It's Somebody Else's Fault

I grew up watching professional wrestling. When I was five-years-old, my father accepted a new job that required our family to relocate to Columbus, Georgia. During that time, we were frequent visitors to the Columbus Municipal Auditorium to witness first hand the stars of Georgia Championship Wrestling. As a young boy, I cheered wildly for the good guys like Tommy “Wildfire” Rich and Mr. Wrestling #2. I booed furiously when bad guys like Mad Dog Buzz Sawyer and The Great Kabuki made their way to the ring. (What was that green stuff that would come out of Kabuki's mouth?)

My grandfather used to tell me that the whole thing was fake; that the same guys who beat each other senseless in the ring would later leave the arena together and go out for a bite to eat. Although I was certain that he was wrong about that, it wouldn’t have mattered to me if I had known he was right. Just seeing those superstars up close and personal was a thrill for me, and fake or not, it was incredibly entertaining.

As I grew older and we moved away from the Columbus area, my interest in professional wrestling began to wane. It wasn’t until my mid-twenties that I became somewhat fascinated by wrestling again. This time, however, I was sure it was all just a show. Honestly, I didn't care. I guess you could say it was like a soap opera for men. The plot lines were intriguing, and the athletic stunts pulled off by the performers made it compelling television. I never watched the WWF/WWE, primarily because I was quite uncomfortable with how vulgar it had become. It was the WCW (Ted Turner’s attempt to compete with Vince McMahon's WWF) that caught my attention, and I became a regular viewer in the nineties. I know it was incredibly immature and I was a minister and probably shouldn’t have wasted my time with it, but hey, I’m a guy.

Eventually I outgrew this phase in my life. OK, so I became a married man and the WCW went out of business, but I like to think that I outgrew it. I’ve not really followed professional wrestling closely since then, so I feel incredibly out of the loop even discussing it. That being said, however, I was shocked last week to learn of the tragic murder-suicide involving wrestler Chris Benoit and his family. What would lead a man to kill his wife on Friday, his son on Saturday, and take his own life on Sunday?

There have been attempts to blame Benoit’s actions on his obvious steroid abuse. I would never condone the use of performance enhancing drugs for athletes, but to put the blame on steroids is an attempt to shift responsibility. I have no doubt that these drugs did irreparable harm to Benoit, and they may have even contributed to his mindset. That, however, is no excuse for the evil actions that led to three deaths in three days.

Some have and will put the blame on professional wrestling. And why wouldn’t they? After all, this is a sport . . . I mean form of entertainment that has become increasingly violent and more bizarre as the years have gone by. I thought things were pretty extreme when Buzz Sawyer used a belt to whip Tommy Rich back in the early eighties. Kids watching wrestling today would probably laugh at such an incident, most likely thinking it moderately boring and incredibly lame. In today’s wrestling world, the brutality has got to be over the top and the shock factor off the charts. And much of the subject matter in today’s televised broadcasts of professional wrestling would have easily earned an “R” rating for a theatrical release not too many years ago.

But is wrestling to blame for the Benoit murder-suicide? Without condoning the current state of professional wrestling, I have to conclude that there is only one who bears the responsibility for this tragedy: the person who perpetrated it.

These attempts by society to try to find something or someone else to blame have led to a culture where we have a hard time accepting responsibility for ourselves. Why is it in this country that we’ve always got to go back and find some excuse for the detestable things we do? Whatever happened to people being accountable for their actions instead of trying to place the blame on their parents, their employer, or their miserable lot in life?

What we need in the world today are people who are not afraid to stand up and say, “It’s me! I’m to blame for how messed up I am, and I need somebody to pull me out of this pit I’m in.” And then, when a person comes to grips with the reality that it is their own sin that has led them to where they are, that is when they are ready to receive the forgiveness that is available only through Jesus Christ.

Until we recognize that we are sinners, we’ll never recognize our need for a Savior. And we’ll keep trying to blame our problems on everybody and everything else.

Chris Benoit was, I am certain, negatively affected by the performance enhancing drugs he chose to use. Similarly, I have no doubt that his choice of career as a professional wrestler took its toll on his physical and mental well-being. But that doesn’t change the fact that those were choices he made.

It is often said that with freedom comes great responsibility. Nowhere is that more true than with the freedom of choice.