I'll respond. I'm on this forum because I loved wrestling when I grew up and recently started rewatching some of those old events. They're goofy as shit, but I remember how crazy we got as kids watching it.
Every time I watch pro wrestling that I have no attachment to I roll my eyes and groan at how stupid it is and change the channel. It doesn't have any of the qualities that I enjoy in any other form of entertainment: the characters and storylines are so silly, so cartoonish and so aggressively pandering that they're on par with Maury, which I also do not enjoy. Though I do not enjoy watching many sports, I love watching combat sports and there is literally nothing in American pro-wrestling action that interests me. At least in stiff puroresu matches I can spend a few minutes watching authentic martial arts movements before I turn to something else.
Not only is there nothing about it that appeals to me, there's nothing about it that doesn't seem stupid to me. It's like a particularly bad pop/rap song or a thoroughly shitty movie.
However, I have a friend who puts on local shows and every time he tells me what they're planning I get jazzed up to see them because it's creative and usually he manages to work in ideas that are legitimately intriguing (like one time he dressed as a bum and spent hours before the show panhandling on the streets, then during the show one of the tag team partners was too injured to go on so they gave this bum $20 and sent him into the ring -- it was done so well that a good number of people thought it really was shoddy promotion sending in a bum and were worried for him, but as the match progressed they realized what was going on and went crazy with delight because they had been gotten). I see none of those qualities in prowrestling on TV. It's literally just people doing stupid things and taking themselves very seriously, which is a surefire combination to make me think you're peddling a crappy product, whether you're a wrestler, a singer or an actor/director/whatever. I think I could potentially find more value in prowrestling if they didn't take themselves so seriously. That's a deal killer for me when you're product is something really, really lacking in originality, creativity or sophistication. Some of the weirder puroresu things are intriguing to me for this reason.
EDIT: reading the rest of this thread, I feel I need to point out that I don't care what you like as a fan and I don't feel superior to you. Sometimes I go onto youtube and laugh hysterically watching videos of fat people falling down so I'm not about to look down on people for enjoying the pure crap that they enjoy. People were getting really personally ruffled by that other guy speaking badly of prowrestling so I want to nip that in the bud here. Brony, prowrestling fan, opera fanatic... everyone like something different.
