1980s Sex Scandal in the WWE

Vince135792003

This is a 45 minute clip of the Donahue show (day time talk show with audience) in the 1980s when the WWE (specifically ring announcer Mel Philips and Pat Paterson and 1 other, all who resigned at the time over it) were being accused of sexual harrasment.

Its a surreal clip. You have 3 wrestlers/announcers including Barry O (Randy Ortons uncle) claiming that male WWE employees made sexual advances to them.

It takes about 5 minutes to really get going but its a bizarre cast of characters; Vince McMahon, Dave Meltzer (with a hell of a mullet), Bruno Samartino, Barry O and Superstar Billy Graham all in a line.



http://stage6.divx.com/content/show/1077892?user_id=196932

Stalfos

That was so messed up. I could only imagine how it would have been to sit in front of vince mcmahon and not s**t yourself. Those guys were brave enough to do that. Also i felt those people should be shouting "jerry" though out the show.
Wonder how Pat Patterson got back into the WWE after that. The host was very in your face too. Does anyone know if anyone was arrested over this?

Firewalkwithme

Interesting show, McMahon would make a great politician if he wasn't so overtly aggressive. He looked like he was ready to explode at any moment.

Anyway this is from Pat Patterson's Wikipedia entry:

Announcer Jim Ross made disparaging remarks like "he's single, fellas", "that is the largest man that has ever been on top of Pat Patterson" (after Patterson was splashed by Viscera), and that he "does rear-end work at the Brisco Brothers Auto Body Shop in Tampa, Florida"

Jerichoholic

I watched this a while ago and it is awesome. The guy that Vince fired for being "horrible" was obviously not, he would have been a great asset to WWF at the time. I have no doubt about the whole thing being true, there's a great list of wrestling urban myths doing the rounds, with really horrible stories about life on the road.

Meltzer is great on this (as always), sticking to the facts and telling Vince he's wrong. Always the diplomat.

The woman at the end is hillairious as she feels none of this matters since wrestling is fake

Fozzy

Mad seein Meltzer so close to Vince! I'd heard about most of this before, the three people accusing WWE of sexual harassment never filed criminal charges against anyone, so read into that what you will I suppose. One of them was a female former WWE ref who accused Vince himself of harassment

Gillie

Watching it at the mo. It's compelling stuff!

YOUR BUGGGGGGERED!

Sorry. Bad joke I guess! McMahon seems capable of handling himself!

Gillie

Jesus it's getting heated now! McMahon is getting thick.
The Commentator guy said his lawyers were talking to WWF in 91 so this video must be after 91?!


Just finished watching it there! Fairly damning stuff!
Felt sorry for the guy with the glasses!

Vince135792003

Gillie wrote:

Jesus it's getting heated now! McMahon is getting thick.
The Commentator guy said his lawyers were talking to WWF in 91 so this video must be after 91?!

!

Yep its 1991. I got the year wrong. To be honest apart from a few Meltzer comments on it years ago, I don't really know anything about it.

Apparently they stuck Dave in between Vince and Bruno because of how bad things were between the 2.

The other thing that struck me was Billy Graham burying Vince and now in 2007 all is forgiven.

Meltzer will be on figure four radio today and I think it'll be brought up, so if anything noteworthy comes from the discussion I'll post it.

Gillie

Vince135792003 wrote:

The other thing that struck me was Billy Graham burying Vince and now in 2007 all is forgiven.

That happens a lot:
Hogan, Bret (to a degree), Sable etc.:rolleyes:

Vince135792003

Gillie wrote:

That happens a lot:
Hogan, Bret (to a degree), Sable etc.:rolleyes:

Everybody but Bruno Samartino.

Mr.Nice Guy

What was with the audience laughing so much? That was a bit weird. Even when they were told by the host that juveniles were involved they still snickered.

It's a fascinating clip though. I remember reading about charges against Paterson but I'd no idea it was such a big issue.

Vince135792003

Just an update on the figure four radio with Dave Meltzer as the guest.

He only talked about it for 2 minutes saying he could easily talk about it for 2 hours. So thats what there gonna do in 2 weeks time.

He did say during the commericials that Vince clearly didn't want to be there and said it was the worst day of his life. Obviously with the steroid trial that was to follow, there were worse days to come though.

Exit

There's an interview with Tom Cole (the guy who alleges he was abused) here - http://www.1wrestling.com/columns/fringe/default.asp?articleid=7702&btn=View

As said in the article, the story is covered in depth in the book"Sex, Lies and Headlocks"

The other sex scandal during that time that someone referred to earlier was when a female referee, Rita Chatterton, accused Vince McMahon of raping her in the back of a limousine. It's covered in detail on the first page of this thread - http://forums.sescoops.com/showthread.php?t=1022