Evan Rachel Wood, Marilyn Manson, #MeToo, and the Death of Heroes

 

ERW giving testimony at the Senate, advocating for
Sexual Assault Bill of Rights Acts in all 50 States. 

I’m not sure I’m ready to write this post.

 

I really wanted to start the year of this blog on a more positive note, with my latest birth story, for example, but that’s taking me forever to compose into something coherent. I’ve been writing this story in my head since I first heard Evan Rachel Wood’s story in 2018 when she testified in front of the Senate. Now, the headlines have exploded. She explicitly named her demon, and other women have come forward with their own stories. Ready or not, I think it’s time to voice my thoughts on this.

 

So. For those who aren’t in the know, a terribly kept secret in the music industry has officially been called out: Marilyn Manson’s horrific abuse of Evan Rachel Wood during their relationship over a decade ago. Her accusations include: Emotional abuse, manipulation and control, intimidation, physical violence, starvation, sleep deprivation, and stalking. Many of Manson’s statements in various interviews at the time these abuses occurred seem to corroborate her account of things. If you’re curious about the details, a quick Google search will get you there. I don’t think I have the strength to sum everything up myself.

 

Gods, where to start on this?

 

Well, how about with this: Despite the insinuation in this post’s title, Marilyn Manson has never been a “hero” of mine. He has nevertheless influenced my life in immeasurable ways. For years, I’ve called Marilyn Manson my “Granddaddy Goth.” He is a progenitor of the dark and beautiful subculture that I hold so dear. Manson’s music, his style, his aesthetic, shaped so much of what the massive umbrella term that is Goth looks like, sounds like, is. Without his influence, I can’t even imagine what the subculture would be.

 

My personal history with Marilyn Manson and his music is as follows: I like his music. I love some songs. I love his aesthetic, especially earlier in his career. That’s it. I never thought to read any interviews of his, never felt the desire to pick up his autobiography, never even watched a Behind the Music-type documentary. I just enjoyed his music, his appearance, and basked in the subculture he helped shape.

 

Now, I wish I would have paid better attention.

 

When I first heard Evan Rachel Wood’s testimony, which detailed the abuse she endured, I shut down a little. Some of the things she had said hit too close to home. Specifically, the incident to which she alludes and that Manson actually described was almost exactly like an experience I endured in an abusive relationship. At one point, Wood gathered her strength and left Manson. He harassed her—according to him, he called her 158 times in one day and cut himself every single time he called: "I wanted to show her the pain she put me through," Manson said. "It was like, 'I want you to physically see what you've done.'"  Wood summed up the incident, and probably many more, by saying in her Senate testimony that her abuser would threaten to commit suicide when she tried to leave. I would have believed her anyway—there is no sound reason to doubt Evan Rachel Wood—but if I had wanted to doubt her, I couldn’t after that.

“You made me do this.”

 

Like many people, after Wood named Manson as her abuser for the first-time last week, I did a postmortem of his career. With only a passing knowledge of Manson’s legacy, it didn’t take long for me to start feeling sick. Manson’s “shock rock” antics—railing against Christianity, wiping his ass with the American flag, etc—never bothered me and still don’t. But in the realms of casual misogyny and violence against women?* It’s everywhere. Blatant and brutal. Yes, he’s a “shock rocker.” But there’s nothing norm-shattering about misogyny and violence against women. Unfortunately, it is the norm. And though his press reps insist that every interview where he talked about emotionally abusing and manipulating his exes, stalking them, or having violent fantasies about murdering them, were just “obviously a theatrical rock star interview promoting a new record” or something like it.

 

On to my feelings about this. In short,

 

1. I believe Evan Rachel Wood. Of course I believe Evan Rachel Wood. She has nothing to gain and everything to lose by speaking out. And for a few quick retorts to the usual bullshit:

-She’s just doing it for attention!

            Why? She’s an award-winning actress currently starring in one of the best dramas on television. Marilyn Manson’s career has been in decline for over a decade. What, exactly, does she need the “attention”—which is pretty much just the vitriol of a few thousand aging goths and misogynists—for?

-Why now, so long after it all “allegedly” happened?

            Trauma can take a very long time to process. Wood herself said it took her years before she could even call the abuse what it was. Wood’s career has only recently become powerful enough to withstand the inevitable attacks she will receive for coming forward. The general public has only very, very recently shown itself to be willing to listen to women who have been abused by powerful men (#MeToo movement.)

-Why is she even bothering stirring all this up?

            As evidenced by the multiple women also coming out against Manson, he has continued to abuse women without consequence. Calling him—and the industry that enabled him—out is often the only way to prevent him from preying on more women, the only way for him to face consequences so long after the statute of limitations has expired, and, hopefully, to show a greedy and sociopathic industry that enabling abusers is now bad for business.

            -Why play this out in public instead of in the courts?

            The statute of limitations for Wood’s case expired long ago. Also, the courts have proven a thousand times to be hostile to victims of domestic violence.

 

2. I believe the other women who are now coming forward.

 

3. I believe Marilyn Manson being dropped from his label is 100% justified and not nearly enough consequence.

 

4. I still don’t fully know what I’m going to do about my current affiliation with him.

 

            That last part may seem incongruent with the rest of my feelings on the subject. If I believe Manson is a horrific abuser, one too painfully reminiscent of my own experiences; a misogynistic predator whose platform continues to enable his abuse, why on earth would I want his art anywhere near my life?

 

            That’s an excellent question to which there seems to be an easy answer.

 

            But…

 

            Let me first say this: Marilyn Manson will receive no more royalties from me. That much I know I can do, hard as it is. And yes, currently in my life, it’s hard. My daughter, M, adores watching music videos on YouTube, and Manson’s The Beautiful People and Personal Jesus are two of her favorites. More than a few of Manson’s songs feature on our Alexa playlist for the baby bats. Luckily, her attention span is short and she isn’t likely to notice their absence for long.

            What I’m not sure about is pulling away entirely from Manson’s music and aesthetic completely.

            The #MeToo movement, and the rise of so-called “Cancel Culture” has forced many of us to reexamine our personal relationships with a toxic artist’s work. JK Rowling’s recent public declaration of TERFery has broken the hearts of countless trans, nonbinary, and ally friends of mine, and put them in moral conflict with their lifelong affiliation with Harry Potter. Harry Potter was a world-shifting phenomenon for people my age. So many people, especially those in the LGBTQIA family, found comfort and even shaped their identity within the series’ pages. To disaffiliate from Harry Potter would be like cutting out a piece of themselves. And yet continuing to consume Harry Potter actively enables JK Rowling’s now openly, loudly transphobic platform to reach literally millions of people. My Harry Potter-loving friends can stop buying merch, stop streaming the films, stop going to the park at Universal, thus ending direct support to JK Rowling, but for many, the moral conundrum remains: What does it mean for us to continue to love and otherwise (just not financially) continue to celebrate a piece of art whose artist is dangerous, toxic, or otherwise “problematic?”

            Ladies and gentlemen, the aesthetic paragraph break.

            There is no easy answer to this. For me, personally, I remember how my heart swelled when M first danced her little toddler dance to The Beautiful People, when she broke into a huge grin seeing Manson’s painted face and twisted aesthetic. It deepened my sense of kinship with my child. For right now, she loves the sound, the aesthetic, that has called to her Mama all her life. She’s like me. Granted, she’s a toddler, who knows what she’ll end up liking, but still. There’s a sense of pride there I can’t deny. For right now, I have a fellow darkling who dissolves into screaming laughter when I goth-stomp around the living room to Marilyn Manson.

            My spawn aside, how does one truly turn their back on the art that shaped them? Manson will always be a cornerstone of my beloved subculture as the brutally racist Lovecraft is a cornerstone of modern horror. There is no way to cut off that limb.

            Right now, here’s how I’m emotionally handling it: When I see the man today, I see Brian Hugh Warner; the 52-year-old bloated carcass still slathered in the old makeup as if he’d skinned his past successful self and is wearing the hide like a mask, a bad disguise. When I hear Wood and his other victims’ stories, I see that worn out, washed-up has been preying on them. In this way, my mind has cut the glowing legacy of Marilyn Manson from the taint of abuse.

But it’s a lie.

I just don’t know what else to do right now. Right now, I don’t see his victims when I hear his music. I see my young bouncing between rock stations on the radio (ah yes, I am indeed an Elder Millennial,) and letting out an excited cry when I hear the intro to Tainted Love. I see the younger versions of too many dear friends using Manson’s music and aesthetic to begin to break away from authoritarian parents and their stifling religion. I see my old haunt, the iNation, where I felt a joy like no other amidst the flashing lights and swaying bodies, the bass booming like a second heartbeat.

 

I don’t know if this will ever change for me. I don’t know if my glowing nostalgia will warp into visions of blood and pain and fear, into the horrific accounts given by Evan Rachel Wood and her fellow survivors. I don’t know if I’ll hear a Marilyn Manson song one day and see my own trauma. Maybe one day I won’t be able to separate the art from the artist. It’s happened in other cases like this, and it hasn’t happened in others.

I don’t want to shrug this off, nor do I want to pass judgment on how one “should” react when an artist they love reveals themselves to be monstrous. I don’t think there’s an easy answer here. No matter what we decide, it hurts.

In conclusion, toxic artists suck, but I hope you out there on social media give the people around you, and yourselves, time to process things when an artist’s toxicity is revealed. In an ideal world, we’d all be able to hop right onto our moral high horse and strike down any and all affiliation with an artist, regardless of how much their work means to us. Unfortunately, our brains aren’t so black and white. So long as no one is attacking the survivors who are speaking out, be gentle with each other. Give each other time. Unfortunately, a celebrity actually paying for their shitty behavior is a new concept. It’s going to take time for everyone to figure out how they handle it.

 

 

 

*I’m also disgusted by his anti-Semitism and Nazi fetishization, but that is tangential to this post. But yeah. The fuck.