Marilyn Manson
Throughout the last few months, I have been thinking a lot about a very special someone, a person whose impact on my life I’ve never before tried to articulate but which I’ve never been able to deny.
You see, I think that most trans people today can, without a moment’s thought, name the first celebrity who opened their eyes to trans-gender presentation. Although few of these celebrities actually identify (at least publicly) as transgender, their effect on young trans people searching for self-acceptance can be so intense that it deserves examination.
For some, it was David Bowie. Other names from music that come to mind are Prince, Boy George, Antony Hegarty (of Antony and the Johnsons), Dee Snider (of Twisted Sister), Patti Smith, Pete Burns (of Dead or Alive), k. d. lang, Robert Smith (of The Cure), Annie Lennox, Grace Jones and Lucas Silveira (of the Cliks). (Have I successfully clued you all in to my approximate age? Yep, that list probably did it.)
And while I give each of those performers varying degrees of gratitude and respect (sorry, Dee, you aren’t on the top of the list), the one who affected me the most powerfully as a young baby-tranny was Marilyn Manson.
“Really?!” some of you may ask, particularly those among you who are more familiar with the rumors about him than with his words and music.
In response, let me first just say that the all-too-common fixation on the false and hyperbolized rumors only serves to distract from the uncomfortable, and yet still beautiful, truths that he represents. In fact, I would venture to say that this is one of the deepest similarities between Manson and the trans community.
Furthermore, he basically is the embodiment of not only the beautiful androgyny of the genderqueer movement, but also of the righteous anger and incomprehensible pain that is felt by trans people around the world and that (dare I say the obvious?) needs to be heard and understood, particularly by the people who are made the most uncomfortable by his/our existence.
In short, he is the kind who can challenge the hypocrisies and injustices in today’s world with all the swagger of the butchest drag king and all the glam of a queen.
“How,” you may ask, “do you think he does that?”
Goodness, just take his pseudonym and the pseudonyms of many, though not all, of the musicians who have made up his band: Twiggy Ramirez, Ginger Fish, Madonna Wayne-Gacy, Daisy Berkowitz, Sara Lee Lucas, Gidget Gein, Olivia Newton Bundy and Zsa Zsa Speck.
All of these names bring into juxtaposition the first names of female cultural icons with the last names of male mass-murderers, thereby communicating a powerful critique of what gender represents to us culturally. Too few people think about what it means that women are stereotypically expected to be beautiful, while men are the violent ones: just saying Manson’s name brings these assumptions into stark relief.
There is also, of course, his obvious visual androgyny. He was the most overt about this in the era of his platinum-selling album Mechanical Animals. This album featured a cover that showed him sporting long hair with red highlights, prosthetic breasts and a latex body-suit that completely hid his manly genitals without detracting from the illusion that he was naked. However, androgyny has been an unwavering and constant theme throughout his career.
And yet, these reasons (compelling though they are) only scratch the surface of what made Marilyn Manson and his music so deeply and personally significant to me, and many other trans and genderqueer people of my generation.
The truth is that it is still nearly impossible to grow up trans in today’s Western world without experiencing all the emotions that arise from having an identity that is mocked and invalidated by most of polite society, and Manson was able to articulate and embody these emotions in a way that few other musicians have attempted.
Firstly and most obviously, he spoke to my anger: not the self-indulgent kind of anger, but the empowering kind that causes people to rise up in the face of all that is untrue and unjust, demanding to be heard. For instance, in the song “Kinderfeld” (off of the album Antichrist Superstar, which also went platinum), Manson sings that “Because your lies have watered me/ I have become the strongest seed.” There is something very existential about this line, something that points to the strength that comes from separating what is true from the many invalidating messages that we hear through our lives and moving beyond the bullshit.
And, quite frankly, there are few things more purging on really, really bad days — the kind when I’m called a “lady” and a “dyke” more than a few times, when the transphobia of even the queer community is a bit too much to take — than singing along (loudly, of course) to “Better of Two Evils.” The chorus of this song is formed around the rhythmic insistence that “Haters call me bitch/ Call me faggot, call me Whitey/ But I am something they will never be….”
Speaking of trans-invisibility, one of the other things about Manson’s music is the way it gave voice to my sense of alienation from much of the dominant culture. As a closeted genderqueer teenager at a time before I understood that the concept of genderqueer existed, when I was wondering if the ambiguity I felt about gender was complete confirmation that I was a freak in a world of normalcy, I would croon along when he sang that “I’m a million different things/ And not one you know” (from “I Want to Disappear”). In these moments, I would feel an odd sense of peace that at least I wasn’t the only one who felt that my internal experience of complexity marked me as an “other.”
Any yet even his expressions of alienation held something empowering for me in their grasp. There was an odd sense of hope that I got from listening to “Wormboy,” in which Manson sings that “I got my wings and I never even knew it/ When I was a worm, thought I wouldn’t get through it.” This line seemed to promise to me that there was something that lay beyond the feelings of alienation: something which I am, indeed, finally able to experience through my growing self-acceptance.
Likewise, the line from “Wrapped in Plastic,” that “I’m only as deep as the self that I dig” did not communicate self-hatred or a lack of acceptance to me: it instead inspired me to look more deeply into myself, to find the truth within the confusion I was feeling at the time.
Manson speaks to these themes even outside of his music. For example, in an interview he did on the O’Reilly Factor (oh, yes, it’s strange but true that he appeared on that show), Bill O’Reilly asked Manson “What’s your message? What are you trying to get across in the lyrics to these songs?”
Manson replied, “It’s always about being yourself and not being ashamed of being different or thinking differently.” Simple. True. Powerful. And all too pertinent of an idea for the trans community, the least protected and most silenced group of people in America today.
Also among the most powerful ways that Manson affected me as a young genderqueer was the way he articulated the importance of becoming disillusioned regarding the powers-that-be in today’s world. In regards to this matter, one of the most inspiring statements from Manson can be found within the documentary Bowling for Columbine.
In this interview, he spoke about how in the aftermath of Columbine his music and violence in entertainment became main targets, while “in the meantime, we forgot about how the President was shooting bombs overseas…. And no one said, well, maybe the President had an influence on this violent behavior, because that’s not the way the media wants to take it and spin it to turn it into fear.”
This reminds me a lot of the recent debates over GENDA. Rather than talking about civil rights, human rights, and the frequent victimization and discrimination that are faced by trans people throughout New York State and the entire nation, the transphobic powers-that-be distracted the conversation through fear tactics: the theory was posed that, should GENDA pass, public restrooms would dissolve into violent anarchy, that women wouldn’t be safe from the MTF predators in the stall next door, that peaceful urination would become a thing of the past.
Let’s not talk about how trans people are being turned away from emergency rooms and refused fundamental medical care: let’s not talk about how a huge number of trans people are under the poverty line and denied the basic protections of equal-opportunity employment. Let’s not talk about the frequency with which transpeople are the victims of hate crimes. Let’s distract the public from the true violence and injustice with a red herring that is as insulting as it is discriminatory.
In the same Bowling for Columbine interview, Michael Moore asks Manson, “If you were to talk directly to the kids at Columbine and the people in the community, what would you say to them if they were here right now?”
Manson replied, “I wouldn’t say a single word to them. I would listen to what they have to say, and that’s what no one did.”
I would take this statement and say that it doesn’t just apply to the kids at Columbine, but to every young queer and trans person who is struggling to understand and accept him-, her- or hirself. I remember being brought to the brink of tears during that part of the movie the first time I watched it, because I recalled so clearly the feeling of being a youth who felt invalidated, unheard and unaccepted for far too many of my formative years.
It is my own humble opinion that Manson speaks clearly to the beauty, strength, uniqueness and emotions of the trans and genderqueer experience. I’d even go so far as to say that the knee-jerk rumors, misinformation and fear that surround his persona are a near-perfect parallel to the prejudice and invisibility that continue to plague transpeople today.
But don’t take it from me: decide for yourself. Talk to trannies. Listen to something you’ve never before heard said or sung. Refuse to be convinced solely by what you’ve been taught, what you’ve heard from others, or what you saw on television. Scared of Manson? Weirded-out and confused by trans issues and genderqueer people? Do yourself a favor: go beyond the surface.
