John Cena made a monumental statement this week when the 16-time WWE Champion announced he was joining the K-Pop group BTS and their fans, the BTS Army in supporting the Black Lives Matter Movement. The music group originally announced that they were donating one million dollars to the organization, and asked their fans if they could match that total via a fundraiser. Within days that amount was met, and Cena opted to give another million of his own money to the cause.
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Cena announced his donation via Twitter on Monday
Very happy to join #BTSARMY in efforts to match @BTS_twt tremendous donation #ARMYMatch1M
— John Cena (@JohnCena) June 8, 2020
The donation comes just a few weeks after Cena reportedly donated $40,000 to the family of deceased former WWE Superstar Shad Gaspard, who died tragically last month after he and his son were pulled out into open waters at Venice Beach via a riptide. While the donation was left anonymous, Gaspard’s tag partner JTG (as well as many fans) think the donation points to Cena.
“I don’t know. I can’t 100 percent confirm, but I’m 99.9% percent sure,” JTG said “There was a donation for $40,000. The person they said donated the money was ‘CTC RIP,’ and CTC was a faction between Cryme Time and John Cena in 2008. That was the most fun I’ve ever had in the WWE was teaming with John Cena because I learned so much,” JTG said in an interview with Lilian Garcia.
During that same interview he described what it was liked working alongside Cena on Raw in 2008.
“Shad and I were doing rookie mistakes every night. We had no clue and then teaming with him and making little, small change,” he said. “I remember, for example, there was something that I would do before I start the match. I would go to the crowd. I would lean over and say, ‘let’s get this started. Let’s get it poppin,’ just to get a reaction. John tapped me on the shoulder and said, ‘don’t ever do that again. Don’t do that tomorrow,’ and I’m like OK? And then he explained to me why. You don’t need them to validate you in the beginning. You don’t go to them for validation. You let them validate you, just be you.”
Over the last week Cena has released a number of tweets indicating he stands with the protesters across the country rallying against police brutality and the murder of George Floyd.
Change is always possible. A major catalyst to change is facing uncomfortable truths, leaning into them and realizing that tremendous effort is needed on a consistent and dedicated basis with the goal of improvement.
— John Cena (@JohnCena) June 3, 2020
