When WWE first started its "Divas Revolution" in 2015, it was the company's way of responding to the fans more serious storylines and longer matches for its women, then called "Divas." WWE Chief Brand Officer Stephanie McMahon was one of the biggest supporters of this movement in favor of the women in WWE.
In speaking to ESPN.com and advertising the sports news organization's new WWE page on its website, Stephanie spoke on the progress of women's wrestling within the company. She said that it began when the Twitter hashtag, #GiveDivasAChance, started trending in February 2015. Stephanie said that it was a wakeup call to management and that they needed to respond and give fans what they wanted: a legitimate women's division.
"I noticed it the second it started trending," Stephanie McMahon said. "We talked about it Tuesday night and Wednesday and it was brought to everyone's attention that this is still trending. It really was an 'aha moment' for some of us in the office and it was definitely the impetus for a much bigger movement. Our fans spoke out. It was a global trend that was so loud and so powerful. It was a cry for our female performers to be given longer match time and to be given more meaningful story lines and to have deeper character development. Our fans said with their voices very loud and clear that we want more from our female performers."
One of the things WWE did was rebrand the WWE Divas Championship to the WWE Women's championship as well as get rid of the term "Divas" when describing the female athletes inside the company. They also called up several NXT women's stars, including 3 of NXT's "Four Horsewomen" - Sasha Banks, Charlotte and Becky Lynch to the main roster. Stephanie McMahon said that there is more to come.
"We started slowly but surely featuring our female [talent] a little bit more prominently," Stephanie McMahon said. "All you had to do was look at what was happening in NXT with the 'Four Horsewomen' of Charlotte, Becky Lynch, Bayley and Sasha Banks and what they were doing and how they were elevating women's wrestling. It was to the point that the fans were chanting, 'This is wrestling!' and 'Women's wresting!' Our fans were saying so loudly and so clearly that this is what we want. This is amazing and we want more."
You can read the full interview here.
