Former WWE star Ahmed Johnson on racism and the casting couch

Inside The Ropes Radio with Ahmed Johnson
Show airs Thursday nights at 10:00 p.m.
Available at Facebook.com/theinsidenetwork

To clarify his recent racism allegations against the WWF: "To become the black champion in history there (WWF), it was so neat. But there was also a dull side to it, I lived in this fantasy land where I thought there was no more racism in the world, then I go out to my car and and someone had scratched ‘Congratulations N-----’ on my car. I didn’t know who did it, nobody would fess up to it. I never found out who did it but you know I thought about it for a while and I asked Vince the question.

"I asked him why did it take them until 1996 to decide that they’d have a black champion because there was so many great black wrestlers before me like Junkyard Dog and other people. Why didn’t he give them the opportunity to be a champion and wear the belt? He got very upset about me asking that question. So that ended up being the end of me in the WWF after that. I didn’t want anything to do with him. The word I got from the booker Vince Russo, he told me after this was over and all the smoke had cleared, that they would have meetings about this and Vince and other people said that the American audience wasn’t ready for a black champion which was bullshit. Every time we went to Germany, Kuwait, India, I was the number one draw over there when we went."

Thoughts on Former WWF Booker Pat Patterson: "Not so cool. He likes guys you know, I don’t have a problem with that, that’s cool. But when you start pushing guys based on who has the sexiest ass to you, I have a problem with that. I’m telling you this as a respect point, I’m gonna be honest, he was gay, there’s no secret about it. He did do some things that are unmentionable. He made certain wrestlers do certain things to get pushed in certain positions. That was his thing. He was a bully, a gay bully. The casting couch type thing but with males not females."