Wacky Wrestling Theory 5.22.08: A New Kind of 'Mark'

Posted by Jake Chambers on 05.22.2008

What exactly are 'barks'? Where did they come from, what do they want, and are you one of them?

Everybody reading this knows the definition of a ‘mark.' Pro-wrestling co-opted this word from carny speak as code for the easily fooled. When we were all children, probably we thought pro-wrestling was real-ish, so we were marks. At some point, whether it was from subscription newsletters, playground word of mouth, or the Internet, we all became ‘smart' about wrestling. The information about booking, backstage politics, and the tricks used to present the illusion of sport, turned naive fans into artistic connoisseurs. This could have happened to any generation of fans, but in this modern era the deluge of information and commentaries forced the entity of ‘pro-wrestling' to acknowledge its own deceptions and thus made the ‘smart' enlightenment a given and seemingly eliminated pure adult ‘marks.'

This wasn't always the case, as I'm sure anyone who's met an old-timer who used to watch wrestling fifty years ago could attest. At one point there was a distinct division between ‘smart' fans and ‘marks.' Today, mostly all fans should be considered smart marks, or ‘smarks' if you will. Certainly it wasn't just a handful of tweed jacket wearing cool guys with smart alec-y signs chanting "You screwed Matt" in every arena Edge and Lita appeared for months. Yet this is the evolution of the wrestling fan, and the WWE, among others, has gladly exposed everything about their craft in hopes of taking pro-wrestling away from a niche cult market in order to make it a genre as acceptable as mainstream movies and television shows, which of course all customers pay for specifically because it is ‘fake.' This choice to put financial gain over artistic culture has led to the creation of a new kind of mark fan, the business mark, or as I forth with will dub them the ‘bark.'

When Brian Pillman popularized the term ‘smart mark' in his ECW stint, he was talking about gullible fans that were smart to "the business," not smart about business. These days, a certain type of smark has moved away from the discussion of pushes and angles, and taken up debate about television ratings and pay per view buyrates. The idea of critiquing what is personally liked or disliked about the happenings in pro-wrestling at some point took a back seat to the prognostication on the marketing decisions and financial statistics surrounding the promotion of a wrestling company. Some might say this is a natural progression following the fall of ‘kayfabe', but I would suggest that is like saying that critical value can only be assessed for movies that find box office success. I believe, as society becomes increasingly selfish due to the widening gap between rich and poor, the dwindling middle class fans of pro-wrestling vicariously fulfill their out-of-reach high finance fantasies by acting like authoritative business experts. These ‘bark' fans may or may not realize that their business knowledge is pedestrian at best, and delusional at worst, and thus that puts the ‘mark' in the ‘bark.'

Where did they come from?
The origin of the ‘bark' fan can be traced back to the economics of the early nineties and the growth of the Internet as a global commodity. The massive investments into the media and content development for the Internet, translated into a influx of jobs for liberal arts majors, and this atmosphere of prosperity flowed over into a growth of creativity, and thus a growth of academic criticism. Once the bubble burst on these investments, rudimentarily explained by a lack of business acumen within these companies and a poor sense of where the ideas could meet the technology, or whatever the popular reason, it made those liberal arts majors all of a sudden seem like a poor investment. The effects can be seen in all areas of entertainment, the studio-ization of indpendent cinema, the resurgence of game shows/reality shows on television, the shift from the strong lyrical content of rock and hip-hop to the homogenized and simplistic pop rock, country music and radio rap.

In a way these changes in the late nineties were not only a response to the lack ingrained marketing in the artists responsible for this critically acclaimed era of entertainment, but also the expansion into international markets. New forms of entertainment that were easy to translate overseas were required. Movies and music that are not grounded in any real place were preferred over realistic and stylish narratives that interpret the American experience. As these diluted forms of culture were distributed through new technological revenue streams, an influx of money flooded into the business of the arts without the requirement of an artist. Other complicated global economic factors combined with this trend in the entertainment industry have led to the widening gap between rich and poor and thus the devaluation of liberal arts degrees. Whereas going to a technical college was once a stepping-stone to a university degree, now arts graduates go backwards to college in order to train in a skill that can make them ‘employable.' Although this cycle is not truly strange, how easily average students submit to the mentality of the dominant class in the pursuit of ultra-wealth is interesting and a trend that has obviously played out in pro-wrestling fandom as well.

Vince McMahon becoming a character on RAW around 1996/97 and starting to talk about what is "good for business," is the touchstone in the creation of ‘bark' culture. By agonizing over the Stone Cold character not being a good corporate champion, McMahon began subconsciously laying the foundation within some fans that there is a certain standard that is truly ‘good for business.' Of course, this was only a creative storyline. The fact that McMahon would be angry that Stone Cold wouldn't wear a suit, yet at the same time is garnering the highest ratings in company history, is quiet absurd.

Yet, as the McMahon character was humiliated on television, McMahon the businessman, who was so well followed by smart fans, was growing in power, be it through his well spun decision to oust Bret Hart, his win in the Monday night ratings ‘war,' his ability to buy-out corporate competition and the personal and professional windfall gained from taking his company public. Smart fans morphed into smarks during these developments, since the popularity of the Attitude era gave them plenty of opportunities to explain all their insider information about to casually interested non-fans. Although not privy to the specific business moves of this era the factual information on ratings and sales numbers combined with the pseudo-realistic narrative storylines playing out on television gave these smark fans a certain confidence that they were becoming knowledgeable about this fictional concept of ‘good business' that McMahon introduced in order to manipulate smart fans. And thus the bark fan was born.

Smark fans feeling disenfranchised by the economics of their personal lives during this time period and the superficial changes in the pro-wrestling industry is symbolically paralleled by the demise of the ECW. This fabled wrestling company was a smark oasis, where smart wrestling fans could appreciate the ‘good' wrestlers, and possibly even get caught up in the passion of the moment. ECW was at a creative peak producing pure pro-wrestling when driven by live events, tape trading and word of mouth, and not worried about financial expansion. Everyone from the World Champion and booker, to the ring crew and the timekeeper were true artists at work. This passionate environment resonated with fans, and drew wrestling stars from other places, like Cactus Jack, the Steiners, Rey Mysterio and Psychosis, into their safe artistic haven. Business is what eventually brought all this to a halt. There was a buzz around ECW and more and more fans wanted to see it, but the company couldn't deliver on a mainstream level.

Corporate-style pro-wrestling companies successfully homogenized the ECW style proving that truly creative minds were not necessary for the financial growth of big business. Since ECW couldn't provide that pure and artistic wrestling experience anymore, they also seemed to covet becoming a worldwide force in professional wrestling, attempting grand business plans in merchandising, video games, monthly pay-per-view, and national television. Regardless of the quality of the product at this point, the company made that crossover into the mainstream business that subliminally disheartened a generation of new wrestlers and the eventual end of the ECW business provided the stats bark fans needed to establish the base for their interest in pro-wrestling business. This was proof enough for bark fans to establish their measure for the failure of ‘good' wrestling and therefore encouraged them to find their fandom stimulus not through artistic criticism, since no good wrestling is possible in the corporate environment, but through evaluations of the business of pro-wrestling.

What do they want?
The smart fans always wanted pro-wrestling that didn't insult their intelligence. Artistic wrestling that built upon their accumulated knowledge and sophisticated sense of humor was what ECW was once able to provide. Ring of Honor is the perfect home for these fans since it ‘claims' to be a company comfortable in their size like off-Broadway theater. Smarks are stuck in limbo between the big company and the little company, always wanting to be into a storyline, wrestling style or certain wrestler before they are ‘cool' and using that perceived foresight as cultural capital when those aspects become prominent. Smarks want to cheer for the underdog company to overcome the dominant force in the industry, yet can only be fulfilled by the sustainable struggle rather than finding eros in any true conquering. Thus the common smark credo that ‘competition is good for wrestling.' These new barks on the other hand are more interesting to contemplate.

Do barks look at the business trends of pro-wrestling the same way traders thrive off the ebbs and flows of the stock market? If so, then barks can cash in (emotionally) on small predictions of number fluctuations, yet what is their windfall? A bark may want to revel in seamless developments that properly sell products, in this case using free to air TV show content to sell pay per view wrestling specials. This would be similar I guess to the way those in the advertisement industry admire the commercials and product placements in and around movies and TV, yet it seems like an odd way for fans to enjoy artistic entertainment. Do barks see pro-wrestling as a possible investment opportunity? Will a generation of small wrestling promotions open up across the country founded on the grassroots savvy of these young business minds? Perhaps this has already begun, as the American independent pro-wrestling scene must be considered on an incredible rise in recent years. But I would argue that it is impossible for barks to truly become management since in a way that would be like a genuine, classic mark, who believes pro-wrestling is real, becoming an in-ring professional wrestler. This is impossible, of course. A pro-wrestler cannot train if they think the fights are real, thus a bark obviously has no real, usable business knowledge.

Of course, it would have to be considered reasonable that the financial backers of TNA, ROH, or other small wrestling ventures, are building their franchises in the hopes of attracting a WWE corporate buy-out. The WWE has shown the proclivity for buying entire brands and video catalogues in the past, especially as their growth of digital specialty channels increases and the WWE needs more new content for their 24/7 channel and/or potential spin-offs. Therefore, no matter how successfully the last ten minutes of an Impact episode perceivably sold more pay per views, and the accumulation of such activity, the true endgame for TNA is not ascension but gaining attention and eventual assimilation into the WWE. Not believing this would almost be as delusional as thinking that the WWE couldn't successfully spin their way out of having their next pay per view sell to less than 1,000 customers.

The WWE at this point has no competition. They are a deeply embedded American brand and short of a total national economic depression, the WWE will be as synonymous with pro-wrestling for the rest of our lifetimes as Coke is to soda, McDonald's is to burgers, and Nike is to shoes. The corporate WWE has perfectly plateaued and is now coasting along comfortably, generating a reasonable (multi-million dollar) profit. This in spite of their decision to promote a seemingly disliked main star. In fact John Cena vs. The Great Khali headlined back-to-back pay per views in 2007, a creative choice that I'm assuming for which many barks would have forecasted financial doom.

The domination of the WWE brand has possibly caused many wrestling ‘barks' to latch onto MMA since the environment surrounding that business has yet to be truly colonized. UFC may be the most famous company at the moment, but the various deals, start-up companies, shifting of fighters and struggle to legitimize the sport and penetrate the sporting market place, is reminiscent of the territory and cable TV war years of pro-wrestling.

I think it is then the job of a pro-wrestling company to provide the bark fan with material in which they can sink their speculations into. The new WWE owned ECW could be considered a success in satisfying these fans. Although mainstream smarks are most likely not interested in ECW aside from hoping for TNA Impact to one day statistically beat it in the ratings, the bark fans are the ones constantly obsessed with the ‘failure' of the business decision to revive ECW. In the face of all bark logic, ECW continues as a business venture for the WWE, less likely as a training ground for up and coming wrestlers or creation of innovative wrestling, and more likely as a place for debating superficial wrestling business knowledge. Barks should appreciate this outlet for their unique appetites, but of course, recognizing this wouldn't make them barks anymore, would it?