Part Three: The Grievous Peril of Standing Alone
Standing Alone Leads to Massacres on the High Plains.
"I'm the number one man in Mid-South, I stand alone." Butch Reed.
The Midnight Express has just beaten the Rock and Rolls for the Mid-South Tag Team Titles. Jim Cornette is throwing them a party at ringside, because where else? Ross is out to interview with a microphone and a wet lipped smile.
Cornette is even more magnificent than usual here, telling Jim Ross that "you can't come to our victory party." Even though Beautiful Bobby and Loverboy Dennis are acting like braying jackasses, Ross looks simultaneously sad to be left out and very familiar with being excluded.
At one point in the celebration Corny turns down the Loverboy's offer of champagne, saying that "he didn't drink alcohol, but he'd get his Pepsi later." Somewhere, a lightbulb went on over baby Punk's head. The Rock and Rolls show up looking for frosting based revenge and shock of shocks, Cornette's face ends up in the cake. The squeal of delight Watts gives when this happens is so girlish that one can't help but wonder if his hatred of femininity is ever self-focused.
Watts' beady eyed toady, his $3.99 tie purchased from Woolworths that very morning yet somehow already stained with pork fat, looked on with his patented mixture of awe and shame. Ross knows partying with the villains is wrong but he so desperately wants to join in anyway, to be accepted for once in his life, to be one of the boys, to finally run with the pack.
In the subsequent minutes the Cowboy manages to call Cornette a sissy four times before slapping him for one reason or another, an implied lawsuit or a perceived lack of masculinity. What has really enraged Watts is that Cornette continues to insist on calling his mother's lawyers and using his mother's money to get what he wants. Cornette will not stand alone.
One of the greatest illustrations of the grievous peril of standing alone came during the Cowboy’s feud with Eddie Gilbert’s Hotstuff International.
Watts’ entrance music is Springsteen’s “Born in the USA.” Reagan had used that song during his 1984 campaign so it is not surprising to hear Watts appropriating it for himself here. Neither man, of course, bothered to listen to it and I can’t imagine Bruce was any happier about that crypto-fascist Watts using it than he was Reagan. (13)
This is an outstanding example of Watts needing to stand alone. He pays for it, too, after a short squash over Sting (the Cowboy takes all of the offense and the pin in four minutes while Ross sports and erection that is somehow audible) he gets five minutes with Hotstuff Eddie Gilbert. Throughout the buildup Sailor Jim never specifies exactly where the five minutes alone will take place. In a darkened closet with an Erasure cassette tape playing and the rest of the junior high party waiting outside, I assume. (14) After dispatching Sting with superhuman ease Watts gets after Gilbert for a moment with the leather strap, whippings being a common theme of justice and retribution both in the frontier and in the UWF. Morgan Freeman’s Logan getting whipped to death by Sheriff Little Bill Daggett in Unforgiven is an example straight from one of the cowboy cult’s leading mythmakers.
In his outstanding book, Myth of the Western: New Perspectives on Hollywood's Frontier Narrative, Matthew Carter talks about the role of whipping in the American West and depictions of it in movies. He says that critics have noted that “the bull-whipping of Logan is symptomatic of Anglo-America’s legacy of slavery…the representation of Logan’s oppression relates it to the history of American racism…whipping was traditional punishment for runaway slaves.” (15) Now, it absolutely must be noted that in this angle, Eddie Gilbert is white. But bear in mind that Watts ran whipping angles with some regularity, as well as other angles featuring punishments held over from the times of slavery and the Wild West, lynching and tarring and feathering most notably. (16)
Instead of getting his friends to roll with him when going into a situation when he knew he was outnumbered at least two to one, the Cowboy stands alone and when the ‘Birds, new associates of Hotstuff International (17) hit the ring he succumbs to the numbers game.
Oh, sure, the good guys eventually clear the locker room and make the save, but not after, in the words of Seaman Ross, “Terry Gordy has had the Oriental Spike on Watts longer than he’s ever had it on any other man!” Buddy Roberts fights off the heroes with the strap while Hayes, the ultimate sissy in the eyes of Watts, gloats over the Cowboy’s paralyzed carcass.
Both Watts and and members of the cowboy cult never learn that standing alone in the face of a gang night riders leaves you dead on the plains while the farmhouse burns and the Comanche make off with your daughter.
Women and Other Enemies
It seems natural that kayfabe Indians would've attacked Watts and the other heroes of UWF. In fact, that such an angle never happened seems to negate the thesis of this thought experiment, the idea that the cult of the individual and the nativist, isolationist culture that defined the UWF was inspired by the Texas Indian wars. But even for Watts that may have been too on the nose.
Furthermore, since Reagan had heated up the Cold War with his frontier sheriff rhetoric, the Cowboy was able to use American jingoism to fuel some memorable angles using the Soviets and Arabs as uncivilized, un-American existential threats to UWF.
The Soviets represented everything Watts hated. For a man so obsessed with standing alone, the idea of doing things communally was sacrilegious. Ivan Koloff and his comrades burying the Cowboy in the Russian flag is the most lasting and true image Mid-South television ever produced.
Bill Watts was twenty one years old when John Kennedy became president. It is hard to imagine the staunch Republican Watts being a member of Camelot, but it throughout his time in UWF Watts embodied the most Kennedy-like ideals. Kennedy himself was a member of the cult of the cowboy and constantly used frontier mythology to structure his foreign and domestic policy. Slotkin explains that “the choice of the frontier as a symbol was not simply a device for trademarking the candidate. It was an authentic metaphor, descriptive of the way they hoped to use political power and the kinds of struggle in which they wished to engage. The “Frontier” for them was…a vivid and memorable set of hero-tales, each with a model of successful and morally justifiable action on the stage of conflict.” (18) I cannot think of a better way to describe pro-wrestling as produced by Bill Watts than “a memorable set of hero-tales” featuring “justifiable action on a stage of conflict.” The frontier metaphor, Slotkin continues, “shaped the language that the resultant wars would be understood by who commanded and fought them….American troops would be describing Vietnam as Indian country, search and destroy missions as a “game of Cowboys and Indians;” and Kennedy’s ambassador to Vietnam would justify a massive military escalation by citing the necessity of “moving the Indians away from the fort so the settlers could plant corn.” (19)
After America was defeated and Saigon fell there was a national period of soul searching. The twin tumults of Vietnam and the Civil Rights movement (Anglo superiority being another cornerstone of the frontier mythology) led to a justifiably named time of malaise. A man with a tin badge and a cowboy hat was elected to lead America back to its Wild Western ideals, and standing tall against the Soviets was the way to do it.
Eddie Gilbert, being a new man, an international man, had joined forces with the Russians. Watts was doubly enraged, Eddie wouldn’t walk alone, and he and Ivan Koloff were beating hapless pawns of the bourgeoisie and draping the Hammer and Sickle banner over their bodies. Because even jobbers, the weakest of the weak, must stand alone in the UWF nobody was able to stop them, until the Cowboy had seen enough.
When confronted in the ring by Watts, Gilbert feigns contrition. It is also interesting to note that yet again, the heels don’t do anything particularly heelish. Watts threatens to burn their flag and they run out and beat him up and save it from the flames.
Watts, an uber-Patriot, would’ve done the same if the Russians were doing the same to Old Gory, yes? The ego, hotheadedness and self-righteousness that come with standing alone seems to justify any actions the heroes take. How easily they drift from “the good cowboy” to “the bad cowboy,” proving how useless the distinction is to begin with. The cult of the cowboy is inherently violent and destructive to civil society. Neither country won the Cold War. Shane rode off into the sunset at the end, but he was fatally gut-shot and was slumped dead in the saddle.
Any cowboy who stands alone will inevitably be buried under an enemy flag.
When Duggan and Butch Reed team-up against Akbar's "Rat Pack" (rats themselves having long usage in the encoding of racist, anti-Semitic, and nativist language) some form of the phrase "standing alone" is used six to eight times within three minutes minutes.
The angle starts with a brown-skinned invader, in this case Skandar Akbar, in the ring. The Arabs don't do anything particularly heelish until taunted by the babys, taunted far longer than any self-respecting Southern would endure were the situations reversed.
The heroes often call the Arabs "blood suckers" and "parasites,” again, words with terrible and lengthy history in the language of propaganda. (20)
Both Buddy Landell and Reed are fantastic in their roles and Akbar seems like the most reasonable person in the ring. In the middle of all of these buried yet burning passions of race, masculinity, provincialism and jingoism, Akbar behaves only like a capitalist. He buys what he needs and doesn’t understand the constant ego-driven conflict the Western men are engaged in. Akbar isn’t being slick or deceptive (that’s Budro’s job) he’s just being a businessman. But Butch Reed cannot be bought or sold, Butch Reed is a free man, Butch Reed stands alone.
This of course gets him a beat down. The heels have their way with him until another man who stands alone, Jim Duggan, comes to the ring to save him. Once the ring is cleared, Watts calls them to the microphone to talk out their differences and finally, finally, they realize that some cooperative work, some social engagement with those around you, might be better at saving your ass than standing alone and walking tall.
"I'm the number one man in Mid-South, I stand alone." Butch Reed.
The Midnight Express has just beaten the Rock and Rolls for the Mid-South Tag Team Titles. Jim Cornette is throwing them a party at ringside, because where else? Ross is out to interview with a microphone and a wet lipped smile.
Cornette is even more magnificent than usual here, telling Jim Ross that "you can't come to our victory party." Even though Beautiful Bobby and Loverboy Dennis are acting like braying jackasses, Ross looks simultaneously sad to be left out and very familiar with being excluded.
At one point in the celebration Corny turns down the Loverboy's offer of champagne, saying that "he didn't drink alcohol, but he'd get his Pepsi later." Somewhere, a lightbulb went on over baby Punk's head. The Rock and Rolls show up looking for frosting based revenge and shock of shocks, Cornette's face ends up in the cake. The squeal of delight Watts gives when this happens is so girlish that one can't help but wonder if his hatred of femininity is ever self-focused.
Watts' beady eyed toady, his $3.99 tie purchased from Woolworths that very morning yet somehow already stained with pork fat, looked on with his patented mixture of awe and shame. Ross knows partying with the villains is wrong but he so desperately wants to join in anyway, to be accepted for once in his life, to be one of the boys, to finally run with the pack.
In the subsequent minutes the Cowboy manages to call Cornette a sissy four times before slapping him for one reason or another, an implied lawsuit or a perceived lack of masculinity. What has really enraged Watts is that Cornette continues to insist on calling his mother's lawyers and using his mother's money to get what he wants. Cornette will not stand alone.
One of the greatest illustrations of the grievous peril of standing alone came during the Cowboy’s feud with Eddie Gilbert’s Hotstuff International.
Watts’ entrance music is Springsteen’s “Born in the USA.” Reagan had used that song during his 1984 campaign so it is not surprising to hear Watts appropriating it for himself here. Neither man, of course, bothered to listen to it and I can’t imagine Bruce was any happier about that crypto-fascist Watts using it than he was Reagan. (13)
This is an outstanding example of Watts needing to stand alone. He pays for it, too, after a short squash over Sting (the Cowboy takes all of the offense and the pin in four minutes while Ross sports and erection that is somehow audible) he gets five minutes with Hotstuff Eddie Gilbert. Throughout the buildup Sailor Jim never specifies exactly where the five minutes alone will take place. In a darkened closet with an Erasure cassette tape playing and the rest of the junior high party waiting outside, I assume. (14) After dispatching Sting with superhuman ease Watts gets after Gilbert for a moment with the leather strap, whippings being a common theme of justice and retribution both in the frontier and in the UWF. Morgan Freeman’s Logan getting whipped to death by Sheriff Little Bill Daggett in Unforgiven is an example straight from one of the cowboy cult’s leading mythmakers.
In his outstanding book, Myth of the Western: New Perspectives on Hollywood's Frontier Narrative, Matthew Carter talks about the role of whipping in the American West and depictions of it in movies. He says that critics have noted that “the bull-whipping of Logan is symptomatic of Anglo-America’s legacy of slavery…the representation of Logan’s oppression relates it to the history of American racism…whipping was traditional punishment for runaway slaves.” (15) Now, it absolutely must be noted that in this angle, Eddie Gilbert is white. But bear in mind that Watts ran whipping angles with some regularity, as well as other angles featuring punishments held over from the times of slavery and the Wild West, lynching and tarring and feathering most notably. (16)
Instead of getting his friends to roll with him when going into a situation when he knew he was outnumbered at least two to one, the Cowboy stands alone and when the ‘Birds, new associates of Hotstuff International (17) hit the ring he succumbs to the numbers game.
Oh, sure, the good guys eventually clear the locker room and make the save, but not after, in the words of Seaman Ross, “Terry Gordy has had the Oriental Spike on Watts longer than he’s ever had it on any other man!” Buddy Roberts fights off the heroes with the strap while Hayes, the ultimate sissy in the eyes of Watts, gloats over the Cowboy’s paralyzed carcass.
Both Watts and and members of the cowboy cult never learn that standing alone in the face of a gang night riders leaves you dead on the plains while the farmhouse burns and the Comanche make off with your daughter.
Women and Other Enemies
It seems natural that kayfabe Indians would've attacked Watts and the other heroes of UWF. In fact, that such an angle never happened seems to negate the thesis of this thought experiment, the idea that the cult of the individual and the nativist, isolationist culture that defined the UWF was inspired by the Texas Indian wars. But even for Watts that may have been too on the nose.
Furthermore, since Reagan had heated up the Cold War with his frontier sheriff rhetoric, the Cowboy was able to use American jingoism to fuel some memorable angles using the Soviets and Arabs as uncivilized, un-American existential threats to UWF.
The Soviets represented everything Watts hated. For a man so obsessed with standing alone, the idea of doing things communally was sacrilegious. Ivan Koloff and his comrades burying the Cowboy in the Russian flag is the most lasting and true image Mid-South television ever produced.
Bill Watts was twenty one years old when John Kennedy became president. It is hard to imagine the staunch Republican Watts being a member of Camelot, but it throughout his time in UWF Watts embodied the most Kennedy-like ideals. Kennedy himself was a member of the cult of the cowboy and constantly used frontier mythology to structure his foreign and domestic policy. Slotkin explains that “the choice of the frontier as a symbol was not simply a device for trademarking the candidate. It was an authentic metaphor, descriptive of the way they hoped to use political power and the kinds of struggle in which they wished to engage. The “Frontier” for them was…a vivid and memorable set of hero-tales, each with a model of successful and morally justifiable action on the stage of conflict.” (18) I cannot think of a better way to describe pro-wrestling as produced by Bill Watts than “a memorable set of hero-tales” featuring “justifiable action on a stage of conflict.” The frontier metaphor, Slotkin continues, “shaped the language that the resultant wars would be understood by who commanded and fought them….American troops would be describing Vietnam as Indian country, search and destroy missions as a “game of Cowboys and Indians;” and Kennedy’s ambassador to Vietnam would justify a massive military escalation by citing the necessity of “moving the Indians away from the fort so the settlers could plant corn.” (19)
After America was defeated and Saigon fell there was a national period of soul searching. The twin tumults of Vietnam and the Civil Rights movement (Anglo superiority being another cornerstone of the frontier mythology) led to a justifiably named time of malaise. A man with a tin badge and a cowboy hat was elected to lead America back to its Wild Western ideals, and standing tall against the Soviets was the way to do it.
Eddie Gilbert, being a new man, an international man, had joined forces with the Russians. Watts was doubly enraged, Eddie wouldn’t walk alone, and he and Ivan Koloff were beating hapless pawns of the bourgeoisie and draping the Hammer and Sickle banner over their bodies. Because even jobbers, the weakest of the weak, must stand alone in the UWF nobody was able to stop them, until the Cowboy had seen enough.
When confronted in the ring by Watts, Gilbert feigns contrition. It is also interesting to note that yet again, the heels don’t do anything particularly heelish. Watts threatens to burn their flag and they run out and beat him up and save it from the flames.
Watts, an uber-Patriot, would’ve done the same if the Russians were doing the same to Old Gory, yes? The ego, hotheadedness and self-righteousness that come with standing alone seems to justify any actions the heroes take. How easily they drift from “the good cowboy” to “the bad cowboy,” proving how useless the distinction is to begin with. The cult of the cowboy is inherently violent and destructive to civil society. Neither country won the Cold War. Shane rode off into the sunset at the end, but he was fatally gut-shot and was slumped dead in the saddle.
Any cowboy who stands alone will inevitably be buried under an enemy flag.
When Duggan and Butch Reed team-up against Akbar's "Rat Pack" (rats themselves having long usage in the encoding of racist, anti-Semitic, and nativist language) some form of the phrase "standing alone" is used six to eight times within three minutes minutes.
The angle starts with a brown-skinned invader, in this case Skandar Akbar, in the ring. The Arabs don't do anything particularly heelish until taunted by the babys, taunted far longer than any self-respecting Southern would endure were the situations reversed.
The heroes often call the Arabs "blood suckers" and "parasites,” again, words with terrible and lengthy history in the language of propaganda. (20)
Both Buddy Landell and Reed are fantastic in their roles and Akbar seems like the most reasonable person in the ring. In the middle of all of these buried yet burning passions of race, masculinity, provincialism and jingoism, Akbar behaves only like a capitalist. He buys what he needs and doesn’t understand the constant ego-driven conflict the Western men are engaged in. Akbar isn’t being slick or deceptive (that’s Budro’s job) he’s just being a businessman. But Butch Reed cannot be bought or sold, Butch Reed is a free man, Butch Reed stands alone.
This of course gets him a beat down. The heels have their way with him until another man who stands alone, Jim Duggan, comes to the ring to save him. Once the ring is cleared, Watts calls them to the microphone to talk out their differences and finally, finally, they realize that some cooperative work, some social engagement with those around you, might be better at saving your ass than standing alone and walking tall.
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