• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Chris Benoit family conference on CNN : official thread

Status
Not open for further replies.

Burai

shitonmychest57
What an appalling tragedy.

I don't know if I agree with calling Benoit "evil" or a "piece of shit" though. I think mentally ill is a far more fitting description for someone that believes their only path it to kill their immediate family and themself.

It's not like, say OJ Simpson, where he killed his wife because she was taking his money, ran from justice and used the best lawyers, his race and political pressure to get away scot-free and then attempted to sell a book about "how he'd have done it". You want to know evil? That's your poster-child.

What we've got here is a man that's so mentally unhinged that he believes killing his wife, his son and himself are the only answer to his problems. You cannot justify murder and that's certainly not what I'm trying to do here before people start throwing vortexes at me, but I think to just dismiss the man as evil is oversimplifying something we can't ever begin to understand.

The biggest tragedy here is that Chris Benoit never got the psychiatric help he so desperately needed. People have said he's had a snap personality, his wife has once filed for divorce because she felt she and her son were in danger. The signs were there that this could possibly happen once he'd been pushed too far. This was an avoidable situation.

Three lives senselessly lost. A terrible, terrible tragedy.
 
Shard said:
Okay, as much as we are dealing with the fact that Chris Benoit being a huge god dmaned scum bag, this guy sounds like an idiot. A Clinton comparison, really?

I didn't listen to the clip, but Colin Cowherd's an ass. He's also the same guy that went on a rant about Eddie after he died too.
 

Manics

Banned
bjork said:
That was taken from a dvd they'd made almost 3 years ago. It was painting him in a positive light while he was world champion, not once the details of this case came out. But this will just go around in circles, so I guess there's not much point in debating it. What's done is done.


Yes I know, the point is the WWE shoudln't have gone and aired anything that night. Vince standing out in an empty ring with his sad face reeks of a ratings grab for him. It's disgusting and one of the reasons I stopped watching the WWE years ago. They should have waited until the investigation was providing details, and aired nothing that night.
 

Shard

XBLAnnoyance
As I said before, it was pretty much a lose-lose situation for the WWE at the time, though obviously in hindsight they should have done anything else so as not to have this huge egg on their face, and for those of you who say the WWE should have just gone dark, that isn't the way the WWE works, they don't stop even in the face of a major wrestling death
 

Manics

Banned
WickedAngel said:
Not really, considering you and the people like you can't seem to grasp that the WWE didn't know what had really happened at the time that the show took place.

I don't even like the WWE but demonizing them for their efforts makes absolutely no sense. If they had known, they wouldn't have sacrificed a storyline that they had heavily invested in and they wouldn't have given him tribute. They wouldn't have embarassed all their employees by putting them in the position to praise him.

Good lord, please read my reply before putting me in the "people like you" category. When there's an investigation going on with one of your dead wrestlers, you don't go and air a tribute on him before you know what happened. At best it's a stupid mistake, at worst it's an attempt at a huge ratings grab.
 

koam

Member
I know what he did is horrible, and I feel especially bad for his son who was trapped in a home with his enraged father and dead mother for an entire day. Still, Benoit was a tremendous athlete and i enjoyed his matches. I still have respect for him despite this and it really sucks that he suffered the same faith that many other wrestlers have. It really is a tough business and theses atheletes are forced to push harder and harder in order to get the attention they deserve and to be written into good storylines.

It's a damn shame that his roid abuse ruined his family. I know we don't know all the details (did his wife cheat on him? was there any other factors we don't know about?) but it's still a tragedy.

R.I.P Benoit and family.

I'm waiting to hear from Chris Jericho.
 
Manics said:
Yes I know, the point is the WWE shoudln't have gone and aired anything that night. Vince standing out in an empty ring with his sad face reeks of a ratings grab for him. It's disgusting and one of the reasons I stopped watching the WWE years ago.

Point made. Some of us still disagree. No where further to really go with this argument.
 
Dr_Cogent said:
Yep, what he did was just plain evil as well.

I don't think a lot here believe in evil though, so that might be a hard selling point with many here.

At what point do you think, well **** it - I'm going to kill my flesh and blood. Killing your wife, no matter how despicable, can be better understood than killing your own kid. I would never do either, but the love you have for your child exceeds that for your spouse. At least that is how it is with everyone I know.

Funny, in Roman times the patriarch of the family could kill his wife and children as he saw fit. It was his right. You call it evil, but it is simply a shift in values. Now obviously Benoit, if he did kill them, most likely did not do this as a sort of patriarchal punishment. It is more likely that this was an act of desperation and pain. I feel sorry for them all. Regardless of anything it is a tragedy. I don't agree with your demonization.
 

fallout

Member
Shard said:
Okay, as much as we are dealing with the fact that Chris Benoit being a huge god dmaned scum bag, this guy sounds like an idiot. A Clinton comparison, really?
Eh. He sounds like a complete ass, but he's got a point.
 

Boogie

Member
So, for all you who were saying that you couldn't believe this because of Benoit's history, and how he seemed like the last person who would do anything like this, what about this:

http://www.declarationofindependents.net/doi/pages/ajcbenoit.html

His wife filed for divorce in 2003? On grounds that Benoit lost his temper, threatened to hit her and cause damage to the home. "Petitioner is in reasonable fear for petitioner's own safety and that of the minor child."

Yeah, this situation came out of NOWHERE. :rolleyes
 

Ashodin

Member
Just goes to show you that we all have a little evil person inside, it just takes different circumstances and stress to bring them out.
 

vitaflo

Member
Shard said:
Okay, as much as we are dealing with the fact that Chris Benoit being a huge god dmaned scum bag, this guy sounds like an idiot. A Clinton comparison, really?

The host of that show is an ass, but he brings up a good point in how many wrestlers in their 40s and under have died. It's sickeningly high. It doesn't have much to do with the Benoit case, but the death rate is absurd.
 
Manics said:
Good lord, please read my reply before putting me in the "people like you" category. When there's an investigation going on with one of your dead wrestlers, you don't go and air a tribute on him before you know what happened. At best it's a stupid mistake, at worst it's an attempt at a huge ratings grab.

I read your reply, and yes, you fit well within the "people like you" category.

If this had turned out to be something other than murders and the WWE hadn't made a tribute, you'd be in here saying that any of their future tribute shows would be "Too little, too late".

They did what seemed best with the information they had.
 

Forceatowulf

G***n S**n*bi
Burai said:
What an appalling tragedy.

I don't know if I agree with calling Benoit "evil" or a "piece of shit" though. I think mentally ill is a far more fitting description for someone that believes their only path it to kill their immediate family and themself.

It's not like, say OJ Simpson, where he killed his wife because she was taking his money, ran from justice and used the best lawyers, his race and political pressure to get away scot-free and then attempted to sell a book about "how he'd have done it". You want to know evil? That's your poster-child.

What we've got here is a man that's so mentally unhinged that he believes killing his wife, his son and himself are the only answer to his problems. You cannot justify murder and that's certainly not what I'm trying to do here before people start throwing vortexes at me, but I think to just dismiss the man as evil is oversimplifying something we can't ever begin to understand.

The biggest tragedy here is that Chris Benoit never got the psychiatric help he so desperately needed. People have said he's had a snap personality, his wife has once filed for divorce because she felt she and her son were in danger. The signs were there that this could possibly happen once he'd been pushed too far. This was an avoidable situation.

Three lives senselessly lost. A terrible, terrible tragedy.
The hell?! How is killing your wife AND child and then your self considered less horrible than just killing your wife?
 

bjork

Member
Manics said:
Yes I know, the point is the WWE shoudln't have gone and aired anything that night. Vince standing out in an empty ring with his sad face reeks of a ratings grab for him. It's disgusting and one of the reasons I stopped watching the WWE years ago. They should have waited until the investigation was providing details, and aired nothing that night.

It's very easy to be a monday morning quarterback. Far easier than, say, making some snap decision to not air your show when it's the station's biggest ratings draw and doing so would potentially be a breach of contract, both to USA as well as advertisers, etc.

They went on past deaths and made an incorrect assumption, but only due to the very unusual circumstances of this incident. You can't skewer them for that. Well, I suppose you could, but it seems silly after the fact.

Boogie said:
So, for all you who were saying that you couldn't believe this because of Benoit's history, and how he seemed like the last person who would do anything like this, what about this:

http://www.declarationofindependents.net/doi/pages/ajcbenoit.html

His wife filed for divorce in 2003? On grounds that Benoit lost his temper, threatened to hit her and cause damage to the home. "Petitioner is in reasonable fear for petitioner's own safety and that of the minor child."

Yeah, this situation came out of NOWHERE. :rolleyes

Had anyone dug this up and given it press when it happened, then it would've been a point people remembered. They certainly remember Austin's domestic violence troubles. But I don't remember hearing or reading about Benoit's personal issues. Maybe they didn't receive attention because he wasn't Rock/Austin-level popularity or something.

You posting in a wrestling thread seems as out of place as me posting in the mma thread, btw.
 

Chiggs

Gold Member
Manics said:
They should have waited until the investigation was providing details, and aired nothing that night.

Seriously. Anybody with any sense of decency and half-a-goddamned brain would come to this conclusion.

Maxrpg said:
Just goes to show you that we all have a little evil person inside, it just takes different circumstances and stress to bring them out.


And, say, a little bit of deca in your blood.
 
Forceatowulf said:
The hell?! How is killing your wife AND child and then your self considered less horrible than just killing your wife?

Benoit actually paid for his actions with his own life. OJ walked away a free man and is actually trying to profit from the event.
 

Ristamar

Member
Battlezone said:
I didn't listen to the clip, but Colin Cowherd's an ass. He's also the same guy that went on a rant about Eddie after he died too.

I think he's gotten worse over the years. At least he isn't constantly up Michael Vick's ass like he used to be ever since the dog fighting ring came to light.
 

Hellraizah

Member
CNN talks about the divorced filed by Nancy in 2003

Nancy Benoit filed for a divorce in May 2003, saying their three-year union was irrevocably broken and alleging "cruel treatment." But she later dropped the complaint, as well as a request for a restraining order in which she charged that Benoit had threatened her and had broken furniture in their home.

In the divorce filing, she said Benoit made more than $500,000 a year as a professional wrestler and asked for permanent custody of Daniel and child support. In his response, Benoit sought joint custody.
 

Lelielle

Member
I would argue that there are lots of guys out there that need some good counselling (violent tendencies or not) but there is still a stupid stigma about men getting psychiatric help,( seen as unmanly, sign of weakness) even if the problems are serious, its a real shame, there are guys out there in a world of pain too afraid to get help. :(
 

Burai

shitonmychest57
Forceatowulf said:
The hell?! How is killing your wife AND child and then your self considered less horrible than just killing your wife?

You've missed the point I made so spectacularly with your selective quoting that I can't even think about arguing the toss with you.
 

Forceatowulf

G***n S**n*bi
WickedAngel said:
Benoit actually paid for his actions with his own life.
The hell are you talking about?! He paid for his actions? Taking your own life is payment for killing your own flesh and blood? When did this happen?!

Gaf is ****ing nutty some times.
 

Shard

XBLAnnoyance
Also, to those of you who think the WWE did this for very cynical reasons, I am just not buying it. You mean to tell me that Vince would willingly subject his company to all of this humiliation and embarrassment and the public relations nightmare that this shit must be for them?
 

Manics

Banned
WickedAngel said:
I read your reply, and yes, you fit well within the "people like you" category.

If this had turned out to be something other than murders and the WWE hadn't made a tribute, you'd be in here saying that any of their future tribute shows would be "Too little, too late".

You have no idea what I'd be posting in here because you don't know me. If it had turned out he was murdered by someone else then a tribute by the WWE later on would have been fitting. Hell it would have been expected. The fact that there was an investigation ongoing should have been enough for the WWE to wait and see.

WickedAngel said:
They did what seemed best with the information they had.

No they didn't.
 

vitaflo

Member
Manics said:
Yes I know, the point is the WWE shoudln't have gone and aired anything that night. Vince standing out in an empty ring with his sad face reeks of a ratings grab for him. It's disgusting and one of the reasons I stopped watching the WWE years ago. They should have waited until the investigation was providing details, and aired nothing that night.

I would never put anything past Vince after he went on with the show after Owen died.
 
Forceatowulf said:
The hell are you talking about?! He paid for his actions? Taking your own life is payment for killing your own flesh and blood? When did this happen?!

Gaf is ****ing nutty some times.

At least this event will help GAF seed you knee-jerk, delusional sensationalists out in the open and earn you the bannings you deserve.

OJ Simpson is free and wealthy. Chris Benoit is dead. You're an absolute fool if you can't see which one makes less sense.
 

X26

Banned
Haven't read the thread and I'm sure it's been said many times already, but what a pathetic scumbag
 
Is ECW live tonight? Will there be a crowd?

It should be intresting the see how WWE react to the whole thing and how the crowd will react to there actions!
 

Forceatowulf

G***n S**n*bi
WickedAngel said:
At least this event will help GAF seed you knee-jerk, delusional sensationalists out in the open and earn you the bannings you deserve.

OJ Simpson is free and wealthy. Chris Benoit is dead. You're an absolute fool if you can't see which one makes less sense.
I'm the fool here? You just basically said Benoit somehow atoned for his crimes because he killed him self along with his family. That that some how makes up for what he did when it DOESN'T! And I'm the fool? Ok then...
 

I3rand0

Member
Keyser Soze said:
Is ECW live tonight? Will there be a crowd?

It should be intresting the see how WWE react to the whole thing and how the crowd will react to there actions!
I was just thinking the same thing, should be interesting.
 
vitaflo said:
The host of that show is an ass, but he brings up a good point in how many wrestlers in their 40s and under have died. It's sickeningly high. It doesn't have much to do with the Benoit case, but the death rate is absurd.

The death rate of pro football players is absurd too. Hard sports with large athletes pushing their bodies tend to lead to shorter lives. Just a fact that people who pursue such sports should be aware of.
 

koam

Member
The tribute was a good idea, they've always done tributes for their stars. Had they known that Benoit killed them, they wouldn't have done it. No one was bitching about the tribute as it was airing last night.
 

Ogni-XR21

Member
When I told a colleague at work, who is into wrestling, that Chris Benoit supposedly killed his kid and wife he went "He would never do that!" before I could even finish the sentence... I'm not into wrestling at all, but I can kind of understand the denial some people might go through now.

I guess the saying is true: DON'T JUDGE A BOOK BY IT'S COVER!
 

dskillzhtown

keep your strippers out of my American football
Manics said:
Good lord, please read my reply before putting me in the "people like you" category. When there's an investigation going on with one of your dead wrestlers, you don't go and air a tribute on him before you know what happened. At best it's a stupid mistake, at worst it's an attempt at a huge ratings grab.


People like you are trying to find anyway in the world to blame WWE in this. All they knew at the time when they were putting the show together is that Benoit and family were dead. That is all. The leaks didn't start until the show was almost over. So one of your top wrestlers and fan favorites is dead, that is all you really know, so in your mind you should just ignore it, right?

Hindsight is 20/20, so it is easy to sit back now and blast WWE for the tribute, but they didn't ****ing know. 24 hours later we are JUST NOW getting a picture of what happened, but you expect WWE to have known all this yesterday?

There is only one person who deserves blame in this situation.
 

fallout

Member
Manics said:
You have no idea what I'd be posting in here because you don't know me. If it had turned out he was murdered by someone else then a tribute by the WWE later on would have been fitting. Hell it would have been expected. The fact that there was an investigation ongoing should have been enough for the WWE to wait and see.
Obviously, your route is the best one. Still, a friend and his family that they held very dear to them were dead.
 

f3niks

Member
Keyser Soze said:
Is ECW live tonight? Will there be a crowd?

It should be intresting the see how WWE react to the whole thing and how the crowd will react to there actions!


If Vince was smart, he should just do a show with matches only, no storylines or show some old footage from WWE 24/7 for the rest of the week. But they have an oblgation to the fans at that will be attenting these events. It's hard to say, I know I will tune in tonight to see what he does.
 

Fireblend

Banned
Burai said:
What an appalling tragedy.

I don't know if I agree with calling Benoit "evil" or a "piece of shit" though. I think mentally ill is a far more fitting description for someone that believes their only path it to kill their immediate family and themself.

It's not like, say OJ Simpson, where he killed his wife because she was taking his money, ran from justice and used the best lawyers, his race and political pressure to get away scot-free and then attempted to sell a book about "how he'd have done it". You want to know evil? That's your poster-child.

What we've got here is a man that's so mentally unhinged that he believes killing his wife, his son and himself are the only answer to his problems. You cannot justify murder and that's certainly not what I'm trying to do here before people start throwing vortexes at me, but I think to just dismiss the man as evil is oversimplifying something we can't ever begin to understand.

The biggest tragedy here is that Chris Benoit never got the psychiatric help he so desperately needed. People have said he's had a snap personality, his wife has once filed for divorce because she felt she and her son were in danger. The signs were there that this could possibly happen once he'd been pushed too far. This was an avoidable situation.

Three lives senselessly lost. A terrible, terrible tragedy.

Damn, great post. I am definitely not a WWE fan or anything like that but reading about all the reactions you've had sure is interesting. Anyway, back to my lurking...
 

dskillzhtown

keep your strippers out of my American football
Keyser Soze said:
Is ECW live tonight? Will there be a crowd?

It should be intresting the see how WWE react to the whole thing and how the crowd will react to there actions!


SD/ECW will be nothing but matches. No angles, nothing but wrestling. Vince angle is dropped and RAW is being booked now.
 

vitaflo

Member
BigGreenMat said:
The death rate of pro football players is absurd too. Hard sports with large athletes pushing their bodies tend to lead to shorter lives. Just a fact that people who pursue such sports should be aware of.

It's nowhere near wrestling, especially in the age groups we're talking about. What you said also doesn't take into account that there are hardly any deaths at all in MMA, which is one of the most brutal sports around.
 
Forceatowulf said:
I'm the fool here? You just basically said Benoit somehow atoned for his crimes because he killed him self along with his family. That that some how makes up for what he did when it DOESN'T! And I'm the fool? Ok then...

Yes, you are the fool.

Atonement implies the result of actions that were taken to earn forgiveness. Given the nature of the investigation (No clear motive, no suicide note), nobody knows exactly what Chris Benoit was thinking when he killed his family and followed by killing himself. What we do know is that he, for one reason or another, paid the biggest price a person can pay in this life. This means one of two things;

1. He had some kind of mental disorder and wasn't completely himself when he committed the crimes.

Or

2. He committed the crimes, realized what he'd done was wrong, and took his own life.

OJ Simpson seemingly murdered two people, hired a crafty lawyer, and walked away with his freedom. To make matters worse, he wrote a "hypothetical" How To book in order to profit from what he did. He has paid nothing except money.
 

GSG Flash

Nobody ruins my family vacation but me...and maybe the boy!
Any pity I had for Benoit yesterday is gone, in fact I hope he burns in hell now. Sucks for the WWE and I hope they don't take a hit for this, they may have did a tribute for a murderer, but they were not at fault at all.
 
Not everyone who does seriods develops a serious mental illness (even if they get roid rage occasionally) but it does happen as it is well documented. You can't rule it out just becuase some roid users don't suffer from that particular possible side effect.

Also, the prescription pills he was abusing (just like eddie ) could have warped his brain as well over time in large enough doses. Its not like drug use has never been linked to mental illness. We are looking at a combination of the two.

The bible thing is probably becuase he felt she was a whore. She probably done something he felt made her "desrve death" and used the bible as an insult. He probably viewed the kid as a "son of a whore" and used the bible there too. Of course, I'm trying to guess what goes on in the mind of a psycho path but its a plausible theory.

At any rate, the WWE should have caught on to his drug and steriod abuse. If they knew, well I feel they should be in some sort of legal trouble. Not over the deaths, but becuase they allowed it to continue. My employer points you towards certain service s that can help you until your able to come back to work if you have a drug problem. They don't want half crazy people hopped up on something to snap on someone in public.

No point in having a bunch of druggies fighting one another one live on TV.
 
I know that dskillzhtown and VisionaryQuest0 but people will be coming out to the ring, people that knew Benoit and people that have an opinion, they always used to be allowed these people to say there piece when Eddie/Owen died and I was just wondering under the circumstances will they totally blank the Benoit stuff and will Tazz/Styles mention it at all.... and if a wrestler does mention it on the mic what will the crowd do.
 

Burai

shitonmychest57
Forceatowulf said:
You never had a decent point to begin with.

Yes I did. It was the WHOLE post. If you want to take a single paragraph out and quote it out of context to make a completely unrelated argument about how evil your kill tally makes you, that's up to you, but understand that that's certainly not the point I'm making and therefore not an argument I'm even remotely interested in getting involved with.
 
Wow, I feel for the family. All Im going to say is let the cops conduct their investigation before you guys start condeming the man. Yes, we know he killed his family, but there are so many variables that are still left unanswered. Was he sane when he did this? Was he out of touch with reality? Did something trumatic happen that would cause him to do this? I mean, people are quick to judge people without first looking at ALL the facts.

This just reminds me of those mothers with post-partum(sp?) depression that ended up killing their children. Very sad. :'(
 

dskillzhtown

keep your strippers out of my American football
Dr. Kitty Muffins said:
Not everyone who does seriods develops a serious mental illness (even if they get roid rage occasionally) but it does happen as it is well documented. You can't rule it out just becuase some roid users don't suffer from that particular possible side effect.

Also, the prescription pills he was abusing (just like eddie ) could have warped his brain as well over time in large enough doses. Its not like drug use has never been linked to mental illness. We are looking at a combination of the two.

The bible thing is probably becuase he felt she was a whore. She probably done something he felt made her "desrve death" and used the bible as an insult. He probably viewed the kid as a "son of a whore" and used the bible there too. Of course, I'm trying to guess what goes on in the mind of a psycho path but its a plausible theory.

At any rate, the WWE should have caught on to his drug and steriod abuse. If they knew, well I feel they should be in some sort of legal trouble. Not over the deaths, but becuase they allowed it to continue. My employer points you towards certain service s that can help you until your able to come back to work if you have a drug problem. They don't want half crazy people hopped up on something to snap on someone in public.

This entire post is 100% speculation and your imagination.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom