[ No. 13 ]

Kill the music?

by Vicki Shuttleworth

No sooner have the organisers of the Big Day Out rescued Australia's most popular festival from limbo than they are faced with months of uncertainty about their headline act. Will the Reverend Fred Nile succeed in persuading Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock to ban Marilyn Manson from entering Australia?

Nile, leader of the Christian Democratic Party and the Festival of Light says that Manson is 'anti-family', 'anti-social' and his lyrics 'are evil'. Nothing new here, of course -- according to the criteria for a 'caring society' offered on the Christian Democrat's web site, most, if not all, of the bands playing the Big Day Out bill would qualify for that description. More to the point, Manson has faced the wrath of Christian leaders around the world many times before, with threats of concert bans or cancellations a regular feature of his tour reports.

Yet, the Reverend Fred Nile has a good chance of winning this one, not because of any issues of public morality but simply for reasons of political expediency. The crux of Nile's argument is that the Minister for Immigration has already set a precedent by denying a Visa entry to David Irving --- the British historian who not only says that the Jewish Holocaust didn't happen but that the Holocaust is a fabrication of the Jewish diaspora. According to Fred Nile, Marilyn Manson is far more dangerous than David Irving because of his alleged influence over 'impressionable' young people; his history of being blamed for fan suicides, and, Australia's dark secret -- the land of endless sunshine, optimism and the year 2000 Olympics has one of the highest youth suicide rates in the world.

Will Philip Ruddock -- a man with a track record of banning people with unpopular ideas -- be able to politically justify admitting Mr Manson and his 'cohorts'?

Certainly, Marilyn Manson and his music has been intermittently linked with a number of youth suicides, the most notorious case being in 1996 when 15 year old Richard Kuntz shot himself. His grieving father testified before a US Congressional hearing covering the issue of CDs and parental guidance. Ray Kuntz argued: 'It wasn't a symptom. The music wasn't symptomatic of other problems. I would say the music caused him to kill himself.' Manson defenders have meticulously researched this and other alleged Manson-inspired suicides. At every turn they point to more significant factors such as the recent suicide of a close school friend or a major family trauma. In the case of Kuntz, for example, the boy's parents had recently separated. During the two weeks prior to his suicide, Richard had locked himself away in his bedroom without any constructive intervention by either parent.

Marilyn Manson himself (aka Brian Warner) has consistently told the media and his fans that it is stupid and weak to kill yourself and even when others lose faith in you, you must believe in yourself. He told MTV: 'Obviously it upsets me that someone would think I would encourage that type of behaviour. I've always said that people who would harm themselves or others over music or film or books, they're just being ignorant . . . It's a wake up call for parents to teach their kids to interpret art with some sort of intelligence.'

While arguments that claim 'this is only art' or 'this is only rock n roll' are little too glib, there does seem to be a suspiciously long line of rock and punk artists who cop the blame for every imaginable social sin -- Sid Vicious, Metallica, Kiss and Alice Cooper to name but a few. Somehow the vast majority of their fans have managed to pass through 'impressionable youth' to sedate adulthood unscathed and probably now vote for Mr Ruddock. A few may even vote for the Reverend Fred Nile.

It seems that, irrespective of how well intentioned they may be, any group with a specific agenda and simple world view will nearly always come up with a specific and simple answer -- blame the singer, blame the song and if you can't do much about either, then slap a 'parent advisory' label on the CD. Rock stars are not the only ones in Fred Nile's line of fire. The Christian Democrats have some very specific ideas about what a 'caring' Australia should include and exclude. For example, one of their aims is 'To strengthen our relationships with those countries with which we share a common heritage and/or with those countries which demonstrate a commitment to freedom and the Judeo-Christian ethic as expressed in this charter.' In other words, not Asians, not Black Africans, not Muslims, not Buddhists and definitely not rock stars who avow 'individual preferences' -- something that the Christian Democrats also believe to be part of an 'experiment gone wrong'.