In Your Face

Have you noticed a growing use of sexually suggestive poses in pro wrestling in recent years?  More and more, we’re seeing what I call the “Kneeling Bitch” position portrayed in the ring to imply a Dominant/Submissive relationship between the wrestlers.

I’m sure you’ve seen this spot: one wrestler will be so exhausted and hurt, he can barely peel his heavy body off the mat.  He will slowly crawl to a kneeling position, perhaps using his opponent’s legs to pull himself up.  Soon he will find his face in a compromising position, just inches from the standing man’s crotch.  They will then freeze the action in this provocative pose.

The dominant wrestler will stand over the fallen man, perhaps looking down in contempt, perhaps with a sly grin, presenting his crotch toward the helpless victim’s face.  He may even grab the bitch’s hair.  Pro wrestling has always subtly implied eroticism, but this is a blatant, in-your-face reference to a sexual act.

We have seen this pose used on occasion in the past.  I believe it was pioneered (or at least used most frequently) by Ric Flair.   For example, during Flair’s epic “I Quit” match against Terry Funk, we saw him in Kneeling Bitch position several times.

Flair loved to juxtapose his confident, cocky swagger before the fight with a begging, submissive, mouth-open kneel halfway into the battle.  Oh, how the mighty have fallen!

Kneeling before another man implies being enslaved or bested (who could forget  when queer-beard General Zod forced Superman to kneel before him).  It also implies a potential forced sex act, a rape, a pleasuring of the dominant male in exchange for him not kicking the helpless man’s ass.

In many cases, this sexual harassment is soon repaid with swift vengeance. General Zod, remember, was punished brutally by the end of Superman II, his hand broken in Superman’s grasp and then his body thrown into an icy crevice as just punishment for his homosexual antics…

Back in the day, not many wrestlers besides Flair — who was way ahead of his time — would ever place themselves in such a degrading position (at least not while in the public eye.)

Today’s young wrestlers must have studied Flair’s career — his willingness to humiliate himself, kneeling offering his open mouth to all comers — followed by his fame, popularity, and eventually Hero Worship from the fans.

Now every stud in trunks and boots is eager to get beaten down into Kneeling Bitch Position (KBP) and permit the other wrestler to stand over him like a demanding boss when your performance evaluation is due.

And the more attractive the Heel, the more frequently we see him mastering his opponents in this way.  Dolph Ziggler’s shiny trunks, for example, have had more noses pressed against them than the store-front window at Macy’s department store…

It seems that pro wrestling is in the process of being “Outed” a second time.  In the 1990’s, after years of speculation, they basically admitted the sport was fake — and the fans slowly came to accept it and love it anyway.

Now twenty years later, they’re beginning to admit the sport is homo-erotic, slowly ramping up the sexual antics, using more suggestive blow-job imagery.  And I think the fans are slowly accepting the fact that pro wrestling is meant to arouse a dude, and are laughing it off.

Everyone’s favorite punching bag — John Cena — certainly understands the heat and excitement generated when the hero is forced to his knees before the horny attacker. In nearly every match these days, we see Gay-for-Pay Cena helpless on his knees, his massive muscles just barely able to raise his body, his eyes closed so he perhaps is not aware that he just stuck his face in a dude’s crotch.  Fans are left to wonder if Cena is really hurt, or really into other men…

And if you’ve seen any modern “comedy” wrestling by some of the Japanese federations, you know that they’re pushing the envelope even further with queer, sexually sadistic, ever groping wrestlers like Danshoku Dino and Hard Gay.

Mexican Lucha Libre is also now featuring more sissy wrestlers called “exoticos” who fondle and kiss their opponents, like the pink-haired (and beloved) Maximo.  In a sport (and nation) where being tough and masculine is the ideal, it’s interesting to see these sissies being embraced and cheered — perhaps indicating a greater tolerance for gayness.

Maybe pro wrestling needs to become gayer in order to survive — to compete with the graphic and sexually explicit underground wrestling that is now so readily available on-line.  Maybe instead of Survival of the Fittest, in pro wrestling we’re seeing Survival of the Gayest.

So where do we go from here?  How can they shock us even more at this point? Will mainstream pro wrestling become ever more explicit and homo-erotic until we’re witnessing actual rape scenes in the ring?  Is that what we really want to see, or is it sexier to just imply the eroticism?  Where is the line between arousing and exciting the viewers, and possibly outraging and offending them?