Scapegoat? Or serious problem?
It seems as though a recent tragedy in Britain has begun a new round of music-scene scapegoating.
You know, normally I’d roll my eyes and say the media just wants someone to blame. There are parts of this article I have serious issue with (MCR a “suicide cult” band?!) but the overall concern with the emo scene glorifying self-harm and depressive behavior is something to think about. In the same vein, way back after the Columbine shooting there were words being tossed around about Marilyn Manson’s influence on the perpetrators, along with other incidents where heavy metal and other “alternative” genres were blamed for influencing violent behavior. On the surface, it makes sense that we should worry about listening to lyrics that glamorize and poeticize violence and death. It might easily convince the listener of the truth of its message. But there are two points going beyond this that I’d like to address.
First: blaming a scene or a genre of music, videogames, movies, etc. removes a great deal of responsibility from the perpetrator. It seems like yet another example of how today we never want to take any responsibility for the things we cause to happen in our own lives, so we try to blame whatever we can to avoid the hard fact that we were wrong. True, there are many influencing factors that can contribute to actions a person takes in his life, but ultimately it all comes down to individual choice. Each person is responsible for what he does to himself. This girl didn’t have to kill herself because she was emo. She didn’t even have to do that stupid “emo initiation” cutting thing; she could have chosen to listen to whatever music she felt like (including MCR) and worn whatever kind of clothes she felt like and not have to do herself harm in any way. Trust me, I know plenty of happy scene kids. I don’t know what drove the girl to kill herself, but that doesn’t make it any less her choice.
My second point is that for those who do subscribe to violent ideas in music, they have crossed an important line distinguishing fantasy and reality. Music is a performance art. That means that, like in other performance arts such as theatre (or even visual arts), sometimes ideas are expressed that do not reflect true intentions. Most people who watch Shakespeare’s Hamlet understand that the actor playing Hamlet isn’t actually insane, and doesn’t actually want to kill the actor playing Hamlet’s uncle. The same suspension of disbelief applies to music. Much of the time, lyrics are written for drama, not for reality. Think of all the artists who sing about breakups and haven’t actually had one occur anywhere around the time the song was written or recorded. Now, there are always exceptions- thinking of Nightwish’s “Master Passion Greed”, it is a hate-filled and somewhat violent song directed at a specific person after a traumatic event in which the songwriter felt that person was central. But even there, there is a line to be drawn. The songwriter used the song as a medium of drama, confrontation and emotional outburst, but he never carried it further than the lyrics. The violence ended there, as it does with most songs expressing similar sentiments. For listeners who carry it further, that is a reflection of their own poor judgment and skewed understanding, rather than the “evil” ways of the musician. I feel this is true because I see substantially more healthy people who happen to like music with themes of violence than I do people like the girl in this article (who, truth be told, was listening to comparably tame lyrics). As for emo itself, it’s disturbing that so many young people are unable to draw this important line to the point that self-harm has become a feature of the style, but once again I don’t think it’s the fault of the music so much as the individual.
So the ultimate point is, it’s not fair to hold a music genre responsible for individual acts of violence. We need to look beyond blaming outside parties and start taking a hard look at what really drives people to do terrible things. It’s internal, more often than not, and it’s irresponsible to go blame something else just so you don’t have to deal with that more difficult internal turmoil. It’s not fair to the musicians, it’s not fair to the mourning parents, and it’s not fair to troubled kids who need real help and real answers before they decide to ruin the lives of others or themselves.
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