Workers: ROH’s Internet Angle
Posted on August 02, 2007 by John Philapavage
After years of trying, award winning ROH Booker (and possibly his wife) Gabe Sapolsky are pulling off the angle of a lifetime with the internet. A DETAILED follow up on a Brian Streleckis initial report.
This is totally Gabe Sapolsky 101. longtime fans will remember he so badly wanted to do worked-shoot angles like this the first year of ROH, but they didn’t have the tools in place yet. He tried to do the “I fired Donavan Morgan for real, so lets get into it w/ CW Anderson as a shoot” angle in Philly that first year, which was kinda funny. But then that led into the NYC riot angle, which was amazingly pulled off (still looks good on DVD to this day), but debunked by the net within a day because of the use of NYC indy workers as plants (that didn’t stop it from giving ringside fans, aswell as my half-drunk clan in the balcony, a heart attack at the show itself).
This one totally takes it. Heres a little more background. There is a site someone created called abusedsociety.com . Flyers were handed out at the ROH weekend shows in Long Island and Edison, NJ promoting this site. I belive the handouts were in the parking lot, and not by ROH staffers.
Before this there was a cryptic promo on the first ROH PPV by Adam Pearce - very Raven-esque -and in the end Pearce attempts to console a beaten BJ Whitmer, who lost a title match and is floundering after being in ROH basically from the begining. It goes from there
this site was created “independent of the angle” by one of the many fans on ROH boards trying to debunk the angle: http://project161.blogspot.com/ . The guy who did it was “a fan looking into this worked ROH angle”. The man had the info of the domain of the abusedsociety.com site (ownership, contacts, ideas of where the angle was going, etc.), and also had several other things “debunking” the angle, going so far as to link to Gabe Sapolsky’s wife’s Myspace and use a pic of the two of them (now blurred and used at the AbusedSociety site in “mock” fashion)as “evidence”.
That guy was on the Pro Wrestling Torch message board - wrestling journalism site/newsletter w/o ties to ROH. They cover the wrestling industry and are considered near the top of the proffession - A site for paying users only, under the name big Daddy. We’ll get back to that in a minute.
In the meantime this goes down (from friend T-Dog of other message boards)
“Last night when “TheWorldsParasite” invaded the ROH boards and made several topics with cryptic one-liners, registration at the boards was open. Now, less that 12 hours later, it’s closed. (Also, “TheWorldsParasite” AIM username was “project161″)
I also know registration wasn’t open before then. So unless someone hacked the site just to do this (when you can hack the website for tons of other better reasons) and this whole this is just a coincidence with the Pearce promo, then this is definately ROH’s doing. Plus Gabe would have said something by now if it wasn’t them to cool it all down.”
The messages were:
A poster using the username “Honor 161″ spammed the ROH Boards with cryptic messages
(subject/body):
WE KNOW YOUR FEAR
REMORESE AND RESILIENCE MEAN NOTHING
ABUSE US NO LONGER
IGNORED NO LONGER, TAKING OVER IS KEY
UNSPOKEN BONDS
WE ARE THE HOLDERS OF MERCY
THE MERCILESS
OVERTAKE THE WEAK
NO HONOR
SUCCUMB TO THE SOCIETY OF DEATH
ALL IS GONE
HOPE, GREED, AND DESIRE EQUAL FEAR
INJUSTINCE
THE WORLD WILL BOW TO THE ABUSEDSOCIETY
DEFINE US
THE INSURGENCY WILL FALL
FEAR THE ABUSED
SAVIORS OF THE NEW WORLD WITHOUT HONOR
REJECT US
HORDES OF MEN AND THE BLOOD OF HONOR SHALL MAKE WAY
SWEET OR SOUR
THE PROPHECY HAS BEEN REVISITED AND REVISED FOR HONOR KILLS
THE ALLEGIANCE
MAKE WAY THE END IS UPON US CHOICES TO BE MADE
BLEED HONOR
HONOR WILL KILL THE KIDS
CRUCIFY
WE WARNED YOU
WE WONT BE SILENCED
ABUSED AND UNDERUTILIZED, WE ARE NOT HERE FOR A WAR, WE ARE HERE TO DESTROY HONOR AND TAKE OVER
NO ONE IS SAFE
THE MESSENGER OF GOD, OUR GABRIEL
On abusedsociety.com, there is a new pic, a distorted picture of Gabe Sapolsky and apparantly his wife with the caption “We told you no one is safe” across the picture.”
So then this happened (commentary by our friend T-Dog again (don’t let the name fool you. Well spoken guy):
Gabe posted this after cleaning up the spam on the ROH Boards
Quote:
Ok, all this crap ends now. I’m sorry if it seems like I’m in a bad mood because I am. I am trying my best to keep my composure. I just had a long day/night of production on the Japan DVDs. I sign on here, I’m actually feeling pretty good about things because I just watched a lot of great wrestling from our Japan shows. So what do I find:
1) A private email I send to someone requesting that photos and information about my family be taken off a website is now made public. This is my family, not an angle. Understand that. When I send you an email it is private. When I make a request about my family it is real. Lets get that straight right now.
2) The clowns who are attempting to f*** with my life and ROH, which is my life, spam this board again after it takes me two hours the other night to clean it up. Not only that, but other people decide to jump in. I am about to start banning people like crazy so I suggest everyone read the rules and stick to them quickly. My patience is running out. Again, I am trying to keep my composure here, but I have had enough. I now have to go clean up the board again after a long day of production. I suggest if you are in doubt about something you posted that you delete it to yourself. I will ban anyone involved with any posts that are in doubt of breaking any rules. This is a warning. If this doesn’t apply to you and you are a productive member of this board I apologize and please ignore this rant.
3) Now we have more people than ever checking this board and it is a disgrace to the company. I want everyone to know that police have been alerted and I will do whatever I can to stop these websites and harrassment both to me personally and my wife. This is your warning. Stop it now.
That is all for now. I’m not playing a sick game here. It is over and I need to go back to doing what deserves my attention and that’s making ROH and FIP as good as possible for you.
If this doesn’t apply to you sorry for the rant. If it does then take this warning seriously.
I love how he’s able to pull off kayfabe so well in the Internet age.
He’s got people eating out of the palm of his hand. Some of the people there are showing solidarity about how his life is being threatened like this and are convinced it’s not an angle. Others are giving him virtual blow jobs and the rest don’t know what to think.
And to go with the post above, the blog started by a “fan” has been shut down, but the Abused Society website is still up.”
This thanks to Steve Kriske:
“Wow, this thing has exploded. As I mentioned yesterday, someone on the Torch forum (”Big Daddy”) started the blog (or at least claimed to). Here are some posts in that thread:
Big Daddy
Quote:
If you check the Project 161 blog (http://project161.blogspot.com/ ), you’ll find some new stuff including PROOF that ROH is behind the project. I am loving this angle.
Big Daddy
Quote:
Thanks for the support, Eric. On other boards, I am getting blasted for “ruining” the gimmick. I just think it’s intriguing, and I will keep investigating it. I’m still very excited to see where this angle is going.
Big Daddy
Quote:
Now things have gotten crazy.
I was sent an e-mail from Gabe “begging” me to take down his family’s photos. I will be posting the e-mail soon. I guess they are using my blog as part of the angle, now!
Big Daddy
Quote:
Blog is down. I won’t be discussing this anymore.
Mike Roe, Torch beat writer
Quote:
Boooo! Well, when it turns out to all be a work, will you bring it back?
Big Daddy
Quote:
I’ll only say this: if this does turn out to be a work, I will never buy anything from ROH again. I’m confused about all this, and quite upset.
Sean Radican, Torch ROH columnist
Quote:
There’s no way those flyers end up in all the seats last weekend and it isn’t an angle.
It’s interesting how far this is being taken.
Big Daddy
Quote:
This is not an angle.
Gabe has made that clear in a number of public and private ways.
If this does turn out, in any way, to be part of a wrestling angle, I am done with ROH. I will not support a company that tries to bully their fans and supporters with guilt, threats, and fear.
But the guy tried to clarify later. T-Dog w/ the info:
I’m now of the belief he’s just being a drama queen over it all because Gabe told him to pull it down.
The blog did contain pictures of Gabe and his wife, the people who supposedly used the site and other personal info, so it’s understandable that it was taken down.
The latest from BigDaddy
Quote:
These “arguments” are making little, if any sense.
Here’s the deal: Gabe announced this is not a game and wants it all to end “now.”
This is not part of an angle. If it is, it’s a truly sick joke to make people think innocent people are in danger. This all needs to be dropped now. Please delete this thread.
Well, using that logic, if Stephanie McMahon being abducted by the Undertaker TWICE wasn’t an angle, I am pissed off that it was a sick joke. APPALED I TELL YOU!
Same can be said for all the people Kane abducted and held hostage, the threats Matt Hardy made to Edge about wanting him to die, every person on earth Zandig has threatened to kill (which is alot), Jimmy Jacobs threatening to make Whitmer suffer for a lifetime,Homicide trying to kill Samoa Joe and Cabana numerous time, plus tons of other times I was worked into believing people I thought were wrestling personalities were in “real danger”.
Thanks to everyone I gathered info from. Seems either Gabe started the angle and is working the whole ‘net (most likely), or some really overzealous fan got involved and went to far with his blog (it’s possible). Brian Streleckis pointed this out a few minutes ago.
“You know, thinking about it more, the person behind the blog (Big Daddy or not) posting all of those personal pictures/info is more creepy than the angle itself. If anything, I think he screwed himself in trying to seriously follow it. The upside (or downside, whatever perspective you take) to this is that Gabe used this personal info to further the creep-factor of this angle.”
The picture of Gabe and his wife remains out there, both on her myspace site and on independent servers.
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