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GUEST EDITORIAL
By Alex Roberts, PWTorch.com Reader

For almost a year TNA has been asking us to "Cross The Line" with them every week on Impact, a slogan designed with two specific agendas the most prominent and obvious being to paint the company as edgy and envelope-pushing.

The irony of course is that while asking us to cross the line with them, TNA has produced shows that look, sound, and feel ten years past their prime that in no way push the proverbial envelope. At least that was true until the latest edition of Impact, where TNA really did cross the line, but not in the radical envelope-pushing way they might have hoped.

The incident to which I am referring to is the segment where TNA booked Samoa Joe to threaten Scott Steiner with a knife.

When I first scanned the Impact results this morning, I was amazed not only that this segment had been written and then allowed on the air but also by the completely non-plus way in which it was covered. Are we really living in an age where one wrestler holding a knife to the throat of another is considered acceptable storyline progression? My amazement only grew when a more detailed read of the results revealed that not only did TNA allow this segment on the air, there was absolutely no follow-up to it. No condemnation from anyone on screen of Joe's actions; just a throwaway quip from Mike Tenay.

With all that in mind, I thought perhaps my interpretation of the segment was wrong. What read like an irresponsible, dangerous, and unbelievably bad-in-taste segment may in reality have been something different. So I made the decision to watch it. After an online search for the video, it was confirmed to me that this wasn't something different; it really was an irresponsible, dangerous and unbelievably bad taste segment.

Within the world of professional wrestling I will accept many things. I can suspend my disbelief far enough to accept occasional steel chair shots and even the odd sledgehammer attack. This week on Raw for example, I was perfectly willing to accept that after Randy Orton systematically took out Triple He's family, including his wife, Hunter would bring a weapon to fight Orton. But my suspension of disbelief and views on acceptable weapons within pro-wrestling comes to a crashing halt with knives.

Had there been some kind of emotional depth to the Joe-Steiner confrontation on Impact then perhaps I might have been willing to forgive TNA for this particular segment, although it's unlikely. Maybe if TNA had made some attempt to condemn Samoa Joe's actions as wrong and not merely dismissed the incident as nothing, I would be willing to overlook this, but again it seems unlikely. There is just something too inherently distasteful about turning one of your top babyfaces into a knife-wielding maniac and still expecting fans to root for him.

How exactly am I supposed to react to Samoa Joe threatening another human being with a knife? Am I supposed to agree with and support his actions, maybe even cheer him on as he holds the blade to Steiner's throat? And just what exactly has Steiner done that warrants this kind of response from Joe in the first place? I'm supposed to believe that this feud between The Frontline and the Main Event Mafia has escalated to such a degree that legitimate death threats are now being thrown around? And more worryingly am I supposed to feel comfortable with that?

In reality, I know that there would be just as much chance of a Triple H sledgehammer shot killing someone as Samoa Joe wielding a knife and yet I feel incredibly uncomfortable when watching the Joe-Steiner segment in a way that I never have with Triple H and his sledgehammer. Or even Sting and his baseball bat, which was used on this week's Impact.

As I said previously there's just something too inherently distasteful about a knife being held to someone's throat. The fact that TNA felt that this was an acceptable piece of storyline development is astonishing. More astonishing still is the complete disregard with which the segment was treated. No follow-up and no condemnation and on a show where the police were called because Booker T's locker room was trashed. That was obscene.

TNA finally crossed a line this week - one they should never have crossed. Asking your audience to cheer a man on as he holds a knife to someone's throat can't be described by words like, distasteful, irresponsible, or stupid. All of them are understatements and how any aspect of the segment or its aftermath can be praised is beyond me. This was dangerous and terrible wrestling booking at its very worst. Whether or not TNA wants to be perceived as the edgy alternative to a PG-rated WWE, this should never have happened.

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