The hysterics of the local wrestling scene are more progressive than you think

**Story originally published on Aug. 5, 2019, under Young STAR**

These days, no one cares whether wrestling is fake or not. You can argue with your 10-year-old cousin about how professional wrestling isn’t a real sport, or that the WWE is scripted all you want — but to attend a live match of the Philippine Wrestling Revolution (PWR), you’ll find yourself reconsidering.

From RuPaul’s Drag Race to deriving insight from Carly Rae Jepsen’s Boy Problems, these days we’ve come to embrace the kitschiness of low art and pop culture without shame, and without escape of a critical awareness of what we consume — to which we sometimes answer, and what about it? I’ll admit, I didn’t think much of wrestling either until I watched my first live match. Straight out of Pride Month, a hyper-masculine display of brawn and brute was not where I expected to be. But wrestling is full of surprises and PWR kicked off the start of their sixth season with “PWR Live: Pak! Ganern!” Their main event? Martivo “The Man Doll,” an out and proud wrestler challenged to defend his title of “All-Out-Warla Champion” against Kap Tutan.

In this world of crass names and grown adults in multi-colored tights, throwing chairs; pro-wrestling is frequently condescended as a lowbrow form of sport and entertainment. But save your comments for never, because it’s exceeded way past proving itself as anything valid.

Since its establishment in 2014, Philippine Wrestling Revolution has doled out a live match almost every month, helping nourish a community and a culture of pro-wrestling aspirants and stans in the Philippines, complete with their own lingo, merchandise, and storylines behind each wrestler, all inter-connected in the PWR universe.

That day, in a line stretching three flights of stairs, I wait for my ticket. A man in green tights and briefs is screaming, “WHY WASN’T I TOLD ABOUT THE MERCHANDISE?”

I lean into Eman, who I just met while he was waiting beside me, and ask, “Is he a wrestler?” Unflinchingly, the swole man in green looks at me and says, “AM I A WRESTLER?”

“That’s Grab Camus,” says Eman.

Kayfabe is the key term to know in the world of pro-wrestling. Wrestlers and everyone involved do everything they can to keep everyone immersed in the reality of the show — even outside the venue. In the WWE, purists have been doing this since the ’80s. Veteran wrestler Ricky Steamboat recalls walking into a restaurant and seeing a heel (wrestling-vernacular for an enemy, a villain) across the room, and despite having no-beef with him in the real world, the principle of Kayfabe obligated him to walk out of the restaurant and keep character.

But big-business wrestling is different from PWR. Whereas fans aspire for an autograph from Triple H or, if you’re lucky, an interaction with CM Punk; Grab Camus yells at, high-fives, and exchanges what seems like already established inside jokes between him and his fans.

In the waiting area, a man decked in Destino merchandise hypes up the crowd and starts thumping his chest. “And who’s that?” I ask Eman. “I don’t know but he’s always here […] most of the people here are regulars. Hardcore wrestling fans and I like watching [people like him] get riled up.”

Paramedics are stationed at the sides of the ring every match. Jhemherlhynn, a member of the Naughty Boys pack of PWR, gets assisted out of the ring due to an injury. In their T-shirts, “NICE” is plastered all over. Nice has become a tongue-in-cheek term among the wrestling community of PWR.

“It’s actually live telenovelas without the stuntmen. You can call it fake if they’re out to body slam you and in the middle of it, they replace the wrestler with a stuntman, but no. They put their bodies on the line every month for our entertainment. Sure, it’s scripted, pre-determined — but the pain is not fake,” says Eman, who has been following PWR since its first show in 2014.

Much like the term “boy band” has discredited K-Pop groups like BTS of their mastery over music production, rapping, and dancing; “pro-wrestling” is immediately scoffed at for its seedy reputation as a fake sport. Call it what you want, but don’t call it easy. A PWR wrestler takes months to train and develop.

New wrestlers undergo a bootcamp of learning holds and maneuvers, while starting each day with intensive conditioning of drills and exercises to ensure their bodies can handle, what will be from now on, a weakly beating.

Papa’s got a brand new bag of toys, as Martivo pours thumbtacks on the ring and bodyslams Kap Tutan. It’s antics like that where PWR brings out the absurd playfulness of your Id that would otherwise be considered as inhumane or abnormal human behavior. In this ring, bodies are prepared for the beating and you can’t help but give in and believe.

Wrestling interrogates reality and that’s not just confined to executing death-defying moves. I forget that, outside of the ring, these people have real lives, with day jobs just like us, completely separated from their persona. Just look at Martivo, who’s a senior trainer at a BPO. On the other hand, you also have Mark Javellana adopting fractions of his life in reality to his alter-ego, Jake de Leon, a.k.a. Mr. Philippine Wrestling, a.k.a. “The Senyorito.” His character, dons a leather-sleeved letterman jacket, paying people to do push-ups with him and then proceeds to kick their hands. In an interview with GRID magazine, Javellana admits to being “a son of a true haciendero” and constructing a character that was close to home made perfect material to self-satirize the asshole-haciendero stereotype.

When the WWE still had a monopoly over its wrestling fanbase, global audiences would watch this form of entertainment sports with characters like Stone Cold Steve Austin or Hulk Hogan take their persona to heart and dress and speak in the most American of ways; thus, birthed generations of international audiences with an excess of knowledge on American pop culture that we otherwise wouldn’t have known had it not been for frikin’ wrestling. But with the growing number of wrestling organizations across continents, the question of what issues to represent and what identities to portray have become localized.

The politics of representation always counts best in mass media, and Martivo, a.k.a. “The Man Doll,” makes it his personal mission to be anything but the token gay of Philippine Wrestling Revolution. In a country that seeks to put gays in their supposed “place,” utilized only for humor and aesthetics, Martivo waves his pride flag around all the four-corners of the ring, while boasting off his well-deserved All-Out-Warla champion’s belt.

Amidst a raging crowd of children, families, and wrestling fanboys, Martivo makes his rounds through the aisles of seats, greets his audience and roars, “I am now here to prove to everyone that I am the best champion that PWR has. Not just for one month but for 365 days: day-in and day-out, baby!” He declares the presence of his parents in the audience, where not long after, he wrestles Kap Tutan through bodyslams, headlocks, and whacking him with a cucumber.

To be honest, Martivo sticks out like a sore thumb, but so does everyone in this community. In what has been decades of monopolized representation and pre-determined wins dictated by Vince MacMahon’s WWE, hosting bra and panty matches for women wrestlers in the ’90s, with cis-het males favored by WWE’s administration being the only ones who ever get to move up the ranks; it’s a big surprise to me how much of a safe space the PWR community has become. With a growing fanbase speaking their own slang, regular training sessions available to literally anyone willing to become part of their roster, and wrestlers satirizing and subverting stereotypes, it has established a community, a culture, and a platform to get political. Try watching a live match yourself, and remember: we’re not watching sports, but we’re probably watching something better.