Vince McMahon’s Culture Of Humiliation & Hostility In WWE Exposed
Several former WWE writers have lifted the lid on the culture of hostility, humiliation, and sexism that prevailed under the leadership of Vince McMahon.
Vince McMahon has been accused of serious sexual abuse and sex trafficking in a lawsuit that rocked the wrestling world. WWE and former Head of Talent Relations John Laurinaitis are also subject of the suit as the culture of the company has come under the spotlight to perhaps the greatest extent ever.
Now former writers for the company have revealed the issues they dealt with during their time in WWE and the culture of fear instilled by McMahon.
Speaking to Rolling Stone, former writer Michael Leonardi revealed his experience of being fired by WWE after a run-in with McMahon. Leonardi had overseen a segment where Neville was supposed to repurpose a Martin Luther King Jr. speech in front of African American stars but R-Truth took the intended line instead as Neville had expressed discomfort at delivering it. And it seemed Leonardi paid the price when confronted by Vince McMahon:
He turned to me and he said, ‘So you didn’t give me what I wanted?’ I said, ‘I understand, I’m sorry. We all went over it and felt good about it, we just made the small tweak.’ And then he started just yelling at me. It was such an intense moment. I walked out with my tail between my legs.
A short time later, Leonardi was fired by the company, being told that he was “not fit for the role.
As far as Vince McMahon’s side of the story, a spokesperson for the disgraced ex-WWE chairman told Rolling Stone that McMahon was very hands-on with writing in the company and that’s why they claim Leonardi’s account didn’t happen:
That’s why the idea of him suggesting or approving the use of a famous Martin Luther King, Jr. quote for a punchline to be used by a white British character is so ridiculous. It simply didn’t happen.
Vince McMahon oversaw WWE creative when there were heavy racial overtones in feuds between the likes of the Nation of Domination, Los Boricuas, and the DOA as well as the infamous rivalry between Triple H and Booker T. McMahon also said the n-word on live TV in front of Booker T.
Leonardi went on to assert that there was a culture in WWE that was permeated by Vince McMahon that was not helpful to the working environment:
There was a very heavy layer of fear and tension and that was directly from Vince and that culture that he created obviously created a lot of problems.
Another unnamed former writer claimed that the atmosphere in the company saw people humiliated frequently under the guise of jokes:
Everybody was getting yelled at all the time in the room. It was more saying sh*t that was humiliating or mean [that was then] couched as a joke, but it’s a nasty joke.
If you’re being targeted in the room, nobody stands up for you, but that’s because if they do, they will get the bullet in the head, too. You don’t stick your head up out of the foxhole for anybody, because nobody wants to take a bullet.
Vince McMahon “Enjoys Making People Squirm”
One former writer claimed the WWE creative team were simply transcribers for Vince McMahon and thinks McMahon’s frequent changes to scripts were part of his manipulation of his employees:
It doesn’t really matter what he said in that creative room or if he loved it [at an earlier point], it was still going to get torn up before the show. By the time Monday rolled around and we were all in the production meeting, something else was gonna happen. It almost felt like a joke, like we were just there to satisfy Vince’s whims. We were all Vince McMahon transcribers.
I think Vince enjoyed the manipulation. He liked changing things. He liked keeping people on their toes. I genuinely felt like, this isn’t to benefit the show or the storyline, Vince really just enjoys making people squirm.
One writer who said they didn’t have a negative experience with Vince McMahon did have run-ins with those in leading positions on the creative team who had only worked in WWE:
Those people were the most miserable people I’ve ever worked with, but that’s where a lot of them had worked their whole professional lives and that’s the only game in town. They didn’t know what it was like working on a regular television show.
The WWE writer’s room is said to have been an especially difficult place for women who worked there. A female former writer spoke of her experience of unwanted touching:
They would touch me where they would have me come closer [to them]. They would pull me by my waist to come somewhere or move closer to them. I’m just super aware that it’s kind of close to my butt and most people don’t touch me by the waist ever. I thought, ‘This is strange.’
It is noted that by 2020 enough female writers had complained to HR that a Zoom meeting was held to address the issues. Following that an in-person meeting was held where someone in a senior leadership role was said to have told the room that they were acting like middle-schoolers and to take any complaints to them and not to HR.
One writer said they left the company because they didn’t feel safe working with their male counterparts due to how they spoke about women – including WWE Superstars – in the writer’s room:
On the one hand, this is the product in the story, but on the other hand, I feel like we’re not talking about the story anymore. The undertones are dangerous, and what they wanted in their environment scared me.
WWE is now led creatively by Paul Levesque (Triple H) with many people in the company excited and enjoying working under him. Under Levesque’s leadership, things in WWE are now too calm for one WWE Hall of Famer who seemed to thrive under the chaos of Vince McMahon.