Linkin Park are back together, but their reunion has already been marred by controversy. The band’s new co-vocalist Emily Armstrong was part of a group of Scientologists who showed up at the courthouse to support That ’70s Show actor Danny Masterson during his 2020 rape trial, where he was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison. The choice to have Armstrong fill in for the late Chester Bennington received quite a bit of backlash, notably from Cedric Bixler-Zavala of the Mars Volta/At The Drive-In. His wife Chrissie Carnell-Bixler was one of the four women who pursued rape charges against Masterson, and now, she has spoken out against Armstrong as well.
Why the fuck am I supposed to care about the religion of a performer?
Or am I now allowed to bash on all the christian performers out there too?
And I don’t give a flying fuck about masterson either. You have a friend, you fucking back them until you have solid proof in front of you. Which, she did. Once she saw the proof, she stopped backing him. End of fucking story.
People are fucking idiots about this kind of shit.
The only one who believes scientology is a religion is the IRS lol
They treat it as one.
Cult, scam, whatever. They suck, but that isn’t the point.
Idk i think the only thing religion has going for it is tradition. Scientology is missing the tradition component which makes me think followers are just really dumb ir desparate for connection. Scientologist celebs are trying to cash in their influence by selling it to the church and lying to dumb people to try to get them caught up in a cult.
I dont see a defensible position for someone like that. I would want to know who is doing that and not buy their stuff, personally.
Edit: she was born into it, so im wrong.
Her parents are like high ranking members, she was born into it. So either shes still in the church, which sucks but is more defensible than someone choosing it for themselves, or as evidenced by her queer lifestyle and song lyrics, shes left the church but doesnt want to completely burn bridges with all her former friends and family or possibly put them at risk by speaking out publicly.
I see a defensible position:
Cults are basically abusive boyfriends x1000.
If you leave or speak out, goodbye all family and friends you’ve ever known.
She was born into this.
You ever been brainwashed, either by a cult or just an abusive ex? I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, but it would help you gain a deeper understandings of the inner workings of a cult, and how they retain their victims.
The previous singer died from suicide and scientologists are very anti mental health treatment. I can’t blame anyone for being bothered by that.
It’s fucking dumb.
The only thing that matters is if she can do the job.
I’m not blaming anyone, I’m just saying they should use their brain for something useful.
The whole thing is beyond stupid and into absurdity at this point.
It’s a fucking band
Are you deliberately missing the point?
no, I’m disagreeing with it.
It’s not the same thing as the NAACP at all.
It isn’t some kind of organization dedicated to anti-cult endeavor, nor even a band dedicated to anything other than making music. That’s it. That’s the entirety of what linkin park is. They’re an amazing fucking band that makes amazing fucking music.
Nothing about making music is predicated on the beliefs of the members unless they’re making music about those beliefs, and even then it doesn’t mean they have to do it all the time.
Are we going to flip out on Garth Brooks and Chance the rapper now? Both of them are openly supporters of a religion that has caused or condoned wars, genocide, and even today actively seek to crush the rights of other people. Christianity is just a big cult that demands loyalty and money and strict adherence to the rules of whichever sect of the cult you belong to, and nobody is up their ass for the actions of the rest of their religion.
Or is it only the cults we like that get a pass? Is that what it is? Sammy Davis Jr is cool, what with being a Satanist and jewish (at the same time, which is actually pretty damn cool), and Reba Macentire gets a pass because reasons, but not this woman that grew up in a cult we don’t like as much?
It’s bullshit. It’s empty headed drek.
Now, if Armstrong gets up on stage and starts trying to convert people that didn’t show up for that, that’s a different issue. If she starts writing songs with LP that tear down what they’ve always claimed to believe, that’s a different issue.
I simply do not give a fuck about what fiction a person believes in. It has nothing to do with the music unless they make it about that.
Anyone wanna tear Scientology down? Go for it! It’s a giant scam as well as a cult. Tear down all of them as far as I’m concerned. Make it illegal, remove all non profit status from all of the brain washing cults that get called religion. But that’s still a separate issue from some band making music.
It’s the old art vs artist argument, only in this case, all the artist did was get raised in a disliked religion, and then take part in a truly fucking stupid show of support for a fellow church member. That’s it. That’s all she has done, unless there’s something I’m missing that she’s been accused of personally doing? Is there, was she actively involved in any of the bullshit the cult did? Did she know about it happening at the time at all?
It’s a fucking nothing burger, and if anyone tried saying the same shit about someone that was wiccan, or muslim, or christian that did the exact same thing, it would be a shitstorm against the person trying to do so.
Shit, nobody can even point to her doing anything after she discovered the details of the shitstain to support him.
That’s the fucking point, it’s a witch hunt.
See, by your logic, it’s okay if I am a anti-semite for example, just quietly.
So long as I’m only funding and supporting my Anton Jew crusade off stage and off screen, and never writing a song that says “kill the Jews”, it’s okay to take all my money from those concerts and funnel it into my organization that manufactures gas chambers “just in case”.
A quiet tolerance of racism, bigotry, and abuse, leads to its proliferation. Period.
It’s not a witch hunt. Her organization is directly responsible for funding hate and attacks on innocent people. The money she earns from the band will fund this. It is perfectly reasonable to object to her being able to jump onto this band’s good reputation and use it to fund such efforts.
No, I’m saying that if every single member of a group is responsible for the worst actions of their religion, then every Catholic, Muslim, baptist, jew, and any sect of Christianity is just as bad.
Singling Armstrong out and ignoring the rest is bullshit.
There is no religion on this earth, with the possible exception of Jains, that isn’t currently doing absolutely horrible shit.
And if you take into account past actions, anyone that’s christian supports genocide just by being a member of their local church.
I’m not saying Scientology is some kind of good thing, it isn’t.
I’m saying that all over the world, there are people that belong to religions that are horrible, but aren’t themselves. There’s people all over the world that go about their daily lives following their religion that they were raised in, but we’re not putting the weight of someone else’s actions on their shoulders.
But somehow, because this is scientology, she doesn’t get that pass.
Why? Why is she any different from Garth Brooks being an active, practicing Christian? A religion responsible for the current wave of hate against LGBTQ people everywhere. There are musicians that are muslims, and I don’t see anyone up in arms about that, and there are islamic groups right now commiting atrocities in multiple places.
Like it or not, there are entire generations of people raised in scientology that are no better or worse than christians or any other religion you pick.
So, why this woman? Why is she suddenly now responsible for all of it? Didn’t see anyone raising hell about her for being the singer in her previous band. No, it’s a bunch of butthurt children attacking her because it’s this band, looking for any damn excuse to be shitty to other people.
And let’s not forget that this all started up when one of Masterson’s victims raised hell at her. Which is understandable, what with the horror she went through herself. But Armstrong? She wasn’t one of the people writing letters after seeing the evidence, she isn’t on that list. She abandoned that ship after the very early stages of the generic support from scientology. Unless anyone has any proof otherwise? I’ve yet to see any, and I’ve been looking today.
Let me say it again. If she’s somehow evil for being a scientologist, then every single person in any religion (and they’re all made up craziness) is evil for staying a member of their religion. If anyone of any older religion is given the benefit of the doubt at all, then she should have that same benefit given.
Nobody has yet to bring up anything other than her still being a scientologist to condemn her actions. I’ve not seen any evidence of wrongdoing that she did. To the contrary, up until this explosion, nobody had much of anything to say about her at all, and Dead Sara wasn’t exactly an unheard of band. They just dropped an album three years ago, nobody was making accusations of anything then, nobody was on the warpath about her fronting a different band.
So, are we now going to start going after every religion? I’m fine with that, hold every single member of every religion responsible for the actions of the rest. It’s a bad idea, but at least it’s consistent.
This is honestly the worst-faith arguing I’ve seen in a looong time. To the point that it’s actually funny when I’ve read it a couple times
Who the fuck is stopping you dumbass? Go right ahead.
No one asked you to care or asked your opinion.
If you don’t know the history behind Scientology and what happened to Chester, and why it matters. Sit the fuck down and stop acting like a fucking moron.
Man, people are just addicted to drama, and so locked into their own heads that they can’t step outside of it for even a minute.
It’s an abusive cult you fucking moron! Would you care if she was a literal Nazi? Probably not, because you’re part of the fucking problem.
You do know that fedia.io has a rule about behavior, right?
Fuck cult, rape, murder and otherwise abusive spineless apologists like you!
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There’s a difference between incendiary and attacking an individual.
I criticized the idea, called it stupid.
While that may be taken to be an attack on anyone that holds the idea, it is a different thing.
Now, people being stupid is kinda on the borderline, and I probably should have been more careful in my phrasing, but I did specify that it was about this subject, not all subjects, or even that holding the stupid opinion makes them inherently stupid. Plenty of otherwise great people hold stupid ideas.
Which is kinda relevant to the subject as well. The new singer being involved in a cult only means that she’s stupid about that, not that there’s anything else going on about her that’s bad or dumb.
Also, my lemmy homie, tattling? The only way to maintain a given C/ or instance is to have clear statements of usage terms. Someone breaking those tarnishes the entire C/ or instance. Don’t believe me? Hexbear. Lemmygrad. Lemmy.ml. Even lemmy.world. They catch shit all the time because people just ignore the rules/terms.
A very gentle reminder to someone being directly nasty to someone else in violation of those terms isn’t tattling, and even if it was, that’s why reporting exists on lemmy in the first place. Nobody can moderate everything solo. Reports are necessary for that.
And, again, instead of just being nasty back, despite multiple direct written attacks, all I did is remind them that what they’re doing isn’t acceptable based on terms they agreed to.
You don’t want to get reported, don’t do shit you agreed not to do. We’re supposed to do that instead of getting into slap fights.