to ignore everything people said about Chris Benoit. And I got angrier and angrier, I got more frustrated that people who didn’t know what they were talking about would come forward and chip in their penny’s worth. I think it’s time that the true wrestling fans among us stood up and fought for what we believe in. For what we love. If we don’t. If we allow these fucknuts to have their say and their way then we’ve failed Chris Benoit’s legacy and his career. If we sit back and say nothing then everything he gave us in the ring was for nothing. We might as well say that we don’t appreciate everything he did for us. We need to defend all of that from pricks who seek to gladly ruin it. It’s about time someone like me came forward and said this. Because it’s been hiding away in the darkness for too long. Being cast aside because people are too afraid to talk about it.
Chris Benoit’s legacy should be and needs to be guarded and held dear by all those who remember him. All those who ever saw Benoit fly like an eagle need to take a stand and stop his memory being washed away into the depths of hell where most would see it rest. If we don’t then we might as well spit in the face of everyone who came before. We might as well spit in the face of the memories. So stand up and grow a pair. And have your say. Stop people trashing a man who during his life was the very best. Otherwise we’ve failed him. We’ve failed his efforts for us, we’ve failed everyone else WWE would have us forget. The people like Chris Kanyon (who wanted to be the first openly gay wrestler but was denied that opportunity. Kanyon went to WWE with the idea but it was naturally brushed aside and laughed at. Vince saw it as a slur on wrestling to have an openly gay character. Yet it was perfectly happy for Goldust to pretend to be gay. But not for someone to be actually gay. Kanyon even took the idea to TNA who rejected it. Then months later TNA employed Orlando Jordan to play the role. Kanyon was devastated. After months and years of no money and depression Chris Kanyon took his own life). More tragically, if we fail these people then Chris Benoit died for nothing. I won’t allow that to happen.
I loved Chris Benoit! I still do! And I thank him as you all should for the years he gave to us and for everything he did for this business. I watch his matches and am regularly left with a warm glow inside. His career and his legacy aren’t spoilt for me and neither should they be for you. I think the best compliment we could pay the man is to leave it on this. I will always remember Chris Benoit as the greatest technical wrestler in history. Even all these years after his death, that’s something Chris Benoit and his family can be immensely proud of. And when you think about it, for a man whose career shone brighter than the sun and whose life was cut tragically short. That’s not bad. That’s not bad at all.
Onwards and Upwards...
