Just when you thought there couldn’t be any more awful stories about Vince McMahon from former WWE employees, Torrie Wilson, a former Diva from 2001-08, stopped by Insight with Chris Van Vliet to discuss her wrestling career, and needless to say, much of it didn’t paint her former boss in a good light.
Discussing her involvement in WWE’s infamous bikini contests, Wilson revealed just how uncomfortable the women’s locker room was with the booking decisions, with the Hall of Famer revealing she “fought back tears” during a segment in question.
“They were all mortifying. People don’t realize. I went out there and owned it the best I could and pushed through the fear, but it was mortifying. There were times when, I remember specifically a house show that I was in this bikini showdown with Dawn Marie and Sable and someone else. I was standing in the corner watching one of the girls dance in the middle and literally fighting back tears. Like, I cannot believe I’m doing this right now because it got to like a raunchy point, and I’m like, I don’t want to be a part of this, but that was also my job,” Torrie Wilson revealed via Wrestling News.
“It was like twice that I could remember that I (said no). First of all, I’m a major people pleaser, so to say no to people is really hard, even if it’s someone you know. I’m recovering from that. There was one time when I had a thing with Sable where Vince wanted me to come out with the paint on my boobs like she did, and I was like, hard no, I can’t do that. I mean, it ended up being nearly nothing anyway. Another time was when I did Playboy, Vince wanted me to do a pay-per-view also, the video. That one was very hardcore pressed, and it was really hard for me to say no, but I absolutely didn’t want that.”
Discussing her experience with Playboy, something WWE was all about pushing at the time, Wilson revealed that while she did agree to do the spread, she was ultimately uncomfortable with the situation, as it wasn’t something she expected to do with her career.
“That part, no because I thought it’s photos, I know it’s gonna look good, and it’s Playboy,” Wilson explained. “To be honest, this is gonna sound real dumb, but I hadn’t really even thought about the fact that I was kind of gonna be nude because Playboy was such a popular magazine. I was like, this is gonna be awesome, right? Playboy parties and all that. Literally, it wasn’t until I was landing on the plane to go to the shoot that I was like, oh, sh*t, there’s going to actually be other people in the room, not just me and the photographer. It was kind of a closed set. So there wasn’t more than maybe six people, and I always had a robe, but in between shots, I was always like, this is so weird.”
Goodness, what kind of Pay-Per-View did Mr. McMahon want Wilson to do? Is this like a Divas Gone Wild situation or something more akin to One Night in Chyna? Either way, the fact that WWE openly pushed for something like that proves that the promotion’s culture has been broken for a very long time and that Vince McMahon should have been gone a long time ago.
Torrie Wilson had PTSD from her time with Vince McMahon in WWE.
Discussing her wrestling career further in her interview with Chris Van Vliet, Torrie Wilson was asked about her time away from WWE and how much she kept up with the product when she was away. Unsurprisingly, based on her other comments, Wilson found it incredibly hard to reflect on her WWE career, as all of the requests from Vince McMahon and company that pushed her out of her moral comfort zone left her with “PTSD.”
“That’s taken a long time (to allow myself to reflect on my career). I didn’t watch wrestling, I didn’t want anything to do with wrestling for many years after I left,” Torrie Wilson told Chris Van Vliet via Post Wrestling. “Mostly because I just had a certain amount of P.T.S.D. from being so vulnerable out there and feeling like I was put in this kind of, like, raunchy role that wasn’t me, and I felt judgment from people. I felt like people look down on me for like, just, stuff that I did, the bra and panty matches and all that so, I just wanted to shut that door and for many years, I didn’t watch and it wasn’t until they called me to do the Royal Rumble that I started to kind of catch up and then I got really into it, like more into it than I ever was when I was wrestling.”
Do wrestlers and non-wrestlers alike have issues with an employer from time to time? Sure, plenty of people leave a job they don’t like and do so with a bad taste in their mouths. Still, Wilson’s comments aren’t in a vacuum but instead present a pattern of treating female employees poorly, even if they look to be positioned very well on the outside.
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