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Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!
So I have some comments to catch up on, but I got sidetracked this weekend by finding out that one of my favorite wrestlers, Jeff Hardy, got arrested on Friday and charged with drug trafficking. I can't tell you how much that depresses me. The charges are based on the amount of drugs (Vicodin, Soma, and anabolic steroids) found in his home, and not (as far as anyone knows) any evidence that he was dealing them -- it's very conceivable that they were for his personal use, as Vicodin is a painkiller and the others are apparently often prescribed & used to aid healing from injuries.
One of the reasons I started drifting away from wrestling years ago was my growing discomfort with the idea that my enjoyment was inextricably linked to the spectacle of the wrestlers going to ever-greater lengths to do these amazing stunts which punished and injured their bodies, over and over again. And Jeff Hardy was always a prime example of this, with his wild leaps from the turnbuckles, ladders, etc. It made me feel uncomfortably complicit as I'd hear about serious and even permanent injuries, even career-related deaths, and dependence on drugs to get through a grueling touring and performing schedule.
So I don't know. I'd only just rediscovered my joy for wrestling, and now I'm already back in that place and have no better answers. And like all the problematic narratives and representations and erasures in media fandom TV shows (which are also present in professional wrestling, of course), part of me wants to find ways to reconcile myself to what my pleasures make me complicit in, and part of me wants to resist or defer that urge towards reconciliation. Because the obvious options in both cases -- compartmentalization, recuperation, subversion, critique -- still feel to close too denial or disavowal or accommodation. And I distrust the temptation to just figure out how to feel good about the stuff I like and feel good about myself for liking it, and rationalize away the rest. At the very least, I think I should hold on to that tension and discomfort, and the reconciliation tactics feel like they're geared towards relieving or resolving those tensions that I should be feeling and paying attention to.
Also there's another wrestling PPV event tonight which I'm actually not that excited about, due to the set up and stipulations, but there's a few matches that I do want to see. So the clock is ticking!
In the meantime, inpsired by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cofax7, I've been watching the third season of Avatar this weekend to distract me from drug busts and wrestlers' herniated discs. So far, so good! And I need to get to the comics store to pick up the latest Secret Six.
One of the reasons I started drifting away from wrestling years ago was my growing discomfort with the idea that my enjoyment was inextricably linked to the spectacle of the wrestlers going to ever-greater lengths to do these amazing stunts which punished and injured their bodies, over and over again. And Jeff Hardy was always a prime example of this, with his wild leaps from the turnbuckles, ladders, etc. It made me feel uncomfortably complicit as I'd hear about serious and even permanent injuries, even career-related deaths, and dependence on drugs to get through a grueling touring and performing schedule.
So I don't know. I'd only just rediscovered my joy for wrestling, and now I'm already back in that place and have no better answers. And like all the problematic narratives and representations and erasures in media fandom TV shows (which are also present in professional wrestling, of course), part of me wants to find ways to reconcile myself to what my pleasures make me complicit in, and part of me wants to resist or defer that urge towards reconciliation. Because the obvious options in both cases -- compartmentalization, recuperation, subversion, critique -- still feel to close too denial or disavowal or accommodation. And I distrust the temptation to just figure out how to feel good about the stuff I like and feel good about myself for liking it, and rationalize away the rest. At the very least, I think I should hold on to that tension and discomfort, and the reconciliation tactics feel like they're geared towards relieving or resolving those tensions that I should be feeling and paying attention to.
Also there's another wrestling PPV event tonight which I'm actually not that excited about, due to the set up and stipulations, but there's a few matches that I do want to see. So the clock is ticking!
In the meantime, inpsired by
cofax7, I've been watching the third season of Avatar this weekend to distract me from drug busts and wrestlers' herniated discs. So far, so good! And I need to get to the comics store to pick up the latest Secret Six.