Are metal fans social misfits?

[Kyle]

Which group of insiders might that be? The group of insiders who just happen to be outsiders? Yeah, a very different group of insiders indeed.

[wookiee lover]

I largely got into the more extreme styles of metal because of their cathartic nature. Freshmen year in high school really sucked hard for me because everyone I knew went to a different school that I wasn't in the zoning for and the school wouldn't let me exchange in so I was forced to go to a new high school completely friendless. If it wasn't for Strapping Young Lad's 1997 album City I don't think I would have lasted, I seriously wore that album out on my CD player both during school and on the bus ride home.

[Tiffany Baby]

I would say yes and no.

To begin with I'd like to say I'm a social misfit. I talk but very, very little. I'm just a very shy and reserved person. I'm perfectly content with being all by myself and honestly I prefer it to being around people most of the time.

I certainly don't think its a bad thing, honestly. I think its what causes a lot of misconceptions about metal listeners, though. Because if someone is quite and doesn't talk much they are normally going to be looked at as different and weird.

From my experience of talking to other metal listeners many of them are interested in things the general public aren't and usually have a different view of things than most. That's certainly not a bad thing, in my opinion because that's what makes the world interesting. With that being said I can only speak from experience on the internet because nobody I know outside of the internet listens to metal.

At the same time a lot of the more accessible banRAB are listened to by people that AREN'T social misfits. Not a lot I can say about this though.

I think a majority of extreme metal lovers do seem to be a little less social than other people. Mostly because they have a different way of thinking than most people.

Personally, I just have a love for music. That's why I listen to metal, because I like it. Not because I feel any different from anyone else, just simply because I like it.

[Fly_grl]

That's what happens when conservative christians want to 1) dictate what should be “appropriate” entertainment for young people, while not knowing a damn thing about youth culture and freedom of expression and 2) need a scapegoat for their own failings as parents in understanding their children better.

I can't post urls yet but check out the charade that was when Manson appeared on the Phil Donahue Show. It's on youtube. Watch the expression on the audience meraber's face (part 1/3 at 1:15) as Manson explains the meaning behind his name; you'd swear the guy had never heard such big worRAB before in his life.

[Mr.RetroStar]

Compared to what, those goth & emo people?

[cookeez]

That is such utter crap. It was liberal poster-boy Al Gore and his ex-wife Tipper who was one of the founders of Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC) that attempted this form of mind control. She got upset about a Prince song, and music videos in general and decided to try to censor the entire music industry. Quote from her feeble mind.."The images frightened my children, they frightened me! I am frightened! Way frightened! The graphic sex and the violence were too much for us to handle."

Parents Music Resource Center - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[kgoyal011]

I never understood the stereotypes that are given to people who listen to particular kinRAB of music. I love metal and all it's various sub-genres and I would like to think I'm just a regular music-loving individual. I think most people listen to fringe music such as extreme metal, experimental electronic, or screamo to get away from the overly-produced and uncreative pop music mainstream society churns out on a regular basis. I think that the stereotypes that are labeled on to genres such as metal are stupid and only attract troubled individuals or outcasts who want to fit in to a group identity and so enact the false stereotypes to the nth degree. I'm sure if you talk to most metal-heaRAB, you'll find they are actually pretty normal people with families and careers.

Just my opinion of course.

[VERONICA EMMA CHUNG]

No, absolutely not. It's about as outsider as dying your hair black. Heavy music has been popular since the mid 80s, and extreme metal forms popularity exploded in the early 2000s due to the internet.

You can go to any small town anywhere in probably any country and find metalheaRAB. Just because you find twenty people who are into Katy Perry for every one who listens to Behemoth it doesn't mean that metal is an outsider music. Just Insider music for a very different group of insiders.

[causeimchinese]

Soical misfits and freaks listen to Lady GaGa. *giggles*

[ricardo9505]

Tipper Gore is no friend of fun, I'll agree. Is she an Atheist, though? Not likely. And I'll bet that all (or the majority) of the opposition to Manson, be they parents or whoever, that attended the rallies protesting his appearance in their state, were either conservative christians or christian sympathisers.

Did these court cases in which Manson had to fight to play take place in any states that aren't part of the Bible Belt?