As racist, woman-hating fantasy writer Vox Day (aka Theodore Beale) likes to remind people, he was kind of a big deal in the industrial dance music scene back in the day, with three Billboard Club Hits to his name.
Well, sort of. Beale — he wasn’t known as Vox back then — was briefly a member of a largely forgotten industrial dance group called Psykosonik in the early nineties.
Now, I was listening to a lot of industrial dance music back in those days, and was particularly enamored of the label (Wax Trax!) that Psykosonik was on. Yet somehow I never noticed them.
Listening to their first album today — the one that Beale was involved in — I can see why. Musically, they’re a peppy, if highly derivative, mix of industrial and rave, at times sounding a bit like the Shamen or Pop Will Eat Itself or even, unbelievably, EMF.
The trouble comes when the group’s vocalist opens his mouth to sing or, even worse, to rap some of the most cringeworthy lyrics I’ve encountered since I listened to this. The bassy “rapping” in their song “Acid Hammer” is on a par with the rapping in Aqua’s “Barbie Girl,” except that Aqua was in on the joke, and Psykosonik clearly wasn’t.
And that’s where Mr. Beale comes in, because a lot of these very very serious, very very terrible lyrics are his. Psykosonik seems to have been built largely around two guys — Paul Sebastien (vocals, lyrics, music) and Daniel Lenz (music). Beale, a member for only two years, is credited by Wikipedia as being responsible for “composition, lyrics.”
So let’s take a look at some of them, shall we? The lyrics below, which I found on Lyrics Wikia, are excerpted from songs he’s credited with co-writing; click on the titles to see more.
Fractals fusing, brain abusing
Drink your smart drug, find illusion
Ride the air on an angel’s dare
Mandlebrots fly everywhere
Illusion the solution
You will find your absolution
Within silicon, in silicon, in me
Mondo rave, magnetic wave
Cyberbaby, my love slave
Computational attractivity
New world networked connectivity
Down to the ground, down to the ground
Social entropy is reigning today
Burn it down, burn it down, burn it down, down to the ground
A generation’s coming your way
Feel your heart explode with lust
Vacationers, this one’s a must
If you choose to take this drug
You will feel your libido erupt ….If you choose to lick my brain
Use your tongue to taste the same
Feel the acid reign
Servitude is in the mind, a death in life
Don’t be confused by the terms of Left and Right
Statism is statism, by any name the same
Apathy is suicide and we will bear the blame …Huge berserk rebel warthog error
Zeroboys unleash domestic terror
Jack it in and burn the data
Violence a religion they can relate to
Now, it’s not completely clear from the scanty info I’ve found if Beale wrote all of these lyrics by himself — Wikipedia also lists Sebastien as being responsible for lyrics — but quite a few of them have the stink of Beale about them. I mean, “social entropy,” “statism is statism?”
Oh, and that bizarre bit about the “huge berserk rebel warthog?” That may be Beale’s only bit of cleverness. After puzzling over it a bit, and listening to that part of the song over and over to make sure that was really what was being said, I put the phrase into Google and discovered that it’s an anagram for George Herbert Walker Bush.
If you want to listen to any of these songs — and really, they’re not bad, if you can manage to ignore the awful lyrics — you can find the whole album here.
And here’s the video for their single “Welcome to My Mind,” which features Mr. Beale’s rotating head.
You … (whispering) … you mean you don’t?
They were no (first album by) Senser, I can see that much.
@Falconer
Of course, or else I wouldn’t be able to watch Flux Buddies or read Manly Men Doing Manly Things! Yaaaay!
I meant Manly Guys. I don’t know what the other would be.
Oh, is that what they said? (I only came back a few minutes ago and was looking at the last page of posts).
I wondered if I was being too uncivil, but I guess not.
I’ll admit I watched and enjoyed a few episodes of Top Gear when I was at my folks. I find it disappointing to find out that Jeremy Clarkson was actually a jerk instead of just being a purposeful caricature of one.
I wanted him to just be hamming it up.
But no…
Disappointment. He wasn’t doing a meta about awful people and how annoying they are. He was just being awful.
🙁
Also, the Top Gear fans with the death threats? I’m also disappointed in you, too.
Hello fellow Yoganaught!
Befriendswithmeplz?@Paradoxical Intention
Of course! Let’s go and make fun of how salty Lewis is in City Skylines! 😀
And give well wishes to poor Simon. I hope he’s doing okay.
N.P.S was right about one thing; because David is a man, he doesn’t get the sheer volume of invective that a woman would get saying the exact same things. That there makes me grateful for this blog because he’s using his privilege for something productive, i.e. documenting online misogyny. He does it so well that his blog is used as a source for other journalists and researchers.
I’ve seen too many female feminists get driven offline by avalances of rape and death threats and doxxing for doing a fraction of what David does. I’m sure David gets his share of gross and threatening emails, but let’s face it – it’s probably nowhere near what a woman would get.
So while N.P.S. is likely a troll, it’s important to take a minute and acknowlege how important it is for a male ally to stand up and call out anti-feminists. Also, the longevity of this blog should lend proof that he’s not just doing it for some weird feminist brownie points.
“because David is a man, he doesn’t get the sheer volume of invective that a woman would get saying the exact same things.”
Never considered that. In fact, after discovering some of the terminology like ‘white knight’ since reading this site I’d have thought it would be the opposite; but thinking about it that’s almost certainly correct.
Whenever I’ve ever raised a “Come on mate, that’s a bang out of order” objection to something I’ve only ever received a “Sorry, didn’t mean it” type response. I can imagine a woman getting, at best an, insincere shrug and a “time of the month” type comment as soon as she’s out of earshot.
Actually, that makes me look like I run around calling out misogyny whenever I see it. I can’t claim that sort of credit. I only do so when it’s completely blatant.
Alan Robertshaw: Your experience is pretty typical for male allies, judging both by my own experience and by that of others I’ve heard tales from. It’s related, if not identical, to the bar creeper who immediately apologizes to the male S.O. of a woman he’s been targeting incessantly, once he realizes she’s ‘attached’. Since the root of the behavior is the discounting of the personhood of women, it’s harder for them to make the jump to be similarly dismissive of other men, even when they clearly would like to be.
Eh sorry. His band kind of sucks
Freemage – I once had an MRA back down on a typical argument only when A) I refused to address his ad-hominems, B) told him my male partner found his comments speculating about my sex life to be offensive. I think he mostly left because he got bored of not being able to get a rise out of me, though. But I definitely sensed a shift in his tone when he thought another man had called him a POS. I knew he’d weight my bloke’s opinion differently, I just didn’t think that’d be all it took to shut him up. 😛
AltoFronto: Obviously, it’s going to vary, but yeah, the whole point of being an ally is that you can leverage your own privilege on someone else’s behalf. This is why they try to twist the “White Knight” epithet so hard–instead of meaning someone who specifically is trying to ‘save the day’ in order to get rewarded (and usually doing so in a fashion that objectifies, in the ‘pedestal’ fashion, their ‘rescue), MRAs want to use it any time any man speaks out against misogynistic conduct. This can get bizarre, at times–I’ve seen anonymous people in online forums accused of ‘white knighting’ when objecting to, say, misogynistic language. Since we’re all anonymous to one another, and given the short memories of most forumites, it is unlikely there’s any ‘reward’ to be had in that scenario.
Okay, since I’m the type of dogged weirdo who’s been searching for the ne plus ultra of homemade Sloppy Joe recipes for the last four years, I decided to take up the Mystery of N.P.S. (Not to mention that I vaguely remembered zir from a while back, and remembered zir as being okay).
My Google-fu revealed that yes, N.P.S. has been here off-and-on since September of last year. The strange part is that some of today’s comments seem to be linked to a thread from January. Zie made a blanket statement about men being full of toxic ideas and got called out by a few commenters. The “you’re all StepfordNotAllMenz-ers!” seems to be zir response…three months later in a different thread…
Zie also told folks to eff off back to 4chan, reddit, etc, in the past (those those folks tended to be MRA trolls).
No clue why zie decided to tear into David, though. Could it be that until today zie somehow missed that this blog is authored by a man?
Alternate theories to N.P.S.:
1. Name hijacked by someone else (unlikely, since the gravatar is the same).
2. Took the red pill, came back to give it to troll the SJW’s.
3. Aliens.
Wow, someone’s been drinking the Fucking Idiot Juice today, haven’t they.
In case you forget, Pox Faecalis is a straight-up fascist. Of course straight white guys should hate him. He’s the very worst that they can get, short of motherfucking, kitten-raping serial killers.
(And just in case you haven’t flounced yet, please do. You won’t be missed.)
Kitten-raping? That’s…an interesting insult.
“Kitten-raping”
Is that a “Thick of it” reference?
Must confess the “ally” thing isn’t a word I’m comfortable with. Same as ‘feminist’ (I’m, at best, an attempted pro feminist)
Apart from anything else, it suggests there are two possible sides to be on; there aren’t though. It’s the default position of anyone who’s not a complete git. It’s like being described as “Not a kitten strangler”; it should go without saying.
@Alan Robertshaw:
I’ve heard several feminists saying they weren’t comfortable with men using the word feminist to describe themselves for a few reasons:
1. Sometimes assholes co-opt that descriptor to try to use it as a get-out-of-sexism free card. (See: Eron Gjoni, Zoe Quinn’s Ex and founder of #GamerGate.)
2. Some men use it as an excuse to talk over women who have legitimate things to say. (Mansplaining even though they’re “feminists”.)
3. Some men use it only as an excuse to get laid. (Or they go take a women’s history course and and when introducing themselves on the first day of class, they try to quip something cheesy and gross about “wanting to learn herstory instead of history. Ughhhhh.)
4. Some people find that it seems to say “I’m part of your struggle! I’m one of you!”, when the ally in question really hasn’t had the experience of being female.
As why some feminists like “ally” better:
1. It shows that you’re willing to take a backseat to women and listen to what they have to say.
2. It shows that you’re supportive without laying any claims to be part of the group you’re supporting.
Mind you, ally has just as much potential to be just as abused (see the “A is for Ally!” folks who want a letter in the LGBTQA+ acronym despite not being queer. : / ), but it’s still better for some than just straight up saying “I’m a feminist”.
All in all, I think it’s up to the individual, but it’s important as to why some people would want you to identify one way or another.
@ Paradoxical Intention
Yup, those reasons tally very much with my own; especially No. 4.
I think I’ve put up a video of that comedy sketch where the guys says “We played well last night” (in relation to a football game) and his mate says “Funny, didn’t notice you on the pitch” to illustrate my feelings on that subject.
I support the team; but I’m not on the team as it were.
My pro feminism attempts pretty much equate to “Er, well give us a shout if you need anything”. That’s partly because I don’t like cashing in on someone else’s struggle; but probably mainly because I’m lazy.
But I’m the same with “Ally” though. I just don’t like it. To paraphrase Chris Rock it’s like claiming credit for “shit you’re *supposed* to do” (if that makes sense); and all the reasons mentioned in relation to ‘feminist’ also apply I think.
I’ll be honest, even though people have made me very welcome on this site (even when I’ve put my foot in it) I still feel a bit like I’m intruding. I can completely understand why women would feel uneasy about a bloke being on here. “What’s he *really* after?” is a perfectly rational attitude; especially on the internet.
@Alan Robertshaw
It’s kinda strange that you feel like you’re “intruding” because you’re a man, especially since a man runs and maintains the blog. I really hope you get more comfortable here, and that goes for every man on this blog that feels the same.
And while I get why people (not just you, Alan) wouldn’t want a man to call themselves “feminist”, it feels excluding to me or distancing away from the word feminism, like it’s a bad word to be described as. It’s like that whole “egalitarian” or whatever the hell it’s called which has all the same goals as feminism, but called something else? It’s like I’m not gonna stop calling myself an atheist just because some assholes are also atheists, you know what I mean?
However, since you do feel like you’re co-opting women’s struggles, I can understand, and again, I hope you feel a little more at home on the blog.
I’m going to be blunt: I’ve never met an “egalitarian” who wasn’t an anti-feminist, circle-jerking, self-important wank stain.
Pretty much, they’re just more MRAs who don’t want to associate with MRAs. They’re like “white nationalists” in that sense. (And some of them actually are white nationalists.)
Banana Jackie Cake, the Best Jackie and Cake! Yum! (^v^)
Are you thinking of womanism?
I’m feminist, but I’d only be a womanist ally, at most*, because (if I remember correctly) womanism was specifically an inter-sectional offshoot focusing on the issues of POC and feminism, because a lot of folks felt that feminism just doesn’t address the additional problems of racism well enough.
*I say at most because I don’t really know enough about the movement to claim I’m actually doing anything effective to help their cause.
@Paradoxical Intention
I’ve seen people, mostly young women between the ages of 14-25, use “egalitarian” or deny they are a feminist even though they agree with the basis of feminism because “feminism” has become a “dirty word” IRL. I’ve only met one person online who spouted off MRA bullshit, mostly about how the “patriarchy doesn’t exist” and “the wage gap is a myth”, who was a guy, and he may have described himself as an egalitarian. I don’t remember. I think this is because I usually try to keep ideals, religion, politics, whatever separate unless I’m on a website/video/forum/whatever that is about said issues? If that makes sense?
Nah, just the worst thing I could think of off the top of my head.
(And now, off to google “thick of it”.)
@ Bina
Here you go. If you get a chance to watch this do so; the delivery is just perfect.
http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0120039/quotes
@contrapangloss
Oh, no, I wasn’t thinking of womanism, actually. I can understand why PoC, mostly WoC, would distance themselves away from the word “feminism”, although I definitely feel that womanist should take back feminism because, honestly, WoC issues ARE feminist issues, regardless of what fucking racist shitstains “feminist” say, which of course emcompass race issues, AND issues with handicapable women. I honestly feel that “feminist” who say race shouldn’t be a part of feminism aren’t actual feminist because of what I said before but that’s a whole ‘nother fucking issue.
Looking back, I don’t think me bringing up being an atheist was the right way to put it? I actually have no idea why I put it in there…or, wait, fuck, what I meant was the whole “skepticism” versus “atheistism” thing? I mean, don’t most people call themselves skeptics because of the whole lot of awful people calling themselves atheist and shit even though they pretty much believe the same exact thing? Because I don’t personally believe in any gods or religious doctrine but I don’t feel that you should write people’s religion off? Or is that agnosticism? I know I ain’t no deist or theist or whatever the fuck it is where you have more spiritual or religious leanings–although I do like the idea of karma and reincarnation even though I know there’s so little proof to prove it actually exists?
I don’t even fucking know what I fucking meant. *facepalms* I think I just tossed it in there without any real thought behind it. ARGHLEBURGLEHSFHASJK. IGNORE ME, JUST STUMBLING THROUGH DRUNKENLY EVEN THOUGH I HAVEN’T HAD A DROP OF ALCOHOL TODAY. *doodily-doo!*
ALSO: Feminism is for anyone who identifies as woman, so also tran* issues are feminist issues. Forgot to put that.
Just pretend I started drinking tequila BEFORE I posted, not after.
I’ve read MRAs on at least two sites go over how to pose as a feminist and say outrageous things but with enough subtlety to be believable. It’s interesting because sometimes the arguments are so realistic that it proves they’re self-aware, and their bullshit is intentionally ridiculous and only meant to antagonize.
For the record, David, you’re an inspiration to me. Your site is a quick reminder that it’s not hopeless, and you allow me to stay informed with comedy relief to ward off the sads and without guilt for the clicks I might’ve given the asshats.
Thank you.
Reads like something spat out from a Gibson-esque Cyberpunk word generator. Mondo…jack in…fractal…robot…er, cyber.
It’s like this N.P.S. person does not understand the concept of empathy. This seemed like such an obvious answer to me for why people act kindly towards others or call out inappropriate behavior. I had a former coworker once who tried to friend me on FB, and I rejected him. Even though he was nice to me, I noticed he treated other people (even his so-called friend!) like crap. He played mind games to mess with them just for funzies. I do think he was a jerk even though he treated me fine. I don’t need people like that in my life.
But even if David were not doing us a kindness in exposing the terrible things manospherians say, some selfish reasons could be that those dudes make men look bad, and their misogynistic actions also make it difficult for men and women to have better relationships. One of the take aways I got from the post on the Reddit megathread was that misogynistic dudes ruin women’s trust in men in general. It also reminded me of an article I read some time ago about how women wanted to have casual sex just as much as men but don’t because there’s the very real risk of being raped. So in a sense those misogynists are cockblocking.
Actually through my lurking on the Sinfest comic forums, I have encountered such a strawfeminist. Their name is KillAllMen. The presence of antifeminists on the forum was not uncommon, and they always complained about the femonst turn the webcomic took. But this strawfeminist seemed to persist at this act for some time. The funny thing is that it seemed that the feminist language they were aping seemed to eventually sink in, and they eventually became a reasonable commenter. I saw in real time as the community there also noticed the change. I’m not claiming that N.P.S. is or isn’t a strawfeminist, but such people exist. Hopefully it means they’re on the road to feminism.
Yes, I am totally comfortable with the idea that, because I am a man, at least half the people in the world are justified in believing that there’s a good chance I’m a woman-hating shit-weasel who wants to fuck 12-year-old (if not younger) girls. Why wouldn’t I — it makes me so … powerful. I just crave being feared.
I can understand that there are women whose experience with men has been so horrifying that they no longer believe in the possibility of men being anything but evil,. so that their interpretation of someone like David is that he must have some sort of ulterior motive and he’s merely using women for whatever that motive is. That’s the vibe I get from N. P. S., but I also realize that I may have an excessive tendency to give people the benefit of the doubt.
I find it funny that N.P.S called us Upper-Class White Feminists and accused David of not caring about women’s issues in the same post, because the whole problem with Upper-Class White Feminists is that they focus primarily on issues that affect them, and not on issues that primarily affect poor women, WOC, trans women, lesbians, etc. Is empathy and solidarity expected of social justice activists, or not?
@Paradoxical Intention “3. Some men use it only as an excuse to get laid. (Or they go take a women’s history course and and when introducing themselves on the first day of class, they try to quip something cheesy and gross about “wanting to learn herstory instead of history. Ughhhhh.)”
Think I’ve seen that sort of thing a number of times on sites that compile creepy dating site messages. Men who label themselves feminists on their profiles and then proceed to send inappropriate/rude/creepy messages to women.
Some people really seem to think social justice terminology is just a secret code you can use to deceive people. Luckily many of them seem to slip up at some point, generally early on.
I’m trying to work out logistically how Paul Elam, Roosh V and their ilk “cockblock” David. Nope, I can’t figure it out and will now stop trying.
I personally think intellectually dishonest MRAs pretending that David’s article about the critically acclaimed film Salo was a defense of child porn and therefore he’s a “pedo” is way worse than the failed attempts at fat jokes, but that’s me. David has used that as an excuse to beg for sympathy exactly zero times, the same number of times he’s expressed self-pity for any harassment he’s received. In fact, the only time he refers to any of it is when he needs an example to show how men like himself get a fraction of abuse that women do.
While David has sympathy for women, is supportive of feminism and has plenty of feminist fans, this isn’t a feminist blog. He’s not writing this from a feminist perspective, he’s writing from a professional journalist perspective, albeit a snarky one. He’s clearly learned a bit about feminism through the years, but in the end he’s covering “the new misogyny” mentioned in the header as a journalist.
This is why David’s never going to be interviewed or lecture about feminism or women’s experiences, but he’s becoming the go to guy to discuss the Manosphere when someone wants the bigger picture after A toxic misogynistic asshole gets in the news. Other then a few FeMRAs, most of his subjects are men.
Again, he’s a journalist and their point is expose the truth to the best of their ability, he’s not an activist, therapist or anyone else working for direct change.
The only sort of criticism I have is David eventually needs to get around to writing a “New Misogyny” book. Write a book about these assholes David, it’s time. **cracking whip noise**
Thanks, everyone, for the nice comments. For what it’s worth, I don’t think NPS is a troll, exactly; her earlier comments seemed sincere.
About what she wrote, I’m acutely aware that if a woman were to write a blog like this she would get easily ten times the harassment I’ve gotten. Actually,that estimate is probably way too low. I’m not sure why that’s an argument against me doing the blog, though. I think the blog serves a useful purpose, lots of other people, most of them women, think the blog serves a useful purpose. Dealing with MRA assholes and the like all the time, even just reading their crap on a regular basis, can be pretty wearying, even for a guy like me; a woman doing a blog like mine would would have to have a much stronger constitution than I’ve got, because the amount of shit the MRAs etc would throw at her would be so much greater than what they throw at me.
Ninjaed by brooked! .
Obviously I agree with pretty much all of that. FWIW, I *do* consider myself a feminist, but, yeah, I don’t try to pretend that I’m an expert on feminism or on women’s experience, because I’m not. I have learned a hell of a lot more about feminism by writing/researching this blog (and by reading the comments here, and by talking to feminist writers, etc).
.
Oh, and the bit about “even for a guy like me” in my last comment was me trying to say that dealing with MRA assholes can be wearying for guys, even though we get much less harassment than women, and so I can only imagine how draining it would be for a woman, who would obviously have to deal with much more harassment and bullshit. .
I do plan to write a book, but a book-sized project is a bit more intimidating than writing a post or two. Even though I write more than a book’s worth of stuff in the form of blog posts every year.
Off topic, but IMO, basically any reason is the right reason to abort. If it’s a dumb, superficial reason, then I can’t imagine that the person who wanted to terminate their pregnancy because eh, I don’t know, the baby might end up having straight hair, for example, would be a good parent in the least. So it’s better for everyone if the kid isn’t dragged into that shitshow.
Obviously a woman being coerced into terminating a pregnancy she wants to keep is fucked up and wrong, but abortion restrictions aren’t going to fix that. There needs to be legislation protecting these ladies from the coersion, not from the option of abortion.
I know this blog takes a ton of work and reading terrible writing by terrible people has to be wearying. I broke up with Right Wing Watch because the anti-gay vitriol got to be too much for me and I was just a reader, not a writer or a researcher.
Plus, my plea for a book is partly selfish, I simply want to read it. I want a Oompa Loompa now!
Oompa Loompa Boobidity day!
OK, I can’t paint myself orange cos it would clash with my red hair.
And I’m too tall.
And I’m not that keen on chocolate (though possibly better than crushed caterpillars)
I would be a terrible Oompa Loompa.
But I think Violet *cough* Brooked does deserve one of zir own!
David, I really appreciate the work you do here. Just wanted to let you know.
Eh, most of those lyrics aren’t really bad, at least given the lyrical themes of the genre. Not sure this was worth digging up. The “Shock on the Wire” lyrics are really terrible, though, and using the phrase “love slave” is a bad idea in the best of contexts.
Does anyone think he actually meant silicone? Because silicon is an element (Si).
Oh never mind, reference to Silicon Valley. Someone needs to learn to read first before she posts!!!
Ew, no, gross. No licking brains. Especially not Vox Day’s. It’s all rotten and filled with ignorance and hatred.
“Silicon” is what modern electronics are made from. “Silicon Jesus” is probably about gadgets or digital media or something, not about San Jose as a geographical location.
Reading the OP, I was reminded of Morrissey’s lyric:
“Frankly, Mr. Shankly, I never knew you wrote such BLOODY AWFUL poetry.”
I understand that putting words together in ways that are both new and good is difficult. So is passing a kidney stone. I’d rather listen to Vox do the latter.