After seeing the tragic George Floyd incident and the heartbreaking wave of videos to follow, AJ Kirsch felt compelled to help a cause that he and so many white Americans weren’t as socially aware of until people saw all the injustice unfold with their own two eyes.
In an exclusive interview with Dominic DeAngelo of WrestleZone, one half of MLW’s commentary team took the time to speak about what inspired him to create a pro wrestling tee design that bridged the gap between a genre we all love and the powerful Black Lives Matter movement. 100% of the proceeds of any BLM-themed tee sold on AJ’s store will go directly to support Black Lives Matter, forever and always.
“It was the type of thing that nobody can turn away from it anymore and the phrase that I kind of keep going to is like ‘It’s not okay anymore,’ but even the ‘anymore’ kind of speaks to my privilege because it’s really never been okay, but me as a white man it’s now at a point where I see just, it’s never been more clear to me the mistreatment of black people in America, and so again it’s like this is not okay anymore in a sense that me as a white man I felt like it was time for me to actually do something about it, but again, this has never been okay and America has been under this illusion of Life liberty and the pursuit of happiness and all men are created equal and really since the inception of this country, it’s never really been that way and that’s the injustice, that’s the injustice. That’s why Black Lives Matter is almost on the tip of everybody’s tongue nowadays and I just feel like that’s wrong. Everybody should be treated equall. You should not be judged on the color of your skin or your gender identity or your sexual preferences or anything else and America, I think Will Smith actually had the quote that ‘Racism isn’t getting worse, it’s just getting filmed’ and I’m all of sudden far more educated and far more aware of what black people have had to deal with ever since they were kidnapped and brought to this country and I wanted to do something about it.”
“I wanted to come up with a shirt that wrestling fans can look at and just be like, ‘Oh I see what he’s doing here’ like it’s almost like a little wink and a nod to your fellow wrestling fans, but also something to support Black Lives Matter,” AJ added and said Pro Wrestling Tees went all in with their efforts in supporting the movement as well.
?LAST CHANCE FOR 20% OFF?
20% off everything at my @PWTees store ends TODAY at 10amPT!
Use checkout code AMERICA to get 20% off everything, including the #BlackLivesMatter shirts.
??100% of the proceeds from the BLM shirts go to @Blklivesmatter ??https://t.co/kqRdSkSXZp pic.twitter.com/WD1mndTNLN
— A.J. Kirsch (@AJKirsch) July 4, 2020
“Pro Wrestling Tees was also kind enough to agree that 100% of the proceeds go to Black Lives Matter so it’s not just me getting my cut, they actually sent me my cut and they would have received for all the sales so in the month of June alone I raised $5,252.23 that all of which was donated to Black Lives Matter.”
“It feels good to be able to contribute to a cause that I believe in, a cause that’s really about equality and justice.”
“It’s a level playing field. I think the whole point is just asking for (and a little bit louder this time because they haven’t gotten it yet), but it’s asking for equal rights, equal treatment and just be treated like human beings and the fact that that’s even a dispute nowadays in 2020 it just blows me away that this is even just an issue right now.”
(Transcription credit should go to @DominicDeAngelo of WrestleZone)
As of this writing, you can still scoop up your Black Lives F’n Matter tee for a discounted price at PWTees by using the code AMERICA at checkout to get 20% off.
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