By Caryl Townsend
The World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) has been a huge entertainment business for several decades. One of the main reasons for it’s survival throughout the decades – besides Vince McMahon’s bank account – is the way it emphasizes entertainment, rather then just straight wrestling, in it’s program. The characters throughout time have included men dressed as police, boogeymen, clowns, and rich men. Any gimmick that you can think of, they have done. But the most interesting thing when examining WWE’s content is how their storylines reflect social ideas of “good” or “bad.” They craft a story they know their audience will have a reaction to. This is when Ron Killings, a wrestler that has been in the professional wrestling business for 20+ years, comes into play. Over the last decade he has worked with the WWE in playing the character R-Truth. His main shtick is being the funny, aloof, crazy “jobber” (this refers to a wrestler that consistently looses). Two moments specifically, his promo at the 2022 Halloween Havoc and his promo where he “secedes” in 2011 will be my focus to describe how the WWE uses R-Truth as a minstrel figure.
Looking at R-Truth in the 2011 “‘seceding” promo, R-Truth is in a confederate soldier outfit. He has multiple piercings on his face, white gloves (which were a common device in a lot of different minstrel shows), a hat to match the confederate outfit and a toy sword. He at times uses a slow, southern voice in which he emphasizes the phrase “I’m sorry,” and tells the audience that he is now a “good R-Truth.” R-Truth shares that the reason he is dressed like this is because he did “research” on West Virginia and it’s history with the confederacy, specifically how Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee “and a bunch of other inbred rednecks” created the confederacy. The audience is clearly not in favor of Truth, as he calls them “inbred rednecks,” and they chant “you suck.” The audience cheers when “Stone Cold” Steve Austin makes fun of Truth, and asks him “What’s that got to do with today?” For the southern majorly white audience, the roles both Steve Austin plays as a face and Truth as a heel, shows Truth’s real purpose with being in this promo. It is not to create drama or tension; it’s purely for making fun of the “loud,” “crazy,” aloof black man making fun of the history of the South. R-Truth goes on to state that like the confederacy he is choosing to secede from the WWE Universe. Then several other characters (John Cena, Vince McMahon, The Miz – all white, established wrestlers) belittle R-Truth, appeasing the crowd yet again. In this promo R-Truth is made out to be the ignorant comedic presence – thus reflecting the minstrel figure role.
In the Halloween Havoc promo, R-Truth stands in the center of the ring with two other wrestlers. He is wearing a loose-fitting, purple striped costume that resembles the comic character “The Joker.” The outfit also includes a tiny green collar, and he holds a Joker mask in one of his hands. In a sense, I do think there is some symbolic gesture here too, because not only is R-Truth’s role to be entertaining and the “comedic” act, but he is also dressing as a character who is also the “comedic” villain. He then begins to try and hype the crowd up with introducing “Halloween Havoc,” a Halloween pay-per-view wrestling event. To the crowd, however, they know that Halloween Havoc happened three days before. Everyone is in on the joke besides Truth. One of the other wrestlers stops him to tell him that the event already happened, and R-Truth mistakes his Australian accent for a British one, which creates laughter in the audience. The audience chants “British accent,” and when R-Truth recreates a very posh British accent the crowd laughs at him again. His ignorance in this scene about accents in order to get a laugh out of the audience again perpetrates this minstrel figure stereotype. The other wrestler finally convinces R-Truth that it actually was three days ago, and they celebrate this wrestler’s victory. R-Truth does a tiny exaggerated dance. The Australian wrestler proceeds to get angry and challenges R-Truth. R-Truth kicks him out of the ring.
To reiterate, this depiction of R-Truth as non-sensical and purely comedic for the audience’s consumption is perpetrating the minstrel figure stereotype. It shows the WWE’s lack of consideration in the wrestler’s own ability to make promos/storylines for themselves. In certain promos, Truth talks to an imaginary person named Little Jimmy; at times he is called The Conspiracy Theorist. Consistently in most storylines including R-Truth he is the comedic relief, or he is the crazy one, or he is just too aloof or lazy to remember certain events. In Halloween Havoc everyone laughs at Truth not knowing where he is, or what time it is. This is a joke that has happened multiple times in WWE’s showing of Truth as a character. In the seceding promo, with Steve Austin and Mr. McMahon beside him, when he speaks of the confederacy, and the “inbred redneck” fans, he is the one causing the audience to have a commotion, and he is then also the one that is made fun of by the white wrestlers that join him in the ring. Although there is definitely some room for criticism and arguments for some subversion, largely WWE’s use of R-Truth’s character is very reminiscent of the very racist and harmful stereotype of the minstrel figure.
Black Men & Women 