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Bret Hart was a guest on the TSN Periscope account recently for a lengthy Q&A with fans and, of course, Hulk Hogan and his recent racist comments were immediately brought up. While saying he's not a fan of the man himself, "The Hitman" does say he feels a little bad about the situation because he doesn't remember the Hulkster being a racist:
"Let's hope not. Let's hope that he lives with himself in Tampa and stays there in his little world of idol worship of himself. I'm not a big Hulk Hogan fan. I kinda feel bad for him because I don't remember him necessarily being a racist."
That said, he does reveal that the N-word was used frequently in locker rooms he was in:
"I can say that, through my experience, that a vast majority, of course not all of them, but a vast majority of the white, Southern wrestlers tend to be a little bit racial all the time, and the N-word was frequently used by a lot of wrestlers in the dressing room when there was a black guy not around, kinda thing. And being a Canadian, I found that really difficult, I didn't see eye-to-eye with that kind of stuff and never felt like that, and I've never been in that kind of mindset, but for Hulk Hogan to make the comments that he made that is something if you had a camera like that in most of the dressing rooms with a lot of the Southern wrestlers from Florida, Tennessee, Mississippi, even Texas, you get a lot of that kind of slant on things. And I'm kinda glad he got busted for that reason, that times have changed, and y'know, you have to answer for that stuff, and he's answering for it. He's probably glad that Roddy Piper passed away, because he took all the edge off all that."
That's as unfortunate as it is unsurprising, but like Hart says, that Hogan is being made to answer for it is at least a step in the right direction because that's what is going to help affect some positive change. And while WWE still has its issues with racism, we can only hope said positive change can reach the locker rooms that it needs to.
But, even while he feels bad and is glad for how things have been handled, Hart made clear how he feels about Hogan late in the Q&A when asked if he likes Hulk:
"No, I don't. I think he's a phony piece of shit."
Never change, Hitman.
HT: Uproxx