Tool - Fear Inoculum (August 30, 2019) Album • Page 11

Couldn't agree more. Sure would be weird to have someone who they respect and trust have a respectful discussion about it, then bring in a survivor from our local domestic abuse chapter to speak after the last lesson.

I will point them to chorus dot fm for the real education.

 

@OhTheWater

Thank you, I will read through the replies

 

First good idea you’ve had all day, completely agree

 

Nah, they’ll just go to the metal thread

 

Also

 

Damn, considering that one was actually posted by a man I figured it would definitely get a response.

 

The idea that online activism is worthless is endlessly fascinating to me. I have years of private messages - from here, in my email, on Twitter, on Facebook, from the old AbsolutePunk days - that stand as testament that the work I and so many others do online matters. It makes a real, tangible difference in peoples lives. It isn't a panacea, and it absolutely can fall short or fail to work - just like IRL work can. People learn and grow when they're ready to, and not a moment sooner. This work is largely for those who are on the cusp of that.

Moreover, the "you don't know what I do offline" line is a nonstarter. You don't know what ANYONE does offline - including the ~social justice warriors doing it for the clout and to get the last word~. Assuming nobody does the work offline is a you problem.

Honestly, I don't give a single crap about this band. I'm here because of the reports that keep coming in from this train wreck of a thread. If we've learned ANYTHING from the R. Kelly saga, it's that these guys who there are years of "whispers" about... well, where there's smoke there's fire. And as far as proof, there will never be enough. No victim is credible enough, perfect enough, has evidence enough. The goalposts move and move and move and for people who don't want to own the reality of what they're implying with their disbelief, a video of the assault would still somehow not live up to the burden of proof. I say that here for context - that's why we say we believe survivors. Because any survivor knows you can't "prove" this, even if the person calling your integrity into question was an eyewitness to the assault. People believe what's easier for them to believe. False allegations are incredibly rare, end of sentence. This is the only kind of crime where survivors are asked to account for every false accusation ever made to defend their own. And speaking of crimes and "chorus would make a bad jury" - this isn't a court of law. This is about basic human accountability. This is about what we think we owe each other. The least folks could do is own that.

And lastly, for any apologist who coats their devil's advocacy in "I know how hard it is to come forward BUT" language, especially when they're speaking to an audience that includes survivors - to quote Lady Gaga and Dianne Warren: "'Til it happens to you, you won't know how I feel." You can do as many good works or say as many "correct" things as you want. The buck stops with the "but", and that's all any survivor will hear. That's where the "conversation" stops being possible.

Fin.

 

We don’t want them there

 

I mean, you could've at least tagged me, that entire thing was about me.

I respect the shit out of you Anna and, per usual, agree with all of your points. I was waiting for someone to come in with the jury line. I didn't mean that in regards to sexual assaults...I know that they're rarely proven and that's the biggest issue...I meant that in regards to judges of others character. I should've been more clear...I know sexual assaults are rarely proven in a court of law and I will 1,000% agree that they should not have to be for someone to be believed.

I have read through the thread of tweets and it has changed my mind on some of my points. I won't be publicly giving this band visibility any further and will continue to decide how I feel comfortable listening to them. With Brand New, I can't listen to them, even alone. Tool, we will see. I am still processing thoughts on this one.

The thing is, I agree with pretty much everyone here. Anna, I appreciate your tact in addressing the subject and I personally will not discuss the band on this website going forward. I apologize to anyone I offended. I don't post on this site much anyway, but if you all think it's best I will step away from the website permanently as well.

 

I didn't tag you because it wasn't just to you. When I don't tag people, it's because the message is addressing multiple people or a thread at large and I've found tagging specific people allows others to absolve themselves of feeling addressed by it.

 

Ah, very valid. You do great work and you have changed my view points on things before. You explain yourself and are thoughtful and tactful instead of just telling people they are wrong and I know that I appreciate that. Everyone in here is fighting for a very noble cause, I just think a lot of it gets lost in translation when people immediately jump on people and pile on. It only hardens people on both sides instead of enlightens. So, continue to do what you're doing. I'll bow out of chorus.

 

While you can certainly choose to leave, I don't think it's that productive to do so. If you've learned something, I'd rather you continued that than turning away from the resource.

Of course, it's a personal choice. The key is always learning and altering the ways you engage accordingly, not leaving. The irony is, the folks who probably SHOULD see themselves out won't because they've learned nothing. But thank you for listening.

edit: contrary to popular belief, I don't love an echo chamber, and I don't want the folks who could benefit from the work most to no longer be present to do it. And choosing to remain but merely observe is a good middle ground option, if you need one.

 

Mad respect for this post, even though I don't entirely share your perspective. This is a great summary that actually acknowledges the position those of us with the minority viewpoint generally hold, as opposed to lashing out at a strawman that no one actually believes (which is what *some* -- not all -- of the other posts have done).

In fact, there's virtually nothing I find objectionable here, and I fully understand why many of you have decided to shun the band. What I perhaps failed to communicate as clearly as I wanted to in my earlier posts is this: the incident described in the original allegation is deadly serious, if true, regardless of any external considerations (e.g., whether he did it to anyone else). Whereas some of you evidently judge the probability of it being from a real woman who met Maynard backstage in 2000 to be over 50%, my judgment (and plenty of others, including those in mainstream outlets who reported on the allegations but have since continued treat Tool as a legitimate, untarnished entity) is something more like 10-20%, with all mitigating factors considered. You have every right to hate me for making that judgment, and I accept criticism on that basis. But the conversation would be loads more productive if people would stop acting like any of us are saying "yeah, even if he did it it's not THAT bad and it was a long time ago," etc. As far as I've seen, no one here has that perspective. And yet, a post yesterday accusing me of thinking his raping "only one" person wasn't a big deal has 15 likes... that signals a degree of insincerity and bad faith that doesn't build trust for useful conversations. Comparing this directly to BN/Lacey is also extremely unhelpful. You guys had a period of, what, 24-48 hours between the first major allegation and his admission of guilt? This is 15 months of being in limbo with a single, anonymous firsthand account who never pursued it further, plus some hearsay about industry rumors and "my friend said something similar." Again, criticize us all you want for not sharing your standard on burden of proof, but please don't casually equate the two.

For what it's worth: all the sarcastic side noise about wokeness and flexing and all that coming from those who share my skepticism of the allegation isn't helpful, and I don't condone it. I do think the posters who said that stuff were being mischaracterized and gratuitously piled onto initially, but that still doesn't justify snapping back with that type of stuff.

Finally, as to the perspectives of women and victims that have been shared thus far: they're appreciated, and it goes without saying they deserve to be heard, even in this thread and even if it's been discussed elsewhere here before. I'm sorry for what you've gone through, apologize if my judgment of this allegation is understandably unsettling to you, and unequivocally hope that more convincing evidence comes to light if it's true that MJK has ever assaulted anyone.

 

Hey don't bring us into it!

 

You're confusing "hate" with "mistrust". I don't know you. I'm certainly not going to put energy into hating you.

Here's the thing: there was nothing disingenuous about what was extrapolated from the words you said. Yes, I had a gut reaction and may have misinterpreted your intent, and I'll own that - but context matters. Apologies for any misunderstanding. But to survivors, this READS AS WHAT I SAID - that you seemed to think this singular offense wasn't enough for this to matter.

"Is it reasonably plausible that the Twitter accuser described a real attack that was a rare or even one-off offense by MJK? Sure, and I understand why some may choose not to support his bands in light of that. But aggregating all the available information, which includes doubts about the legitimacy of that Twitter user, the case simply isn't strong enough to justify attacking other people who choose otherwise, at least as I see it."

Again: your intent has nothing to do with your impact. That is how that sentence looks to survivors. As a survivor myself, if you don't believe me - ask the other survivors and bystanders who clearly thought I had a point. Words don't exist in a vacuum, and nothing I said was insincere or in bad faith. It's an emotional topic, especially for survivors, and objectivity isn't real. If you can't accept that, you aren't equipped to have the conversation in the first place.

 

First of all I want to say that this isn't a question of a "majority vs. minority" viewpoint where both viewpoints are equally valid. This isn't a dispute over whether your local town counsel should or should not let a Walmart open up in town. There is a right and a wrong way to go about things here. Even if you don't care about any of the multiple statements compiled in this thread and in the Accountability thread, from both survivors and people who witnessed the behavior taking place, and you still want to listen to the band, that's totally fine. Nobody is trying to dictate what you do and don't do in your private life. I'm sure there are people who despise what JL did but still need BN's music enough that they continue listening on their own time. That's a personal decision you have to make on your own and nobody here is taking it from you. The wrong thing to do is come in here and say things like "I think there's only a 10-20% chance this happened to I'm not going to cancel the band over it and you can't make me." Those public statements of support, of not believing survivors by default, are harmful to both the discussion and to the actual survivors of abuse that are on this very website.

The problem here isn't that you're saying you're wrong for thinking "it isn't that bad because it happened a long time ago" (although you would be wrong to think that if you did), it's that you're wrong for thinking that, even if it's "just" a 10-20% probability that it's true, It's ok to continue publicly supporting them. Especially when there is way more information out there aside from "just" the original tweet thread.

You shouldn't need an outright admission of guilt to be wary about this kind of thing. Like @oldjersey said in his post mentioning that this kind of behavior on the part of MJK has been talked about on reddit for years, if it smells like a rat there's a good chance it's a rat. And, again, there is far more information out there than "a single, anonymous firsthand account who never pursued it further".

Additionally, trying to discredit a survivor because they "didn't pursue it further" is so, so ignorant and harmful to the conversation. It is beyond widely known at this point that survivors don't come forward at first/don't pursue charges against their abusers for a myriad of different reasons, not the least of which is that when their abusers are famous they will have legions of fans ready to stan their fav and attack/discredit/re-traumatize the survivor at any cost. Which is of course what is happening in this very thread.

Also, as has been pointed out before, this isn't a court of law and the words "burden of proof" mean nothing here. The amount of times allegations such as these are fabricated is so small that defaulting toward believing the accuser, especially in situations where the accuser has nothing to gain and everything to lose by coming forward (even anonymously), should be the norm for everyone.

I'm not going to speak for anyone but myself here but from where I'm standing it doesn't sound at all like you appreciate the perspective of the women and survivors that have been expressed in this thread thus far, nor does it seem like you think they deserve to be heard. Even in this very statement you're demanding "more convincing evidence", casting doubt on the survivor's account of what happened and all of the other statements from people that witnessed similar things happening, and siding with MJK instead. Nothing that you've typed in those few lines of text rings sincere in the slightest bit based on everything else you're saying. It comes across as lip service to get people off your back and let you go back to publicly anticipating this record and supporting this band despite everything else that's been put in front of you.

At least drop the act and say what you really mean outright instead of trying to dress it up in a misguided attempt to assuage your own conscience.

 

I'll give this person 10-20% benefit of the doubt, based on aggregating all of the available information.

 

this is why I’ve been saying even the “credible” stories about MJK paint him as a manipulative, shitty dude who got off on using his status and using women for his personal gain. where there’s smoke there’s fire.

 

Yeah honestly even if these specific allegations weren't true I'd still side-eye anyone who uses their fame to take advantage of people like that. Gross as hell.

 

Bold of you to suggest that people on here who are “chastising” you don’t also have jobs or passions outside of work that focus on the same kind of mission you profess to.

 

After reading this whole thing from today, I’m shocked no one has told you how much you fucking suck because Jesus Christ you fucking suck.

 

People are going to try discussing the song the band with a rapist frontman are putting out on Friday but it's an obvious deflection tactic and won't work here.

 

davjs got banned (lmaooo) and neither desolateearth nor beachdude have been online for the past ~24 hours so i think we're good

isn't it interesting that this site becomes more peaceful and harmonious when the users who demand the right to talk about "the music" whenever serious discussions are happening leave?

 

What did beachdude do that was so bad?
EDIT: Now I see why.