Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Bring On The Manson Bashers!
I was at work and gazed at one of the TV screens in the break area when I saw the news report about today’s school shooting in Cleveland Ohio.
Asa Coon, a 14-year old student at Successtech Academy, an alternative high school, opened fire on his classmates and wounded four of them, two students, and two teachers. He then shot and killed himself.
Luckily no one was killed so what happened here will most likely not resonate throughout the nation and around the world the same way what happened 8 years ago in Littleton Colorado did.
I do not wish to be insensitive. What happened in Cleveland is sad. Yet I find my head already starting to ache at how close we came to a repeat of what happened after Columbine.
In the AP news report on the Cleveland shooting, we have the following bit of info: “Witnesses said the shooter moved through the converted five-story downtown office building, working his way up through the first two floors of administrative offices to the third floor of classrooms. Officials said he was wearing a black Marilyn Manson concert shirt, black jeans and black-painted finger nails.”
Note that last sentence. A Marilyn Manson t-shirt, black jeans and black painted fingernails. Yes folks, time to sound the alarm. The Goths are back and there’s gonna be trouble.
Recall that after Columbine, everyone was looking for something or someone to blame. Some people correctly blamed Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. A few blamed the teen culture that fermented the state for these killings to take place in. Then there were the gun blamers. Then there were those who blamed the Goths and music, video games, movies etc.
One of the musical artists most commonly blamed was Marilyn Manson. Those who watched Michael Moore’s sort-of documentary Bowling For Columbine will recall the sequence where a series of clips of various politicians and pundits blaming Manson are aired back to back, followed by Moore’s interview with singer.
In the interview we had the following exchange:
Moore: If you were to talk directly to the kids at Columbine or the people in that community, what would you say to them if they were here right now?
Manson: I wouldn't say a single word to them, I would listen to what they have to say and that's what no one did.
As hard as it may be to believe, that was probably the most sensible and sane thing anyone said in the weeks after the Columbine tragedy.
So now we can wait until the Goth hunters and Manson bashers come out of the woodwork.
Recall that Charles Manson tried to claim that subliminal messages in the Beatles “White Album” inspired him to orchestrate his mass slaughter. Recall also that Mark David Chapman tried to claim that subliminal messages in Catcher in the Rye inspired him to kill John Lennon. Or that John Hinckley tried to blame the great movie Taxi Driver for his attempted assassination of former president Reagan.
Remember the Diablo video game that Adolph Hitler used to play? You know the one that inspired the holocaust. Didn’t Joseph Stalin and Tojo play it too? That must’ve been why they massacred all those people.
In fact, don’t violent music, movies and video games (as well as guns) go all the way back to the beginning of time? They must have since the world has always been a violent place. There’s gotta be more of an explanation for it than simply the fact that the world is “a violent place”.
So please people. This time, before we go berserk on the media for “Subversive, violent” content, let’s go after it for stupid content. Inane commercials like those Vytorin ones would be a good start. A few of those commercials and I’m ready to kill someone.
I was at work and gazed at one of the TV screens in the break area when I saw the news report about today’s school shooting in Cleveland Ohio.
Asa Coon, a 14-year old student at Successtech Academy, an alternative high school, opened fire on his classmates and wounded four of them, two students, and two teachers. He then shot and killed himself.
Luckily no one was killed so what happened here will most likely not resonate throughout the nation and around the world the same way what happened 8 years ago in Littleton Colorado did.
I do not wish to be insensitive. What happened in Cleveland is sad. Yet I find my head already starting to ache at how close we came to a repeat of what happened after Columbine.
In the AP news report on the Cleveland shooting, we have the following bit of info: “Witnesses said the shooter moved through the converted five-story downtown office building, working his way up through the first two floors of administrative offices to the third floor of classrooms. Officials said he was wearing a black Marilyn Manson concert shirt, black jeans and black-painted finger nails.”
Note that last sentence. A Marilyn Manson t-shirt, black jeans and black painted fingernails. Yes folks, time to sound the alarm. The Goths are back and there’s gonna be trouble.
Recall that after Columbine, everyone was looking for something or someone to blame. Some people correctly blamed Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. A few blamed the teen culture that fermented the state for these killings to take place in. Then there were the gun blamers. Then there were those who blamed the Goths and music, video games, movies etc.
One of the musical artists most commonly blamed was Marilyn Manson. Those who watched Michael Moore’s sort-of documentary Bowling For Columbine will recall the sequence where a series of clips of various politicians and pundits blaming Manson are aired back to back, followed by Moore’s interview with singer.
In the interview we had the following exchange:
Moore: If you were to talk directly to the kids at Columbine or the people in that community, what would you say to them if they were here right now?
Manson: I wouldn't say a single word to them, I would listen to what they have to say and that's what no one did.
As hard as it may be to believe, that was probably the most sensible and sane thing anyone said in the weeks after the Columbine tragedy.
So now we can wait until the Goth hunters and Manson bashers come out of the woodwork.
Recall that Charles Manson tried to claim that subliminal messages in the Beatles “White Album” inspired him to orchestrate his mass slaughter. Recall also that Mark David Chapman tried to claim that subliminal messages in Catcher in the Rye inspired him to kill John Lennon. Or that John Hinckley tried to blame the great movie Taxi Driver for his attempted assassination of former president Reagan.
Remember the Diablo video game that Adolph Hitler used to play? You know the one that inspired the holocaust. Didn’t Joseph Stalin and Tojo play it too? That must’ve been why they massacred all those people.
In fact, don’t violent music, movies and video games (as well as guns) go all the way back to the beginning of time? They must have since the world has always been a violent place. There’s gotta be more of an explanation for it than simply the fact that the world is “a violent place”.
So please people. This time, before we go berserk on the media for “Subversive, violent” content, let’s go after it for stupid content. Inane commercials like those Vytorin ones would be a good start. A few of those commercials and I’m ready to kill someone.
