Earlier this year, during WWE WrestleMania 39 weekend, WrestleCon held its latest fan convention. The event was filled to the brim with top names from the business, per usual, looking to trade autographs and photos with fans for cash. Among the big names that attended the event were Impact Wrestling’s Gisele Shaw and WWE Hall of Fame inductee Rick Steiner. Unfortunately, when the two finally did share space, Steiner unleashed a transphobic tirade on Shaw that left her and those around offended and uncomfortable.
In the wake of the incident, Shaw released a statement detailing her recollection of the events that played out. Steiner reportedly met with several who were around and apologized, but Shaw declined his invitation for a conversation. When pressed to apologize publicly by WrestleCon, Steiner refused. Following his refusal, WrestleCon released a revised code of conduct for those attending their events.
On the Cultaholic podcast, Shaw gave her first recorded statement about what transpired and the aftermath.
“It is very unfortunate that that incident happened,” she began. “There are certain people that I watched growing up and looked up to, and it’s just unfortunate that did happen. I don’t know what the motive was, but all I can say is that I am just so grateful for the people that have supported me and have been there when I went through that because that was really, really rough for me.
“Personally, I didn’t want to get out of bed because of what happened, and there’s been so many people that just supported me and pretty much just said, ‘Hey, no, you’re not, you’re not sleeping, and you need to get out.’ And I’m just, things like that happen. Unfortunately, still, we’ve come so far as a community to be better, but I feel like there’s still so much more work to do. So, all you got to do is keep pushing forward and make sure that, as a wrestling community, that we support each other.”
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