Reading Owen Good’s (excellent!) short article on the difficulties presented in bringing pro wrestling to the game console (The Spectacle Of Pro Wrestling, Played With A Straight Face), I came across this little gem:

“Calling pro wrestling ‘fake’ is neither accurate nor informed. The term is ‘kayfabe.’

Kayfabe isn’t a euphemism for false. Kayfabe is specific to pro wrestling, and it means everyone – athletes and fans – getting the story straight without saying so. It’s a conspired narrative that you can’t acknowledge is unreal, like a hilarious family secret whose official version changes when your drunk uncle shows up sober.”

I’d never encountered this term before, but I can’t help but feel there is a lot to consider here: Immersive, collective, self-consciously pretensive agon, at once methetic and kathartic. I’d say it out-Antigones Antigone. Deeply interesting. (Wikipedia, predictably, is useful, but the OED is clearly immune to the considerable charms of Rowdy Roddy Piper et al.)