Jerry “The King” Lawler spoke at length on Hulk Hogan’s WWE return and the backlash that the company received for moving forward with the event on the latest edition of Dinner With The King podcast.
Lawler mentioned that he was delighted to see The Hulkster well and truly back with the WWE family after years of drama. The WWE Hall Of Famer said:
“You know what? I was really glad to see that part”, said Lawler. “That phase of Hulk Hogan’s life come full circle and be brought back into the WWE and restored into the Hall of Fame and all that sort of stuff because that was just a shame that that all happened to begin with. I’ve known Terry since the beginning of his career and the things that were said about him were just, they were just not true. He’s a good guy. He’s always been a good guy. Somebody just said on an interview that I was on the radio… Billy Madison on the Billy Madison Show down in San Antonio; they asked me something about… ‘Who do you think has been the most important guy to wrestling over the years?’ And I said Hulk Hogan without a doubt. I think he was the face of this business for a long, long time and still to be, so I was glad to see Hulk coming back and it looks like he’ll be doing some stuff at WrestleMania and be a part of the WWE family once again.”
Lawler and co-host Glenn Moore proceeded to speak about WWE Crown Jewel and the negative reception behind the event which drew more attention than the event itself. Lawler claimed that it was political correctness which went wild and added that it was a fairly good show.
“Crown Jewel received a lot of backlash and once again, it is political correctness gone wild and what we’ve talked about so many times is everybody has the voice now with so much social media out there, and everybody wants to have their voice heard. The show itself was apparently a good show.”
Everybody thinks that everybody else should think the way they think and it’s not that way. The people in Saudi Arabia; it’s a different culture, it’s a different lifestyle. Everything is different from the way we are, but we think all of a sudden, if we have any deals with them that they should think and do like we do. It’s not going to happen, but by the same token, I think WWE working in Saudi Arabia and taking some of our western values, I think it can really make a major difference and I’m not just talking about entertainment or wrestling. I’m talking about a major difference in the way the Saudis treat women and females. I think that the fact that Renee Young getting to go over there is something that years ago would have been unheard of.
Lawler went to conclude by stating that the events that took place before the event were truly unfortunate while adding at the same time that ignoring them and not interacting won’t mend the issue. Moreover, The King stated that there should not have been any backlash regarding the event.
“(It’s) very unfortunate thing that happened with the reporter from Saudi Arabia being killed at the consulate (in Turkey), very unfortunate, but that’s one of the things… again, their way of life is totally different from ours. You’re talking about a country over there that in the past, if you stole something they cut your hand off. If you looked at somebody else’s wife, it’s like the death penalty. We think that it’s totally wrong and things need to change, and I think that working with them, if you just shy away from them and never have any interaction with them, nothing’s going to change, they’re going to always stay that way. If we could bring our values into play over there, I think it can’t do anything but help. I don’t think there should be any backlash on that thing. It’s all good.”
H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription
