Wipe out aristocracy now kill, kill, kill, kill, kill
Today we're going to talk about something that really has been upsetting me for some time now. I warn you - whenever I go on a tirade about something, I start to sound ridiculous, but I've got PMS and I'm upset and the root of this is VERY serious.
With the latest Manics album release, I've become a bit ... what's the word? ... turned off to anything associated with them. I don't profess to like anything of theirs before Everything Must Go (yes the weenie album) except for the song that sounds like the theme from Mash. And that's just because it's clever that anyone would sing over the theme from Mash. If Weird Al did it, I'd be more than thrilled. And I guess a couple of the singles I've heard from the new album are nice too.
But then there's the rest of the stuff that embodies everything the fans see about the Manic Street Preachers. The rebelliousness, disgust, faux glam (well, real glam I guess because all glam is "faux"), pretentiousness ... everything like that I *despise*. And I don't know if it has to do with the new album that is out and the tour that they're about to embark on, or if it's just that Manics fans are gaining more access to HTML, but there are an awful lot of Manics fan sites out there that really bug the shit out of me.
I've run into a couple of them. Full of manifestoes about how manics fans might be more depressed than most people, but they're more intelligent and they see the injustices in life. And they all go on to worship Richey.
And they're all like "leave Richey alone!" but go on to showcase portraits of him in his most "glorious" (their interpretation, not mine) moments where he is covered in blood, etc.
Hypocrites. All of them. "Don't exploit our Richey!!" You fools, don't you see you're doing the same thing? He was never YOUR Richey. Let the man alone. He was no role model. He had horrible demons that drove him to run away from his life, and that's nothing to be proud of. It's scary that he drove himself to do things to his body that people look at and say "I admire him for doing that." What he did was nothing to admire. It was something to help him for.
It's punk to rip your shirt up. It's not punk to rip your arm up.
I know people who have had handfuls of their friends die from drug overdoses, and they're very hardened by the experience and cannot understand how all of their closest friends were all afflicted by the same thing. Very sad. But what do you do when two people you care very much about start to delve into self-mutilation? Some people say it's "natural". No. It's not a natural thing. There's something wrong. I found a quote on a Manics site, where after glorifying the habit of self-mutilation, said
to me, richey represents purity. richey was honest. richey told the truth. and boy, didn't he get locked up in a mental hospital for it??!?!?!?!
"it's my body and i can do whatever i want with it." -richey edwards
What a load of selfish bullshit. A complete load of it. It may have been Richey's body, but you know what, he slashed himself up to the point of gore, and then people glorified it. Took pictures of it. Looked at it as some sort of achievement. And then he pulled a "woe is me, I just think life is down and there's no point, so let me take my pain out on myself to save me from tearing down those around me."
At least when Graham Coxon pulls the woe is me attitude, he gets drunk and bangs his head on the street, just acting like a heel. I respect that far more than I will ever respect someone who won't cope with their issues, or won't find a shoulder to lean on. You have ONE body in this life, and you better take care of it. It's retarted to use it as some sort of billboard to cry for help. If you don't feel well, TALK to someone. Don't let things get out of hand, or you'll never get out of it.
And for me, myself, I have to cope with the fact that a friend and my brother can't come to me for advice, and instead lock themselves up with a knife or razor and won't stop until they're in some sort of frenzied mess. I have demons I have to face too, you know. It's not fair that I am stuck staring at your wounds when you're done with slashing yourself up, smiling away, talking like everything is fine. It's NOT. It hurts.
. . . . .
So Manics fans, go to your little convention where you all feel alienated but look and act exactly like one another, talk about what a hero Richey was, and trade singles. Hope you have fun! I accuse delusional manics fans, I accuse. /irony
I've tried to understand the reasoning behind this sort of behavior, but I'm not going to anymore. I'm a very sympathetic person, but there comes a time when enough is enough. Glorification of harming one's body is stupid. It's put up by selfish people who have no grasp of reality, and once reality hits it may be too late. Go on, be 15 years old and think Richey is "cool" but once you step out in the real world, honey, you've got another thing coming to you.
I sound like a brut. But I'm tired of this coming up to haunt my close loved ones and I wish there was something I could do, but I can't. They have to. If I could do it for them I would, and I'd sacrifice anything for a chance to. But it's not up to me. It's their issue.
Secret Shame - A good website to help you understand this problem.