And Finally Beef Of The Week

CMU Beef Of The Week #62: My Chemical Romance v Fox News

By | Published on Saturday 7 May 2011

My Chemical Romance

In the UK, we rely on The Daily Mail for all our right wing scaremongering. In the US, it’s done via the Fox News TV station. This week, one of the station’s most outspoken pundits, Glenn Beck, accused My Chemical Romance of spreading propaganda via their lyrics, warning parents to be “uber-vigilant” if their children became fans of the band, after their song ‘Sing’, which he described as “an anthem saying ‘join us'”, was performed on ‘Glee’.

Frontman Gerard Way hit back in a blog post on the band’s website, wondering if Beck was actually aware of the definition of the word ‘propaganda’. He wrote: “I think the word Glenn Beck was looking for was ‘subversion’ not ‘propaganda’, because I don’t know what [our lyrics] would be considered propaganda for. Truth? Sentiment? And I can’t tell what he’s angrier about, the fact that it’s how I feel about the persistent sterilisation of our culture, or the fact that it’s on network television for everyone to hear”.

Further examining Beck’s trouble with understanding words, Way also pointed out that the tedious Fox man had quoted some of the lyrics incorrectly, mishearing “living on the Webways” as “living on the railways”. Way quipped: “Railways? Is it 1863? Seen any children living on these lately instead of the internet? I’m actually shocked that no actual fact checking was done on the lyrics. I mean, Fox is a major news channel, covering factual topics in an unbiased and intelligent… oh wait”.

This sort of reaction to the band’s music is not unprecedented. Back in 2006, The Daily Mail published an article warning parents about the “emo cult”, in which MCR were briefly mentioned. Two years later the band were elevated to leaders of what the paper was now calling the “emo suicide cult”, accusing them of causing a teenager to take her own life just two weeks after she began listening to their music, warning parents that “no child is safe”.

This resulted in fans of the band marching on the Daily Mail’s offices. It’s not clear if members of ‘the MCRmy’ plan a similar protest outside Fox News’ doors.



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