I genuinely believe wrestling fans are bigger marks today than they were during the carnival days. Literally all any company has to do is present something as a "shoot" and the marks eat it up genuinely buying into it as real when 99% of every single aspect of professional wrestling is a work. It's even easier with social media now because "Oh they threw shade on twitter! They must have legitimate heat!"
It's actually kind of sad that people can still be worked so easily