The Many Sacrifices of Saint Cassandro
Eric Shorey discusses the legacy of Cassandro El Exótico in this essay originally published in the Cassandro Cup Zine.
“The Many Sacrifices of Saint Cassandro” was originally published in the Cassandro Cup Zine. Proceeds from the zine were donated to G.L.I.T.S., an organization dedicated to providing healthcare and housing for LGBTQIA+ individuals. If you enjoy this essay please consider making a donation.
Suffering is the affective experience around which pro-wrestling is organized. Careers are measured by the pain each athlete endures, and martyrs are made of those who die in the ring. In fact, the ability to “sell” for your opponent — to create an illusion of pain so as to convey the realism of the fight — is an underappreciated performance skill necessary for the functioning of a pro-wrestling match. Suffering and sacrifice: those who give of themselves — those whose pain can be transmogrified into heroism through their journey in the ring — are the saints of pro-wrestling.
That being said, there are certain kinds of suffering that are disavowed by wrestling: abuses suffered in training and beyond are often summarily ignored, as was exposed by the Speaking Out movement in 2020. The suffering created by systemic racial or gender-based discrimination is often scotomized by audiences and industry insiders who bizarrely demand an “apolitical” aesthetic from the medium — this is the “keep politics out of entertainment” crowd, who never seems to quiet down. The suffering created by poverty and long-term physical and mental strain in the business is spoken about in secret out of fear of an industry-wide collapse should these issues be adequately addressed.
For this current rising generation of talent in the pro-wrestling industry, the kinds of suffering that was disacknowledged for so long has now taken center stage through unapologetically activist attempts at addressing the industry’s various ills. This new crop of talent certainly did not face the kinds of rampant backstage hate and violence that existed only a few decades ago, and they’re fighting to make sure the children that come after them will not encounter the barriers that hindered their successes. This sort of generational struggle — like so many things in pro-wrestling — is reflective of the political situation in the United States and beyond.
LGBTQ+ people in the pro-wrestling industry, especially non-white members of this community, exist on various axes of political marginalization that expose them to the kinds of suffering that wrestling does not reward. Now, for the first time in history, it is possible for performers to be out and proud — more opportunities exist for LGBTQ+ people in pro-wrestling than ever have before. But the sacrifices and suffering endured by the athletes who came before them were often too great to bear and sometimes resulted in suicide. We never even learned the names of many others who were forced to stay in the closet due to fear.
Cassandro El Exótico is one of the few LGBTQ+ icons who has lived to tell the tale of life as an openly gay athlete before this current moment of consciousness raising. The tales Cassandro tells are stories of immense suffering, and it is through Cassandro’s pious sacrifices that LGBTQ+ athletes can even be considered as serious competitors in a contemporary setting: “There’s been exóticos or gay people since the 1940s in wrestling, but they were like the clowns of the circus. They were there to make people laugh. And what I’ve done in over 26 years is dignify us,” he has said.
“I was stabbed by wrestlers,” Cassandro told me in a 2019 interview. “I was beat up by wrestlers. I was pushed around by wrestlers. I got spit on my face by wrestlers. I got beat up pretty bad. That was just part of my process. I would defend myself, but when two or three get together against you—that’s hard enough.”
It was hard enough for Cassandro to survive as a comedy act who flouted his colorful sexuality in the form of flirtatious kisses and a gorgeous painted face for decades before he was considered a “serious” athlete. The magic of Cassandro was that — in some kind of divine wrestling transubstantiation — he needed not give up his effete gestures or stunning sequined costumes in order to be considered legitimate. His skill and talent shined through — and in a moment of instantaneous resurrection, Cassandro made an impact on the entire wrestling cosmos: “I changed [pro-wrestling] on January 28th of 1991, when I got the opportunity to wrestle for the World Title against El Hijo del Santo. That was my biggest moment. It was very hard for me to take that match. I had everybody against me. But once I finished that match, I knew I had changed the culture and how everyone thought about the exóticos.”
It’s hard to imagine the miracle this bout represented: before it, considering an exótico (or any other kind of openly queer athlete) as more than a silly sideshow was basically an impossibility. After, it was obvious that Cassandro’s talent — or the talent of any LGBTQ+ athlete — couldn’t be dismissed because of who they loved or how they looked.
In Marie Losier’s 2018 documentary Cassandro, The Exótico!, we see Cassandro battling both addiction and his own aching body to continue his path as a living martyr, yet proudly he still declares “I Will Survive!” with every match he fights. The sacrifice continues.
The inaugural Cassandro Cup was created by Billy Dixon not only as a showcase of rising talent, but in honor of our patron saint, whose body was brutalized in the service of a better future. It is a demonstration of the ways queer people are best when they are unapologetically and fully themselves: both beautiful and strong. It is a testament to the sacrifices of Cassandro, and others whose lives and names have been lost — who destroyed their bodies in order for us to have opportunities that couldn’t have existed without them. It is representative of an ongoing struggle towards a liberated future, when these kinds of painful offerings won’t need to be made anymore.
It’s fitting that The Cassandro Cup concludes with a quote from the LGBTQ+ community’s greatest icon, whose life, filled with both suffering and joy, resulted in an ultimate sacrifice: “No pride for some of us without liberation for all of us,” said Marsha P. Johnson.
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