Hi, I’m Tom, and I’m an alcoholic.

SUPPORT GROUP: Hi, Tom.

Hi, I’m Julie, and I’m a heroin addict.

SUPPORT GROUP: Hi, Julie.

Hi, I’m the Sixth Child, and I’m an Ultimate Warrior fan.

SUPPORT GROUP: Oh dear God! Get the fuck out of here!

Yes, it’s true, I’m a fan of that red piece of luggage with face paint that made a career of snorting (not Ed Leslie), grunting (not Great Khali) and screeching (not Stephanie McMahon) about various topics that would make David Lynch say “what the hell is this guy talking about?” When I was a kid, I was a fan of the Warrior for all the wrong reasons. The guy had very limited wrestling ability, but the colourful streamers, the brilliant entrance music and the fact that he yelled a lot was enough for me.

Today not much has changed. I don’t read the rants he posts on his official website (mostly because you need a Philosophy PhD to decode them), but I’m always scurrying to hear about him making a dick of himself on C-Span, selling fluro-coloured title belts for the price of a small car, or my personal favourite, telling a room full of liberal university students (there’s the definition of ‘redundant’) that “queering doesn’t make the world work.”

You know God has a sense of humour when a man who used to do this for a living is now earning his bread as a public speaker! But in all seriousness, if you actually sit down and watch Warrior’s entire UConn speech, he’s actually very good at what he does. He has a presence that makes people sit up and listen to what he has to say. But as the latter part of his speech proved, he needs all the ‘presence’ he can get to put forward some of his warped, ultra right-wing views. I personally didn’t find anything he said particularly offensive (wrong, yes, offensive, no), but then again I write for a website that refers to its readers as “fuckies”, and I hired a copy of both “Predator” and “Commando” for my 6^th birthday, so I’m probably the wrong guy to ask.

But imagine what would happen if Warrior’s views got so out of control, that it was putting the future of his family at risk?

In 1998, Edward Norton starred in American History X as Derek Vinyard, a neo-Nazi skinhead who after being sent to prison realises the error of his ways. Upon his release, he tries to turn his life around and help his younger brother, Danny, from repeating his mistakes.

We now take you to “Parts Unknown”…Venice Beach, California. Danny Warrior has been called to the Principal’s office at Venice High School for writing a controversial history paper. Principal Bob Sweeney is unimpressed by Danny’s essay, where he argued his brother, the Ultimate Warrior, was the saviour of wrestling as we know it, and argued in favour of his proposal to clothesline Mexican immigrants as they tried to cross the boarder.

SWEENEY: Warrior got out from prison this morning, did he not?

DANNY: (nodding) Yeah, he did.

SWEENEY: He was one of my students, you know that right? Honours in English, a brilliant student. Like you. But he hung out with simple-minded fools. Also, like you.

DANNY: Look, Sweeney, did you bring me here to talk about Warrior? Because what happened to him has nothing to do with me.

SWEENEY: Everything you do right now has something to do with Warrior.

DANNY: Look, I followed directions, I wrote an A paper.

SWEENEY: (reading from his essay) “Frankly, Mohammed, I don't give a damn. There are some of us Americans who happen to have our patriotic priorities straight and don't need to have them mangled by today's PC. I don't give a big NY rat's ass about odd-pronounced same-named criminal subhumans who can't get on board with the reality that these are not prehistoric times…” (Looks up at DANNY) Hey! Wake up!

DANNY: (awakens suddenly) Huh? Oh, sorry.

(SWEENEY throws the essay into the trash)

SWEENEY: You see what I mean? I should expel you for the syntax alone!

DANNY: Go ahead. You don’t think I can handle it?

SWEENEY: No, I think the street would kill you. Your rhetoric and your propaganda aren't gonna save you out there. So here’s the drill. I’m your history teacher now. We will discuss current events. We will call this class “America History X”. We will meet once a day, and your first assignment is to prepare a new paper for me tomorrow.

DANNY: (stands up) (yelling) I ONLY ANSWER TO THOSE WHO KNOW THE SMELL OF COMBAT!!! TO THOSE WHO UNDERSTAND THE PRINCIPLES BEHIND DESTRUCITY IN ALL ITS FORMS!!!  WHO EMPATHISE WITH CONCEPTS FROM THE ANTI-LIBERAL BOURGEOIS ETHOS!!! WHO ABSORP THE TEACHINGS OF THE FABULA AND MIFTERLOPE OF THE THALIKOPROUS AND MISILLIC PLACKORE!!!

SWEENEY: (pause) Jesus, this is gonna take a lot of work.

Danny was instructed (in plain English) analyse and interpret the events leading up to Warrior’s incarceration, and write an essay about how it has affected his life personally. Danny was sent home, leaving Sweeney to attend a meeting with several detectives to talk about how to handle Warrior’s release.

DETECTIVE #1: Three years ago, Warrior was sent to prison for killing a couple of Crips who tried to jack his car. Dr Sweeney here used to teach Warrior, and has followed the case rather closely.

SWEENEY: Warrior was the protégé of Cameron Alexander, the biggest distributor of literature and videos promoting something called “Destrucity”.

DETECTIVE #2: What’s “Destrucity”?

DETECTIVE #1: We don’t know. We’ve read extensive essays on the subject, but we haven’t come up with anything crystal clear. Probably because they ramble worse than The Iron Sheik on speed.

SWEENEY: Alexander used Warrior to recruit a slew of insecure, frustrated and impressionable kids.

DETECTIVE #3: (gasps) Just like Cena’s chain gang!?

DETECTIVE #1: Worse. This kid has a lot of baggage, as you’ll see in this tape.

The detective plays a copy of “Warrior’s Workout Video”, where in between segments of him lifting weights and kicking (yes, KICKING) bench-press sets, he drives around the desert in a rusty pick-up truck with a likeness of him painted on the side. After about seven minutes, a detective who has witnessed over a dozen executions requests the tape be stopped.

DETECTIVE #1: Warrior sold copies of this tape for approximately $214 a piece. If people are stupid enough to buy into this crap, it’s something we’ve got to keep an eye on.

Danny finally arrives home to see his brother. Warrior is uncharacteristically quiet. Danny almost doesn’t recognise him without his face paint and tassels. Warrior eventually leaves to take care of some business, leaving Danny alone to start writing his essay.

He begins with the story surrounding how Warrior first got people to listen to his ultra right-wing views. This took place late one night in an empty parking lot across the street from a General Store that employed illegal Mexican immigrants. Warrior addresses the congregation.

WARRIOR: Alright listen up. I’ve had many different interests and pay serious attention to many issues. I express my opinions in a mature, bold, blunt, and politically-incorrectly fashion. I do NOT tolerate political-correctness and moral relativity when I discuss ideas that actually have to do with making life work; in my opinion, these are the two gravest dangers mankind faces today. There is a radical over-sensitivity today to the use of certain words and...

SKINHEAD #1: Uh, Warrior, it’s cold out here man. Just get to the point.

WARRIOR: Tonight is about going to a place within yourself, drumming up all the readiness, rage and explosiveness it takes to do what has to get done. Like morality and integrity, motivation cannot be half-assed. You have to know and believe that you are the best and that each other one striking out to stand atop your mountain is your enemy. Being able to do that is more important than even the…

SKINHEAD #2: (impatiently) Jesus, Warrior, we’re dying out here! Just say what you gotta say!

WARRIOR: It used to be that when someone wanted to know how to do something right, be the best at what they had their mind set on achieving, they would go and seek guidance from the best…

SKINHEAD #3: Ah, fuckit, let’s go across the street and beat up some Mexicans!

ALL: Yeah!

The hoard of skinheads rush over to the General Store. Warrior gets on the PA system and starts playing his theme music, psyching everyone to start smashing everything in sight. Warrior runs up and down the corridors like a madman until he finally reaches the manager’s office, but by the time he confronts him, he’s so out of breath he struggles to stay on his feet.

WARRIOR: (to manager) (panting heavily) Don’t you know… it’s against… (coughing) the law… to hire… (violent coughing) boarder-jumpers, you… (faints)

But Danny comes to the point where he has to write about what happened on the night where Warrior was sent to prison. It was late and Danny was woken up by the sound of breaking glass from outside. He looks out the window to see a black man trying to steal Warrior’s aforementioned rusty pick-up. He runs to Warrior’s room to tell him, but hears loud thrusts and grunts coming from inside. Danny opens the door to see Warrior beating off surrounded by pictures of George W. Bush, Rush Limbagh and Bill O’Reilly.

WARRIOR: Jesus, Danny, what the fuck were you thinking?

DANNY: There’s a black guy outside breaking into your truck.

WARRIOR: (seething) My truck? The four-wheeled Warrior? That bastard! I bet he celebrates Kwanza too!

Warrior quickly puts on his tassels and face paint and races out the front door. He clotheslines the man trying to steal his truck, followed by another clothesline… and another… and another… wait a minute, lemme get a sandwich.

…

…

…

…alright, back. And another clothesline, and, oh wait, now he’s placing the man’s mouth over the curb. Warrior takes a run-up and lands a thunderous Warrior splash on top of the man’s head. Danny, standing close-by, is shocked and starts screaming in shock. His wailing is worse than the crowd at Halloween Havoc who paid to see Warrior’s comeback match against Hulk Hogan (Worst. Match. Ever.). The police eventually arrive to arrest Warrior, who leaves quietly.

Danny sits in front of the computer, stunned by what he remembers. The clotheslines, the five-minute headlocks, the botched fireball to Hogan’s face. The horror of that match… the horror.

Oh yeah, and seeing his brother murder a man in front of him was pretty bad too.

Anyway, Danny later meets up with his friends to go to a skinhead party, where he talks to “Destrucity” leader Cameron Alexander. But when Warrior eventually arrives, he tells Danny to wait outside to he can talk with Cameron alone.

CAMERON: It’s OK, chill out. You’re on safe ground. You don’t have to watch your ass around here. (laughs)

(WARRIOR shifts uneasily)

CAMERON: You know, you’ve got everyone worried. They think the joint has messed with your mind.

WARRIOR: It did.

CAMERON: (chuckles) You don’t understand, Warrior. Your webpage has skyrocketed. Gangs from across the state are reading your posts like they were gospel. Sure, most of them are too stupid to understand them, but hey, we’re moving forward!

WARRIOR:  Cameron, do you even know what the posts are about?

CAMERON: (angrily) What the hell kind of question is that? Of course I do.

WARRIOR: OK. Tell me, what’s “Destrucity”.

CAMERON: “In its design, Destrucity represents a constellation existing in the heavens which symbolizes the Eight Disciplines by which Warriors choose to live their lives. Brought to existence by the destinies of those willing to die for their Beliefs, brought to exist as a place where people…”

WARRIOR: Jesus Christ, stop! Will you listen to yourself! Even the fucking Scientologists are laughing at us!

CAMERON: “…where people live by Belief in the evolution of their Higher Selves-constantly evolving toward a completion of their chosen destiny-all with strength in the denial of…”

WARRIOR: I’m done, Cameron. You hear me? I’m done, and so is Danny.

CAMERON: “…System Beliefs, the very Beliefs that amplify differences in and create rights, wrongs, judgements, and opinions of people, places, and things...”

WARRIOR: (turning to leave) Christ, you’d give a fucking aspirin a headache.

CAMERON: What do you think this, Warrior? This isn’t some country club that you can waltz in and out of!

Suddenly the room fills with smoke, blinding Cameron momentarily. When it finally clears Cameron finds himself alone with Warrior nowhere in sight.

CAMERON: (pause) Well, that was unnecessary.

WARRIOR: (from behind) Not as unnecessary as this…

Warrior knocks out Cameron.

Some time later Danny wanders back into Cameron’s office looking for Warrior. He opens the door to find Cameron stripped down to his boxer shorts, tied up in chains, gagged with a billiard ball and wearing a leather mask.

CAMERON: (frantically) (spits out the billiard ball) Danny! Help me! What kind of perverted fuck does this to someone?

DANNY: Uh, didn’t you publish this in the first edition of the Ultimate Warrior comic book?

(uncomfortable silence)

CAMERON: Remember, Danny, queering doesn’t make the world work. Now help me remove this broomstick from...

Danny, confused and frightened, races out of the office. As he runs home and sees his brother along the way. Danny angrily confronts him, demanding why Warrior would so such a thing. Warrior decides to explain why he could no longer be part of Cameron’s charade.

Being a believer in Destrucity, anyone who wasn’t a straight white man posed a threat. So being surrounded by blacks and Hispanics in prison, Warrior was in trouble. But he came across a group of prisoners who shared the same beliefs as him, led by a man who cemented his place as a true right-wing hero.

This man was imprisoned for mimicking Nazi salutes and goose-steps in the streets of Munich, unaware that it was actually illegal. His carelessness also made him lose his job at Fox News - and you know you’re hardcore when FOX FREAKIN’ NEWS wants nothing to do with you. His name was John Bradshaw Layfield, who immediately hit it off with Warrior.

But it all turned nasty when JBL wanted to initiate Warrior into the group. It’s a tradition as American as eating apple pie while watching baseball on the 4^th of July – that’s right, a good ol’ fashioned gang rape.

Warrior was confused. After all this time of telling people “queering doesn’t make the world work” (which came after making a career of wrestling other men covered in baby oil), he found himself being sodomised by a man in a cowboy hat.

Warrior was violated worse than (insert Pat Patterson / Chris Kanyon / Torrie Wilson joke here), crushed by the fact that the people he had devoted his life to betrayed him. So it was here he decided to change his ways once he got out of prison.

Danny finally understood, so then and there he decided to do the same and avoid making the same mistakes his brother did. He vowed instead to live off his rep and try to pull the rug out from under wrestling promoters by demanding more money five minutes before a title match. Warrior’s eyes welled with tears of joy.

The next morning Warrior walked his brother to school, still beaming from their decision to turn their lives around. Danny dashes quickly into to the toilets so he could take a leak before handing in his paper to Sweeney. But as he finishes, he turns around to find a strange figure staring back at him.

The figure started to chant and waved his arms like a madman. As the figure thrust his hands towards Danny, he suddenly felt very ill. Ooze started to drip from Danny’s eyes and, for some unknown reason, he started to cough up pea soup. Danny fell backwards onto the floor, which gave way due to a trap door he installed in case he needed to make one of his fire-extinguisher escapes. Covered in ooze and pea soup, and with separated discs in his back, Danny pulled himself to his feet using one of the bathroom sinks.

But when he looked into the mirror above it, he was horrified to see the face of the Warrior staring back at him, laughing maniacally. At this point Danny completely flips out, screaming in fear. An alarmed Eric Bischoff runs in to help him.

BISCHOFF: Danny, what’s wrong!? What are you screaming about!? Who are you looking at, Danny!?

BLIND FREDDY: Warrior’s in the mirror, you jackass!

But it was too late. Danny had suffered such trauma and puked up so much pretend vomit that he was dead. Warrior races in moments later, clutching his brother’s body, screaming in agony at the fact that what he had done throughout his life had come back to haunt him and his family in devastating fashion.

DANNY: So I guess this is where I tell you what I learned. My conclusion, right? Well, my conclusion is: Hate is baggage. Life's too short to be pissed off all the time. It's just not worth it. Warrior says it's always good to end a paper with a quote. He says someone else has already said it best. So if you can't top it, steal from them and go out strong. So I picked one of Warrior’s quotes.

(The world as we know it groans collectively)

DANNY: “Always Believe.”

(Deafening sigh or relief)

THE END

CREDITS