By Chris Shore

Saturday, February 05 – 8:00pm (CT)

Kurt Angle on Twitter: The "Jarrett" segments on TNA Impact were appalling. It made me look like a dead beat Dad, which I am not (I can assure you). And it made Karen and Jeff look like the perfect American Family. MY kids were calling Jeff "Daddy Jeff". NOBODY will ever replace me as the Father of my kids. You want me to look like the bad person? Don't forget who wanted the divorce! I didn't walk away from my family, Karen did. So keep your little "act" going on TV. It's amusing to me, but don't think for a million years that my fans are buying this crap.

It is of no surprise to me that TNA would take advantage of the real life drama surrounding Karen Angle leaving Kurt Angle and marrying Jeff Jarrett. And much like Matt Hardy, Edge and Lita, if the parties involved can handle it then more power to them. But dragging their kids into it was quite literally, crossing the line.

I started this blog the morning after Impact showed the despicable videos (segments) Angel talks about above. But I never felt like I had said the thing I wanted to say until Angle's tweets rolled across my TweetDeck. The problem is not so much the videos, but the perception created by them and the fact that the story and the shoot are far too close to one another.

For those who don't know what I'm talking about because you don't watch TNA, this week on Impact there were some documentary style video shorts that showed Karen and Jeff Jarrett in their home with four children. Two of those are Jeff's with his late wife, and two of those are Karen's with Kurt. There were three shorts in all. The second two were cute in a way and I didn't think they were all that out of line.

The first, however, had back to back moments that when taken together, push the proverbial envelope too far. The first was Karen's comment that she, "Finally had someone who was a good father to her children." The second involved Jeff yelling at the kids for saying, "Aunt Dixie," and making them apologize for it. (For those out of the loop, Jarrett is currently kayfabe aligned with Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff against Dixie for control of the company.)

Now let me be clear before we go any farther. Do I believe that the kids were damaged in any way? No, I don't. And even though there are scores of bad parents around (as a former teacher and husband of current teacher I say this with no equivocation), I have no reason to believe that any of the three adults fall under that label. In fact, Angle's son smiling at Jeff when he demanded his apology showed exactly how this little boy feels about him.

But it is that moment which is also the most troubling. Angle's sin went from smiling to frowning after looking at Jarrett for a moment as his mom said, "Say you're sorry to Daddy Jeff." Now whether the boy was frowning from trying to remember what he was told to do (as I'm sure they were all coached to some degree) or because he was just confused is immaterial. It is that face on that little boy with those people in the room that is the problem.

See, we all know—as much as we can anyway—that all of this, even the tweet above, is kayfabe. And we have every reason to believe so. When Jeff and Karen hooked up, Jarrett was basically run off from the company he founded. Dixie Carter gave terse answers to every question that was sent her way about it, even going so far as to say Jeff had put the company, "in a difficult position." To think after all that they would let these two work without the hatchet being buried is an exercise in the absurd.

So with the storyline now tracking the real story, we see a face that hits just a little too close to home for me. We get a glimpse into the most personal of people's lives. And we have no business being there. This is a private matter, not one I should ever see play out on television.

The fact that it is a work is also immaterial. These are the real people, not actors performing a play. In real life, that woman was really married to that guy and had that boy, and now that boy is calling that other guy daddy. As a child of divorce and raising two adopted children, I assure you this doesn't need to be on TV, damaging to the children or not.

Kurt, Karen and Jeff are adults. They understand this business better than I or most of you reading. And while I would find it personally objectionable to see their real life drama play out as a work, I understand that they must have put enough of any animosity there was aside to be able to work together. But exposing the children to us in this manner is more than objectionable, it is unacceptable.

Questions and comments to css3238@gmail.com or on Twitter @the_shore_slant.

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