My Father Said, When I Was Younger

I’ve had a thought rattling around in my head since Mania: Cody Rhodes’ entrance theme—though it has the one thing every wrestling fan loves, a sing-along bit—paints a misleading picture. “My father said/when I was younger/hard times breed better men” is, of course, a reference to Dusty Rhodes’ famous Hard Times promo. Probably the reason you've heard of Dusty Rhodes (if you're not the kind of fan who watches their old Jim Crockett tapes) is that a) he's Cody and Dustin's dad and b) he did something called the Hard Times promo.

But an idiomatic rendering of Strauss–Howe generational theory—the idea that hard times make good men—isn't what that promo was about at all! It was about how much hard times suck, particularly for workers:

Hard times are when the textile workers around this country are out of work, they got four or five kids and can't pay their wages, can't buy their food. Hard times are when the auto workers are out of work and they tell 'em to go home. And hard times are when a man has worked at a job for thirty years, thirty years, and they give him a watch, kick him in the butt and say "hey a computer took your place, daddy", that's hard times! That's hard times!

That sounds more like Eugene Debs than Steve Bannon. (In content if not in style.) And Dusty Rhodes, the "son of a plumber" looked like a normal guy too! His "belly's just a lil' big, my heiny's a lil' big" and the people loved him for it. Now you’ve got his son who looks like a Supermarionation puppet that got turned into a real boy and is dressed like the fascist Superman lad from The Boys coming out to a theme that admittedly slaps but cuts against all of that. It rubs me the wrong way is all.