Violence

It's come to a sad point in my life, where I look back on what atrocities have been committed in the name of things I stand for. Back when I was a freshman, one could associate me with the gothic subculture, although I was a self proclaimed metalhead. People like me always got a bad rep, because we were outcasts of a society that shunned anything it deemed too dark. However in 1999, when I was six years old, the person I would later become became a scapegoat for cold blooded murder. The Columbine Massacre, in which 13 people were killed. Gothic subculture became the reason, Marilyn Manson became the devil, and the world went on a witch hunt. And during my time as a member of this hated group, I felt something strange. Like who I was was evil. Like I was dark and weird, and alienated, because the media said I was.

Me circa 2007.

However, as I grew into different tastes and got out of the group, I felt even more like this type of alienation wasn't fair. Isn't fair. My friends who continued to listen to heavy music were sometimes labeled as misfits, or violent prone, due exclusively to their dressing styles. Sometimes while kids where boots and chain pants, you can hear kids whisper "When is he gonna shoot up a school?" But nothing could be farther from the truth. Half the time gothic kids are some of the nicest kids you'll meet, and treat eachother like family. So why the stereotyping?

The reason is media insanity. They need someone to blame for tragedy, right? Why not the band with the androgynous howling creature as a vocalist? (Although credit to Marilyn Manson for an essay he wrote on the matter, http://www.antilife.org/files/marilyn.html ) He seems too weird to fit in, and thus must be violent! Must hate America! Must want kids to kill eachother!

The "face of evil."

Anyone with a brain can see Manson is a parody of darkness in our society, a ridiculous over the top show of emotion. But not the mainstream media, they saw a monster, a creature, someone who hated everything they stood for.

I urge you to think before you blame.
Think about all the kids who died that day, or on any future tragic event.
Think about the shooters.
Remember, they're the only ones to blame.

When you begin to blame anyone else but the people responsible, you put power into the hands of the individual. It gets to a point where someone can murder a person, and when the cops arrive, tell him TV made him do it, and suddenly, he's a victim of television's evils!

Take the blame from the alternative, and put it into who's really to blame.