So apparently, it wasn’t the company that was holding women’s wrestling back, it was us fans, according to former Smackdown GM Paige. The WWE superstar is doing media rounds promoting her new film, Fighting with my family, and during her interview with
Gulf News Entertainment, Paige stated that it was the lack of interest from fans in women’s wrestling that was the main issue:
“It was never WWE holding the women back. It was the fans not taking them seriously. They wanted to see more of the male characters many years ago. It was a male dominated sport.”
“When I first started, there were only five women there. It was a struggle but WWE just believed in us. When I got into the ring, I wanted to prove to the fans that girls were capable of having good matches and sometimes, even better. That was kind of my mission from the get go. Now there’s obviously a revolution.”
Not surprisingly, Paige’s comments drew criticism within the wrestling community and several fans actually voiced their opinion to the former Smackdown GM about being supporters of women’s wrestling all along and Paige responded to a fan with this:
It’s actually surprising that Paige is blaming the fans for a situation they never had control of. The fans never booked the women in bra & panties and 30 second matches, or purposely timed bathroom break bouts before the main event. In fact, it was the fans who started the #GiveDivasAChance movement three years ago after being fed up with the company booking the women as nothing more than eye candy.
Feel free to drop your opinion below on this situation. Is Paige right in blaming the fans on the lack of interest in women’s wrestling?