A little over a year ago I decided to look deeper into Lucha Libre. A genre of wrestling I felt was far underserved. I want to stress that this statement has nothing to do with my love of Lucha Libre or more specifically CMLL. I’m not writing this to get more eyes on CMLL or Lucha Libre. I’d love for people to find more… honorable wrestling promotions to follow, though really if people decide to drop wrestling all together after this letter, that’s better than supporting WWE in any measure.

So, the cat is out of the bag after that first paragraph. This letter is a call to arms for wrestling fans to finally give up WWE. Why though? Well let me get to that. Since Greatest Royal Rumble, a WWE PPV in Saudi Arabia, I have stopped watching WWE cold turkey and I suggest anyone who cares about LGBT rights to do the same. I’m not an ally, but instead a G or gay. I’m a gay male and the GRR was the last straw for me. Why? Well let me continue…

If you know anything about Saudi Arabia as an LGBT or an alley of such people. One of the things you should know is that being LGBT in Saudi Arabia is literally illegal. It’s not hard to find this information in 2018, in fact it’s readily available on Wikipedia. So what does it being illegal actually mean? What is the punishment? That varies from fines all the way up to life imprisonment/torture/death sentence. That’s poor form for WWE. They shouldn’t be working with a government where this is commonplace.

If that weren’t disgusting enough, at the same time WWE is selling gay pride shirts while they have this 10 year deal with Saudi Arabia. It’s an incredible thin veiled deception by them, trying to have their cake and eat it too. It very easily relates back to Stephanie Mcmahon’s words in 2015, “Philanthropy is the future of marketing”. Her hollow words echo the hollow actions of WWE. The fact is… WWE doesn’t care about LGBT rights. It’s plainly obvious if they are willing to take millions from an anti-LGBT country and spew their propaganda. LGBT shirts are merely a tool to further feed cash into the WWE machine.

I know it’s not easy to give up something that you may have watched since before your age was in the double digits. I have to admit that from 2011-2017 my wrestling fandom was almost entirely WWE with perhaps some NJPW here and there. It’s 2018 though and with the same 9.99 you pay WWE you could buy a subscription to any number of other alternative that aren’t stepping past that moral boundary.

Please… stop supporting WWE. They will only continue to move past the moral boundaries if their fandom continues not to care about what they do. It’s time we the people send a loud and clear message to WWE. I know my own reach is very limited, so please share this if you think LGBT rights are worth fighting for. The company shouldn’t go unchecked and only we, the wrestling fandom can make WWE realize that a 10 year deal with an anti LGBT country is too far.

PS. If you don’t give up WWE, I’m not going to hate you; but I will be disappointed.

Love, Lostinyourears.