We have seen the last of Becky Lynch in a wrestling ring for the unforeseeable future. While it’s bittersweet for fans, wrestlers, legends, writers—even Lynch herself to an extent—it’s a genuinely great and positive experience in her life and no one should be telling anyone when it’s the right time to be The Ma.
Jim Cornette had several comments that hit the bottom of the barrel this past week after Becky revealed her pregnancy on RAW, of course, delivered with his signature crass and verbose vernacular. Cornette basically dragged the ideal and beauty of pregnancy through the mud while inaccurately gauging an appropriate timeframe of woman’s fertility, stating:
“She’s got many years before the fuckin’ easy bake oven power gets shut off. She can have all those problems like distended stomach and stretch marks and hemorrhoids and hormone problems and mood swings and all the joys of motherhood much later on when she ain’t making a million dollars a year.”
The truth is, time isn’t on her side and those comments are as cringe as they come. Studies show that the best window for a woman to have children is between her late 20s and early 30s and one study even pinpointed the pinnacle age to be 30.5. Becky turned 33 in February.
Cornette wasn’t done and proposed the following question to his co-host Brian Last:
“What would you do if your wife came home and said, ‘Instead of making a million dollars next year, I’m gonna basically just be a raging bitch for the next nine months and give you more shit to worry about around the house?’”
Last, a father himself, had a very different outlook on the matter. “Well, that’s not typically how that conversation happens, but I would say, ‘You know that’s a beautiful thing! Don’t worry about it. I’ve got enough money for both of us.”
Cornette followed up on his Monday’s Drive-Thru, not walking back his comments all, but instead tried to explain himself and he said he understood the criticism thrown his way.
“I expected women to get mad at me because I was knocking pregnancy any way shape or form even though I wasn’t against the act, just the timing,” Cornette said. “And also they said, ‘Well he’s mad because Becky Lynch is pregnant.’ No I’m not mad, once again, I’m astonished! At the timing! But I expected a lot of women to get upset,” he added.
“If you are a grown adult male and your wife or girlfriend or significant other gets pregnant and is gonna have a baby, then yes. That is a call to be emotional, and I can see if you are a grown adult male and your brother or your cousin or your family’s either gets pregnant or their girlfriend or significant other gets pregnant there’s some call for emotion. Or some personal close time friend of yours.”
Seth Rollins fell into the first category and the fiance of Becky let cooler, rational heads prevail as he explained his perspective and disappointment in Cornette on After The Bell with Corey Graves. Rollins believed Cornette had more respect for him after he worked under Jim in Ring Of Honor and said he’s lost some for Cornette after his latest rant.
“It hurt my feelings on a personal level because Jim Cornette, that is someone who is a legend in our industry and he’s someone that I’ve personally worked with in my time at Ring of Honor, and for him to come out and say some real negative things, some real misogynist things about women in general and pregnancy in the industry,” he began. “It was just it kind of caught me off guard and it made me lose a lot of respect for someone that, you know, who a lot of people had already kind of lost respect for. I was still holding on to hope that somewhere along the line, it was a personal connection between Jim and I that, you know, he would think twice before making just some egregious comments about women, about my wife, that were just completely – I can’t even forgive them. I don’t even want to repeat them.”
Whether you hate him or champion him as your pinnacle sage for pro wrestling wisdom, Cornette undoubtedly knows the history of wrestling and in just about every situation fathomable, how to book it. His charismatically polarizing, “scorched earth” attitude has allowed him a good 40+ years of making money in the business, but he’s also burned bridges on the way.
No one else can—or should—speak for any of the worry, stress, joy and love that goes with helping to bring another life into this mad world. Men have the ability to seize any opportunity they want, a true benefit of not fathering a kid. For those reasons alone, Cornette is absolutely wrong in his take on Becky Lynch and was extremely disrespectful with his dialogue in the matter.
Despite being encouraged to do so, my problem with “eviscerating” him is this — everybody with or without a blue checkmark tries to do it. What mouth-breathing troll with a Twitter handle doesn’t take a stab at canceling your most infamous public figure of the hour? Go on any social media platform of your choosing and the “cancel culture” is lying in wait for everyone. However, what I will say is it’s as played out of a troupe as a heel authority figure in wrestling and just as ineffective. It’s white noise. It does nothing. Call me old fashioned, but if I have a problem with what you have to say, I’d much rather tell you to “f*** off” in person rather than rely on a medium that’s only been around for 15 years. This idea of a public hanging via the media is done so much that it comes across as disingenuous.
I, along with many of you, thought Cornette’s comments were queasy at best and I really didn’t like what he had to say about Dana Brooke’s appearance on his Tuesday episode of The Jim Cornette Drive-Thru (Cornette didn’t step back from those ones on Monday either). Statements like that are inexcusable and juvenile beyond any amount of years in the wrestling business. To say what he said about Lynch and Brooke took the enjoyment out of any kind of entertainment value that his podcast provided, and seemed hurtful more that anything (and I’m all for people not taking things too seriously). The great thing about podcasts? Everybody has the choice to stop listening. Just do your part if you have a problem. Seth did and did a damn good job of articulating his feelings this week.
Another matter that hasn’t gotten as much buzz is Cornette’s comments that the tearful Becky Lynch announcement on RAW damaged “The Man” persona she’s been so organic at cultivating. I couldn’t disagree more. What makes that moniker so damn cool for Becky is that she happens to (you guessed it) not be a man. She is, in all sense of the word, a woman through and through. With her beauty, attitude and approach, Lynch turned that term on its head. And guess what this woman does? She kicks “lass,” she shares a bloody grin despite a broken nose, she stuns Stone Cold and hey, now she’s gonna have a kid. That’s one powerful person if I’ve ever seen one. Up until now, not one of wrestling’s top draws was ever capable of doing that. Lynch is in a league of her own.
If you need more proof of how this isn’t detrimental to Becky, we didn’t call an emotional Daniel Bryan a wimp in 2016 when he and us thought his in-ring career was done. No, we got closer to him as a fanbase. And despite Brock Lesnar initially leaving in 2004 to preserve his body and sanity from the WWE schedule, “The Beast” came back way more popular than he ever would have if he lingered around. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and thankfully during this time of empty areas and dropping viewership, Lynch has the blessing of realigning her priorities of how she sees fit to bringing the impending “little flower girl” or “page boy” into this world. Money isn’t everything no matter how frustrated Vince McMahon may or may not be by his top star leaving (he is notorious for adoring kids after all). It certainly isn’t in this case.
It all boils down to this—we all entered this world in the same manner and it forever creates a connection to the one unique woman whom we all love. Why don’t we give professional wrestling’s top star the same courtesy? Thirty-three is a great age to have children but my opinion, just like Cornette’s, shouldn’t matter.
If you’re looking to cancel Dominic, find him here on Twitter.
