The latest episode of VICE TV’s Dark Side of the Ring covered the infamous “Plane Ride From Hell” involving WWE Superstars flying home from a European Tour in 2002. During the episode, a flight attendant who worked that flight accused Ric Flair of sexually harassing her after he allegedly stripped naked and began parading around the plane before cornering her. But while fans were furious with “The Nature Boy” over these allegations, many were just as mad at Tommy Dreamer for the statements he made throughout the episode.ย
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“Ric Flair is not going to try to impose by force any sexual stuff onto anybody,” Dreamer said, defending Flair. “He’s just flaunting, stylin and profilin and [doing the] Ric Flair stuff where everybody’s going to laugh about it, but obviously somebody took offense to it.”
He later criticized the flight attendant’s decision to have her lawsuit against WWE settled out of court, saying, “if that’s how she felt, maybe she should have not taken a payout and went to the fullest extent of the law to then truly put this heinous person in jail.”
Over the weekend Impact Wrestling, where Dreamer works both in the ring and behind the scenes, released a statement and confirmed that Dreamer had been suspended indefinitely for his comments.ย
“We are aware of Mr Laughlin’s (Tommy Dreamer) comments on ‘Dark Side of the Ring.’ The views expressed by him in the interview are completely unacceptable. We can confirm Mr Laughlin was suspended this morning with immediate effect, pending further action.”
Dreamer remained silent on social media following the backlash, but returned to Twitter on Sunday with a statement apologizing for what he had said.ย
“Regarding my comments made on Dark Side of the Ring, It was never my intention to offend, hurt or victim shame anyone. I understand my comments were insensitive and could trigger emotions in someone’s own personal past. I do not condone sexual misconduct of any kind. I apologize to anyone I offended. From the bottom of my heart, I am so sorry.”
As for Flair, his ad campaign with CarShield has been put on hold. The company released a statement to PWInsider that read, “We take these matters very seriously. As of right now, we are pausing the campaign and we will do our due diligence.”
