In the original version of a WWE WrestleMania promo for a match between Dominik Mysterio and father Rey Mysterio, wrestling fans spotted a photo of an Auschwitz concentration camp. The WWE called it an error, but the Auschwitz Memorial has its doubts.
“The fact that [an] Auschwitz image was used to promote a WWE match is hard to call ‘an editing mistake,’” the museum in Poland tweeted on Wednesday, sharing a freeze frame showing the Nazi concentration camp where more than a million people were killed during the Holocaust.
“Exploiting the site that became a symbol of enormous human tragedy is shameless and insults the memory of all victims of Auschwitz.”
The image appeared on screen as Dominik discussed getting arrested — in a staged WWE stunt — after an altercation with Rey in December. “You think this is a game to me,” Dominik says in the clip. “I served hard time. And I survived.”
The WWE later replaced the Auschwitz photo with a photo of barbed wire, and a spokesperson for the wrestling organization apologized in a statement to the Washington Post, saying the photo was used in error.
“We had no knowledge of what was depicted,” the WWE’s statement said. “As soon as we learned, it was removed immediately.”
Experts explained to the Washington Post that the original promo might have caused anguish for Holocaust survivors.
“Using imagery associated with the Holocaust for essentially what is kind of entertainment purposes can be seen as minimizing what happened and failing to recognize how horrific it was,” said University of Minnesota and Duluth history professor Natalie Belsky.
In another PR flap, the WWE filed and then abandoned a January 2022 trademark application for the name Gunther Stark, the name of a Nazi U-boat commander, as Sports Illustrated reported at the time. Instead of taking on that moniker, the wrestler formerly known as Walter now goes by the name Gunther.