How John Cena made a whole generation of youngsters dream.
If you're a 90s kid and you don't know about the WWE, then it's probably because you didn't have a TV set or a neighbour with a TV set - because there's no other probable explanation. Growing up, wrestling was one of the most exciting and forbidden TV shows to watch, be it at home or at a neighbour's place.
We all looked forward with much enthusiasm, to shows like SmackDown, Monday Night Raw, Wrestlemania, et al. If there was one sentence every wrestling fan had mastered, it would be "Stay Safe, don’t try this at home!" Wrestlers like Boogie Man, Bobby Lashley, The Undertaker and Kane(who at one point in time we all thought were brothers), Shawn Michaels, Chris Benoit, JBL, Rey Mysterio(my one time favorite), Edge, Triple H, the Big Show and the Great Khali all thrilled us a lot. Some of us even had our favorites amongst these wrestlers but there’s this glimmer of hope that the name John Cena and his popular slogan "You can’t see me" brought about that just made it very hard to dislike the guy. And even worse, to not be inspired by him.
To be honest, growing up, I didn't believe that the E in WWE really meant "Entertainment". I battled with the thought of all this just being sham and it broke my heart to pieces - so I decided to believe WWE to mean World Wrestling Enterprise. At least that made more sense to me. It didn’t break my enthusiasm.
Growing in a world where we all believed the good guys(protagonists) always won or had to win at the end, the majority of the 90s Kids saw some kind of hero and role model in John Cena. And of course, he was and is still a hero. Truth be told, I never liked him from the onset – I always found him too weak and sometimes too mindful of the affairs of other wrestlers. But that’s before I understood that there was nothing noble in not looking out for one’s neighbour. So along the way, he started inspiring me and a lot of my peers. He had become the Jackie Chan of wrestling – he wasn’t necessarily the strongest, but always attracted sympathy of the majority. And why’s that? Because as humans, we all want to aspire to a greater authority… And if one doesn’t exist, we’ll just have to create one for ourselves.
Right now, we don’t really care if the WWE is just for entertainment but the messages gotten from its shows moulded some of us into incredible believers and achievers. To be able to walk through adversity with your face up – only two people showed me that on TV.
Winning the hearts of children could be very easy when you decide to take on the emblem they find is the most important and what better than a HERO? To a certain level, a SUPERHERO. Who was always at the rescue of other wrestlers in the arena? Who never gave up despite being down many times? And who always came back more cheerful and enthusiastic? These little qualities forged the youth into becoming believers, fighters, go-getters and achievers.
The strength of John Cena wasn’t in that he was almost invincible like Undertaker, because we all know that he wasn’t. His charisma came with the fact that he never fell down and lied on the floor. Like Vernyuy Tina would put it, “Fall down 9 times pull up 10 times like it’s no f****** s***” And that’s the perfect dream to sell to youngsters. To know that I could wander far or go astray but it doesn’t mean that I’m lost forever. For like John Cena, I’ll always rise up and continue the fight no matter how serpentine the road might seem.
And now I still look on to much adversity, to haters, to backbiters, to backstabbers, to enemies, and even to bad weather and all I can say is YOU CAN’T SEE ME!!!
