Kayfabe

In the world of professional wrestling (a form of “sports entertainment” in which all the matches have a fixed outcome) kayfabe is a nebulous term which loosely refers to the scripted nature of the event. Since professional wrestling is more about promoting captivating spectacles than it is real sportsmanship, a suspension of disbelief is necessary on the part of the audience to immerse themselves in the narrative - much like if one were watching a fictional movie or playing a video game. Wrestlers will oftentimes stay in-character outside the ring, in order to aid this suspension of disbelief.

Kayfabe is analogous to the fourth wall. A professional wrestler who breaks character might be referred to as “breaking kayfabe”, in the same way an actor breaking character on-screen would be “breaking the fourth wall.” Kayfabe is also used as a code word or safe word, when discussing the logistics of this fake reality around outsiders.

Since the rise of the internet, the term kayfabe has found a new lease on life. On social media, it is now a regular thing for professional internet stuntmen engage in scripted fights to increase engagement, though there are other applications for digital kayfabe as well.

Pictured: Two-time world wrestling champion Kay Fabian.

The term kayfabe is alleged to descend from Carny culture: Travelling carnival workers who needed to let family members know they arrived safely in the next town, would give the name “Kay Fabe” to collect-call operators. Upon receipt of the call, the family member would get the name (and the coded message it represented) and then decline the call, as a form of free long-distance communication.

The true origin of the term however, is disputed. Some say it is a form of pig latin for a now-forgotten original phrase. Others claim there was an actual legendary wrestler named “Kay Fabian.” Nobody is really sure, which is ironically very fitting for a term that refers to the mysteries behind the fourth wall.

From Wikipedia:

Another theory suggests that the term derives from the expression “keep cavey”, from the Latin verb caveo, which means “look out for”; this phrase was used throughout Britain and by Jews living in East London between World War I and World War II. According to that theory, many US promoters and wrestlers at that time were of Eastern European origin and many had heavy accents, leading to the term being transformed into “kayfabe”.