Former WWE wrestler Chyna Dead at 46

[blankall]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

I would argue that because of its own mainstream status, when an actor blows his brains out or overdoses or drives wrecklessly into a pole at 200 mph, the very nature is to an extent over mourn, rehabilitate the celebrity in death, and ignore the causes, that's the hollywood hype machine.

With Wrestlers its a press condemnation of the industry because its a freak show and a circus.

Last year there were 20 wrestler deaths. Out of that one I could see was an in ring caused death, Roddy Piper's death was pretty much 60 years old when he passed, but he also wrestled in a type of environment that doesn't exist anymore. Dusty Rhodes as well, but he was never a picture of healthy living. Bockwinkle and Gagne were old men. You had a wrestler die after brain surgery for removal of a tumor.

This year, you've had three major deaths.

Axl Rotten who was no surprise, he was pretty much a junkie. You had Balls Mahoney who was pretty much a junkie as well, and he also wrestled a style that was conductive to serious injury.

And you had Chyna, but her death was caused by a drug addiction that went far beyond wrestling, she was reached out to and refused to take the help and she's dead. Its sad but it should be a cautionary tail of addiction more then an indictment of the industry that she was in or the company that she was in 16 years ago.

In what other industry do you have this level of death?

I will admit that the unwarranted perceived "freak show" nature of wrestling does create bias though.

[SuperMatt18]

Personally I do feel that a lot of the problem's with Chyna stem from HHH.

It was the treatment and embarrassment of Chyna when HHH left/cheated on her with Stephanie that really set Chyna down the dark path.

In the end Chyna made her own choices, and refused help from the WWE that others have taken in order to turn themselves around (X-Pac, Scott Hall, etc). But really in her situation I could see why she would refuse, hard to trust the person/people that burned you in the first place.

Hope she finds piece now because most of the people in the industry will tell you how nice of a person she was prior to all of the issues that occurred after she was forced out of the WWE.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by blankall

In what other industry do you have this level of death?

I will admit that the unwarranted perceived "freak show" nature of wrestling does create bias though.

Like I said in terms of deaths, and its more pronounced because they don't announce every single tragedy is the movie industry.

How many celebs over dose or die of things that are completely out of the ordinary.

How many stuntmen and production cast members die or are grievously injured making movies.

how many forgotten actors or kids that were ground up and spit out become walking tragedies.

Not to pull out the tired media conspiracy, but a lot of this stuff isn't reported on in the same way because of how effective the Hollywood spin machine protects not the people but the industry.

Is wrestling perfect not even close, but lets look at a few things

Over the past few years they've reduced time on the road a lot, these guys at one point were working 300 dates a year, that's been reduced to about 220.

They changed the rings about 10 years ago, they're probably still not the most comfortable things around, but you can see the greater give.

Health and Wellness program, its not perfect, but its a long long way from what was happening before which was nothing. And give WWE credit, they have refused to clear wrestlers to come back recently. Daniel Bryan is one big example of the your done before you want to be done. You could argue the same with Nikki Bella, they've kept Cena away from the ring in terms of clearing him. Paige was pulled from the road for concussion issues.

The after career stuff, they've paid for rehab for former wrestlers who need help, they even sent Scott Hall and paid for him 4 or 5 times before they pretty much gave up.

The Scholarship program for former wrestlers and active wrestlers.

I'm reading the wellness site now and they have a financial assistance program to help their talent save money.

Compare that to sports like the NFL which disposes of players like dirt, has a questionable drug testing program, and doesn't do much to assist their players in terms of finances and after career help.

Lets alone the entertainment business which throws people away like cardboard.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Personally I do feel that a lot of the problem's with Chyna stem from HHH.

It was the treatment and embarrassment of Chyna when HHH left/cheated on her with Stephanie that really set Chyna down the dark path.

In the end Chyna made her own choices, and refused help from the WWE that others have taken in order to turn themselves around (X-Pac, Scott Hall, etc). But really in her situation I could see why she would refuse, hard to trust the person/people that burned you in the first place.

Hope she finds piece now because most of the people in the industry will tell you how nice of a person she was prior to all of the issues that occurred after she was forced out of the WWE.

Maybe, but at the end of the day, we know that Chyna was hurt by HHH, but we don't know the truths from the lies in this story. Look, I'm the last one that would defend HHH, but Chyna spend half of her life lying about a lot of things that happened to her. Call for help? Maybe, trying to build a career based on tragedy real and created maybe.

Basically where she loses me on the HHH thing is that she accused him of assault and Rape and later admitted it was a lie. She did the same thing to Waltman, and while Waltman is no citizen of the year, it sounds more like Chyna had some serious issues, and some serious drug problems and lived in denial on all of them.

She was destined to be steamrolled, not by an industry, but by her choices and her real mental issues. She was a train wreck, but she was the conductor and engineer and dispatcher on that train.

Break ups happen all the time, so does cheating and obvious other things. But that happened nearly 20 years ago, she chose the low road.

I feel bad for her, I hope her friends and family find some peace from this and don't blame themselves for her downfall and death. But at the end of the day, this wasn't about HHH, or Stephanie Mcmahon or the WWE, this was all on her.

[Locke]

I dont think its genuine to deflect blame from Professional Wrestling by comparing it to other sports.

I think if you want to compare it to anything you have to compare it to other forms of professional combat like boxing and UFC.

Now I'm admittedly not an expert on any of it, but I do have a few friends who have participated and competed in Stampede Wrestling and while its 'staged' it is an incredibly physical feat. Its hard. Its hard work and its hard on your body.

In addition to which is the almost prerequisite cornucopia of drugs that you basically need in order to make it work, steroids to bulk up and PEDs to help you recover more quickly and damned near anything that will kill the pain.

And when you compare it to other forms of professional combat you see that they dont compete nearly as often or nearly as long which forces you to conclude that the problems with Pro Wrestling and inherent and systemic.

The problem is, to change it they'd have to have a fundamental change in their entire business model.

The fact of the matter is though that the tragedies are beginning to outweigh the successes and some drastic solutions should probably be looked at. Its time, in the honourable tradition of Pro Wrestling, to go big or go home.

I'd like to hear what some of the really successful wrestlers that have gotten out of the business have to say on the matter. Theres obviously an appeal to it so it would be a shame to shutter-up the whole thing but I dont think it can keep going on like this.

Its just leaving a trail of human detritus in its wake.

[Swift]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Like I said in terms of deaths, and its more pronounced because they don't announce every single tragedy is the movie industry.

How many celebs over dose or die of things that are completely out of the ordinary.

How many stuntmen and production cast members die or are grievously injured making movies.

how many forgotten actors or kids that were ground up and spit out become walking tragedies.

I get that you're defending wrestling because you're a fan, but I'm a fan too, and this argument doesn't hold up. There are vastly, vastly more people involved in the entertainment industry than there are in the wrestling business, yet the sheer amount of deaths in wrestling blows the number of entertainment deaths out of the water.

Here's a site listing 100 wrestlers who died young - http://www.ewrestlingnews.com/lists/...ore-their-time (unfortunately it's a clickbait type site) but I counted 80-90 who worked in WWE. They're the top dog in town, the home of wrestlers at the top of their game. Now name 80-90 Hollywood stars who died early in the last 30 years. There aren't that many. Now you can argue that we don't hear about never-was actors or unknown stunt men, but we also don't hear about Joe Schmoe, indy wrestler from Kentucky either.

All that said, it appears to be a generation thing. I do think WWE have upped their game in terms of looking after their wrestlers' wellbeing and I don't expect to be sitting here in 10-20 years reading about the drug overdoses of Kofi Kingston and Cody Rhodes.

[Maritime Q-Scout]

From what I understand there has been a huge cultural shift in WWE and wrestling as a whole from partying every night, drinking and the use of hard drugs to guys ending the show, showering, heading back to the hotel and then playing xbox in their rooms.

With the knowledge of health, work out regime, and a reduction in the vices I highly doubt in 15-20 years you'll routinely be seeing names like Sami Zayne, Finn Balor, Kofi Kingston, Xavier Woods, Neville, Cody Rhodes, et al in the papers having died well before their time.

[taco.vidal]

Originally Posted by blankall

In what other industry do you have this level of death?

I will admit that the unwarranted perceived "freak show" nature of wrestling does create bias though.

Hockey enforcer.

[PostandIn]

Not Chyna related but one of WWE's own provides a response to the thick people that can't get over that wrestling is 'fake'

http://www.rollingstone.com/sports/n...tling-20160422

New Day totally rocks!

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

I would argue that because of its own mainstream status, when an actor blows his brains out or overdoses or drives wrecklessly into a pole at 200 mph, the very nature is to an extent over mourn, rehabilitate the celebrity in death, and ignore the causes, that's the hollywood hype machine.

With Wrestlers its a press condemnation of the industry because its a freak show and a circus.

Last year there were 20 wrestler deaths. Out of that one I could see was an in ring caused death, Roddy Piper's death was pretty much 60 years old when he passed, but he also wrestled in a type of environment that doesn't exist anymore. Dusty Rhodes as well, but he was never a picture of healthy living. Bockwinkle and Gagne were old men. You had a wrestler die after brain surgery for removal of a tumor.

This year, you've had three major deaths.

Axl Rotten who was no surprise, he was pretty much a junkie. You had Balls Mahoney who was pretty much a junkie as well, and he also wrestled a style that was conductive to serious injury.

And you had Chyna, but her death was caused by a drug addiction that went far beyond wrestling, she was reached out to and refused to take the help and she's dead. Its sad but it should be a cautionary tail of addiction more then an indictment of the industry that she was in or the company that she was in 16 years ago.

Jeez, all these people died largely from complications of substance abuse, and you think they are all just junkies and it's not related to the industry they work in.

[Northendzone]

To me it sure seems like a lot more wrestlers die at an early age than regular Hollywood stars.

I was thinking that Chyna is the first female wrestler to die earlier than usual.

[VladtheImpaler]

Didn't Elizabeth die young too? Though I guess she is not a wrestler.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by VladtheImpaler

Didn't Elizabeth die young too? Though I guess she is not a wrestler.

She died a while after leaving the industry.

Guys, we know there are problems, I'm not trying to shuffle the problems under the mat no pun intended, but there is a wicked double standard being applied here.

And Chyna was 15 years out of her wrestling career, they offered her help more then once and she refused it, at what point is it the responsibility of the industry and at what point did she kill herself?

I was also arguing that the WWE itself, not the whole industry which is a whole different discussion, seems to be doing a lot more then the pro sports leagues and in terms of the entertainment industry to help their former members.

Its not protecting the industry because I'm a fan of the industry, we know that wrestling itself is a tough way to make a living, we know that it had a pretty big culture of partying and drugs and alcohol, we know that we're seeing the old guard die out because of the culture of the 60's 70's 80's and 90's.

But lets try to be honest, blaming Chyna's death for example on the WWE I think is a bit of agenda building, she lived the life of an addict long after she left and refused help. That's not the industry, that's all her.

I feel bad about it, nobody should die like that. But she made the choices that lead to it.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by VladtheImpaler

Didn't Elizabeth die young too? Though I guess she is not a wrestler.

Guess what she died from...

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

Guess what she died from...

She was mixing painkillers and vodka iirc which is funny because she never took a bump in her whole career.

She was also dating Lex Luger at the time, who beat the crap out of her more then a few times, she also dated Savage who was a psychopath.

[flambers]

Percentage of Wrestlers that die young is staggering high......

Hollywood not even close in my opinion.

Many years ago Hart's had a five man tag team in Calgary for a show.

3 of the 5 have passed away before they were 50 (Owen, Davey and Brian).

[Mean Mr. Mustard]

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

Guess what she died from...

Being a junkie?

It is a sports entertainment in which fans state with great glee that it is scripted, not faked. At the same time ignoring the fact that the human body may not be designed to be subjected to massive blows hundreds of times per year. That isn't even beginning to mention the impacts of steroids on the system when taken at high doses.

It is easy to say that the WWE/WWF has taken their due diligence and that they offer supports and that they are all just junkies ... But maybe it is the lifestyle they demand out of their performers that results in large numbers of them having drug problems (being a junkie). Enjoy the product but don't try and sugar coat it and pretend that the large number of deaths are just coincidence or personal failings.

[Maritime Q-Scout]

I don't think the argument is that all the wrestlers that die young are from the ins tense physicality of the industry combined with drug/steroid/pain killer/alcohol issues.

I think that's there, that's evident, and that's accurate.

However, that's the industry as a whole.

You have to judge each individual case on an individual basis. Did Chyna die young because of the physicality of the industry? Was it because of drug/steroid/pain killer/alcohol abuse? If so, if the WWE offered help on repeated occasions that were denied, does the blame shift to the individual? If the help was rejected because of being burnt by the WWE in the past, should the responsibility rest entirely on the individual?

I think THIS case is complex. I don't know if WWE/wrestling industry is to blame, or Chyna is to blame. It's likely a combination of the two.

However, none of us can sit here at our screens and say "the WWE isn't responsible" in the same way we can't say "Chyna did this to herself and refused help so it's her own fault". It's not that black and white.

Which continues to question, if the WWE made mistakes in the past, recognizes the mistakes and makes attempts to fix them, are they solely to blame?

It's way to witch hunt and point fingers, wmhas hard is answering tough questions, especially when multiple parties acted poorly.

[Locke]

I think they should make professional wrestlers go through a doping test before every event.

Not for the sake of control or fairness but just for interest.

"Dear Lord, this is a performance enhancing drug only found in Sharks!!!"

[Vulcan]

I was watching Anthony Bourdain's show on CNN last night and it was about the out of control heroin addiction happening in Massachusetts. It's been blamed on over prescription of Oxi by doctors who were under the impression from the drug companies that it wasn't habit forming. That Pro Wrestling fell into this path of misinformed doctors prescribing pain killers is hardly surprising. Lets hope the future is sunnier for wrestling and everyone else.

Bourdain, in search for the full scope, also meets with a generalist doctor who claims the medical community must also take responsibility for the widespread sales of pain medication.

https://skift.com/2014/11/10/anthony...mall-town-usa/