As previously reported, CM Punk had an incident with a fan prior to yesterday’s RAW. The report states that Punk refused to sign for a fan who he had previously refused to sign for, due to the way the fan was acting. After Punk’s refusal, the fan and possibly a second person became verbally abusive towards Punk and according to one source, loudly made a threat.
This brought security onto the scene. The fan had been identified and WWE security was going to try and find him and warn him about his behavior, but it is not confirmed if they had caught up to him.
WWE performers noted that it’s not unusual for fans to be waiting for them when they arrive atairports or even be waiting in the early AM when the WWE crews are preparing to check in forflights. While inconvenient, the performers treat it as part of the business. A WWE performer who did not witness the incident commented, stating the following to Pwinsider.com…
“Imagine being up at 430 AM to be on a 630 AM flight. You have to return the rental car, take the shuttle, get through security, check in, find the gate, and until the second you are on the plane, there are going to be people along the way you say, ‘excuse me’, grab you for a photo, stop you from eating your bagel, want to talk to you, sometimes want to be mad at you for what happened on TV, want you to sign a stack of photos, pose for 25 pictures, etc. It’s part of the job, sure, and who’s going to turn down a little kid?”
“However, when it’s the same fan you see every time you are in whatever city, you start to realize who’s there for Ebay sales and who’s there because they have nothing else in their life. When it’s a choice of five minutes to sip some coffee or a fan saying, “Sign this” as a demand, and trust me, there are demands like that every day, you want to rip up the photo and toss it back at them for being rude, but then what will happen is that 10 seconds of cell phone footage ends up on TMZ and you are the person yelled at by the company. I’ve seen on Twitter where I was an a***ole to fans, but the reality was I was rushing to get home to catch a redeye flight to see my family and sorry, I’m not going to spend a night overnight when I can be there when my family wakes up. If that means I am a jerk, then, well, sorry.”
The performer continued, noting the frustration of the situation…
“We, and by this I mean everyone, not just wrestlers, have to get through their day. We do it in a fish bowl where everyone sees us, sadly, as some walking zoo exhibit that they can interact with. There’s good and bad to that. The bad is we interact with fans who end up being complete pieces of sh** to exhausted, tired people that just wants to go sleep on a plane and get home to rest their aching body. If anyone saw what we went through for a week, they’d understand how demeaning some of the fans can be. Please note I said some because in every city there are some really nice people who just love wrestling and want to be near us. That’s great but again, there has to be a time and place. When a fan crosses the line, we have to assume someone else can do that as well. So now, we have to go through all the 3:30 AM stuff at the airport, with our own safety in the back of our heads. It’s enough to drive anyone batty, much less a tired, banged up wrestler.”
This brought security onto the scene. The fan had been identified and WWE security was going to try and find him and warn him about his behavior, but it is not confirmed if they had caught up to him.
WWE performers noted that it’s not unusual for fans to be waiting for them when they arrive atairports or even be waiting in the early AM when the WWE crews are preparing to check in forflights. While inconvenient, the performers treat it as part of the business. A WWE performer who did not witness the incident commented, stating the following to Pwinsider.com…
“Imagine being up at 430 AM to be on a 630 AM flight. You have to return the rental car, take the shuttle, get through security, check in, find the gate, and until the second you are on the plane, there are going to be people along the way you say, ‘excuse me’, grab you for a photo, stop you from eating your bagel, want to talk to you, sometimes want to be mad at you for what happened on TV, want you to sign a stack of photos, pose for 25 pictures, etc. It’s part of the job, sure, and who’s going to turn down a little kid?”
“However, when it’s the same fan you see every time you are in whatever city, you start to realize who’s there for Ebay sales and who’s there because they have nothing else in their life. When it’s a choice of five minutes to sip some coffee or a fan saying, “Sign this” as a demand, and trust me, there are demands like that every day, you want to rip up the photo and toss it back at them for being rude, but then what will happen is that 10 seconds of cell phone footage ends up on TMZ and you are the person yelled at by the company. I’ve seen on Twitter where I was an a***ole to fans, but the reality was I was rushing to get home to catch a redeye flight to see my family and sorry, I’m not going to spend a night overnight when I can be there when my family wakes up. If that means I am a jerk, then, well, sorry.”
The performer continued, noting the frustration of the situation…
“We, and by this I mean everyone, not just wrestlers, have to get through their day. We do it in a fish bowl where everyone sees us, sadly, as some walking zoo exhibit that they can interact with. There’s good and bad to that. The bad is we interact with fans who end up being complete pieces of sh** to exhausted, tired people that just wants to go sleep on a plane and get home to rest their aching body. If anyone saw what we went through for a week, they’d understand how demeaning some of the fans can be. Please note I said some because in every city there are some really nice people who just love wrestling and want to be near us. That’s great but again, there has to be a time and place. When a fan crosses the line, we have to assume someone else can do that as well. So now, we have to go through all the 3:30 AM stuff at the airport, with our own safety in the back of our heads. It’s enough to drive anyone batty, much less a tired, banged up wrestler.”
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