{"id":46433,"date":"2017-08-16T12:09:22","date_gmt":"2017-08-16T17:09:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/?p=46433"},"modified":"2017-08-16T12:09:22","modified_gmt":"2017-08-16T17:09:22","slug":"amadis-take-light-current-events-jinders-gimmick-painting-americans-racists-harder-swallow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2017\/08\/16\/amadis-take-light-current-events-jinders-gimmick-painting-americans-racists-harder-swallow\/","title":{"rendered":"AMADI&#8217;S TAKE: In light of current events, Jinder&#8217;s gimmick of painting American&#8217;s as racists is harder to swallow"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"pwtor-1844928318\" class=\"pwtor-before-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><hr \/><b>SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)... <\/b>\r\n\r\n<iframe src=\"https:\/\/widget.spreaker.com\/player?show_id=3076978&theme=light&playlist=false&playlist-continuous=false&autoplay=false&live-autoplay=false&chapters-image=true&episode_image_position=right&hide-logo=false&hide-likes=false&hide-comments=false&hide-sharing=false&hide-download=true\" width=\"100%\" height=\"140px\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe>\r\n<hr \/><\/div><p>Ever since WWE\u2019s Superstar Shake-up earlier this year, Smackdown Live has gone from being the \u201cland of opportunity\u201d to the land of foreign menace heels. Something about Smackdown\u2019s acquisition of Rusev, Kevin Owens, and Jinder Mahal spurred the company\u2019s creative team to run essentially the same anti-American storyline in three different programs on the same two-hour show. Kevin Owens declared himself the \u201cnew face of America\u201d upon his blue-brand arrival and Rusev declared America a joke during his. However, it\u2019s Jinder Mahal\u2019s spin on the anti-American bad guy that\u2019s the most problematic.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/post\/2016\/10\/Staff10Amadi_130_38.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-33963 alignright\" src=\"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/post\/2016\/10\/Staff10Amadi_130_38.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"130\" height=\"150\" \/><\/a>In contrast to the other two, Jinder Mahal has decided that he doesn\u2019t hate America, but rather it\u2019s the American people who hate him because of the color of his skin, the way he talks, and his Indian heritage.<\/p>\n<p>At the time of his coronation as WWE Champion, the company needed an easy way to cover for the fact that fans were upset with his hasty ascension from perennial jobber to WWE champion. Instead of focusing on that or developing new character dynamics to goad the audience into booing him, WWE decided it best that Mahal claim to be the victim of racism in America so that he could also play hero in India.<\/p>\n<p>In light of recent events in America, however, Mahal\u2019s portrayal as a victim of American racism is a lot harder to swallow this week than it was last week.<\/p>\n<p>On this week\u2019s edition of Smackdown, Mahal declared the American people racist and jingoistic to a chorus of boos, which again, due to recent events isn\u2019t ideal for the purposes of entertainment or escapism. Because he\u2019s an anti-American heel, the audience also booed his announcement that it was Indian Independence Day and his celebration of the occasion.<\/p>\n<p>WWE has a rich history of arguably tasteless storylines at the height of American cultural conflicts, but as of this past Tuesday, Smackdown Live\u2019s top heel claiming to be a victim of American racism is more Muhammad Hassan-Undertaker right now than it is even Sgt. Slaughter-Hulk Hogan.<\/p>\n<p>After the events in Charlottesville, encouraging fans to boo a guy claiming to be hated because of the color of his skin probably isn\u2019t the way to go. Smackdown Live is a perfectly fine show most weeks. There were several wrestlers on this past week\u2019s episode like A.J. Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura who received enormously positive reactions. If WWE is guilty of anything here, it\u2019s simply propping up a character who wasn\u2019t ready to hold the company\u2019s top championship in order to make strides in the Indian market.<\/p>\n<p>WWE\u2019s attempt to recapture the magic of Bret Hart\u2019s late-&#8217;90s run where he was a babyface in Canada and public enemy #1 in America was understandable, but that aspect of the Jinder Mahal character needs to be over and done with. It\u2019s time for WWE to put in the work to get Jinder Mahal over with their domestic audience in a way that doesn\u2019t draw attention to some of the ugliness that\u2019s all over American news stations. If Mahal is to continue as the company\u2019s top champion, or even as a featured act, WWE needs to either ditch the character\u2019s cries of racism or evolve the character in a way that doesn\u2019t make the audience think twice before playing along and booing him.<\/p><div id=\"pwtor-3905699578\" class=\"pwtor-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<hr \/>\n<p><em>(Jason Amadi has written Takes for both PWTorch and MMATorch for many years. Follow him on Twitter @jasonamadi.)<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"pwtor-end-article-groups pwtor-entity-placement\" id=\"pwtor-3935701964\"><div id=\"pwtor-1857955380\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\nTHANK YOU FOR VISITING<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Ever since WWE\u2019s Superstar Shake-up earlier this year, Smackdown Live has gone from being the \u201cland of opportunity\u201d to the land of foreign menace heels. Something about Smackdown\u2019s acquisition of Rusev, Kevin Owens, and Jinder <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2017\/08\/16\/amadis-take-light-current-events-jinders-gimmick-painting-americans-racists-harder-swallow\/\" title=\"AMADI&#8217;S TAKE: In light of current events, Jinder&#8217;s gimmick of painting American&#8217;s as racists is harder to swallow\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":42752,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4010,52,53],"tags":[5697,563,3810],"class_list":["post-46433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-amadis-take","category-opnionandanalysis","category-opinion_stafftakes","tag-charlottesville","tag-india","tag-jinder-mahal"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/post\/2017\/05\/MahalJinderTB3x2_600.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46433"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46433\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46434,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46433\/revisions\/46434"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}