By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
The Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling Podcast with Austin Aries
Host: JP John Poz
Twitter: @TwoManPowerTrip
Website: www.tmptempire.com
Interview available at Tmptow.podomatic.com
The Control Your Narrative Rant Room: “So, he didn’t really hate me. He was actually a fan of mine, but he was very nervous to express how much he disagreed with my takes on COVID or vaccines or masks. Again, he came in there fully masked up, but if that makes him feel better, I have no problem with that. Everyone do what you need to do to feel safe. We can argue [about] the science and statistics but we all know that every study, every science, every statistic can be cherry picked to tell us what we want to hear. I always go with this at the end of the day, especially when people debate passionately about how they’re right. None of us know. We see .005% of the light spectrum, we’re literally blind. The earth is a fraction of the size of a pinhead in the universe, yet we think we’re these smart and intelligent evolved beings. We’re really not. We’re dumb, deaf, and blind. But we’re so convinced that we’re not. People will hold these truths, what is the truth? We don’t know the truth. My favorite saying about myself is that I’m not smart enough to know that I’m not smart enough to know. That’s why I ask a lot of questions. That’s why I leave all possibilities on the table.”
Aries on the purpose of the Rant Room: “I think that was kind of the point of the whole rant room. How many of you that sit on your computers saying all of these nasty and negative things about someone you’ve never met and never been face to face with would be willing to have that same energy when you’re in a room with them. Very very few people do. It’s something to think about when you’re spewing these things online. Would you say that to somebody if they were sitting next to you? It was this opportunity for people [to express] something they feel that strongly about that they wanna get off their chest. I’m man enough to sit in front of you and let you say it and let you say it without yelling back at you. You paid for the ticket, you paid for this time, say what you need to say. I’m man enough to hear it, it’s not gonna bother me and who knows, maybe something you say sparks something in my brain that makes me go ‘Hmm, that’s an interesting point.’ Then maybe I reevaluate my opinion and come up with a different idea after that and I learn something. That’s kind of what it was in its original form, you know I think that the rant room is gonna morph and evolve into something even greater. It can be an idea where it’s not about necessarily having to spew negativity and hate, but if you really wanna have an in-depth conversation about something you’re feeling inside, a problem you’re having, whatever it might be. [You can have] a safe space where you can be real, you can be authentic, and you can say whatever is in your heart without being judged and being lashed [out] at.”
An incident with Rhett Titus’s former girlfriend: “Rhett Titus, a student of mine, did a shoot interview some years back. He talked about a scenario where his girlfriend was in the locker room, and I’ll just say it, she kissed my balls. What do you want me to tell you? It happened. I’m not gonna run from the facts. The facts are, she kissed my balls. She did it willingly. She did it, I would almost say gleefully, maybe a little too gleefully, right. There’s a whole story and context behind it. She was putting kisses on all the wrestlers with her lipstick. She didn’t really belong in the locker room, but she was going to accompany him to the ring that night. She was getting a little flirtatious in the locker room. I kind of told her to kind of knock it off, cut it out, this isn’t high school, and that she needs to act a certain way if she’s going to be in here. I told her this isn’t high school and if you keep talking like that, and acting like that, somebody is going to call your bluff. She said to me, ‘Well, who says I’m bluffing?’ My response, and we can debate if it was the correct response or not, but my left testicle came out and I said, ‘Well put your money where your mouth is’, expecting that at this point, she would maybe realize that this was serious.
“To my surprise, she actually kissed my testicle. So I had to go show Rhett like, ‘Hey, man, you might want to corral your girl over here because she’s acting a little inappropriate. So that story resurfaced, and then, of course, the headline is ‘Austin Aries forces woman to kiss his balls’, and ‘Austin Aries admits to sexual assault’, but that’s not what happened. Nobody was forced. Nobody was coerced. Nobody was pressured. Nobody was tricked. You know, she did this, she was an adult, and she made a choice to do this. But again, you take all these things and people wanting to believe a certain narrative about me, so then that got mischaracterized as something that it wasn’t. So you add all these things up, and I’m a terrible, terrible human being. Because even though we know pro wrestling isn’t real, we know that Austin Aries is really a terrible human being in real life, even though most people have never met me in real life, so they have no idea who I am or who I’m not. They’re basing it off of things they read on the internet, which may or may not be true, or may or may not come from a certain perspective that has a bias. But that’s the world we live in, so I’ve accepted that. People are gonna believe what they want about me, and it’s no longer my job to try to change people’s opinions because that, a lot of times, ends up being futile and you’ll just drive yourself nuts because people are gonna believe what they want to believe. That’s just the world we live in.”
Other topics include breaking into the business, CYN, EC3, Controversy with Christy Hemme, Rhett Titus controversy, Impact Wrestling, Johnny Impact controversy, ROH, Samoa Joe, WWE, NXT, Neville, WrestleMania, Gabe Sapolsky, and more.
“People will hold these truths, what is the truth? We don’t know the truth.”
Moments later….
“What do you want me to tell you? It happened. I’m not gonna run from the facts. The facts are, she kissed my balls.”
This guy……..