Singapore Gets In On The Hate Crime Crusade Against Heavy Metal

We went into the eighteenth century assuming that man-made or artificial systems could do better than nature, based on the “me first” individualism of The Enlightenment.™ People assumed that this would free us of the kings and the crazed mob both, but they were all deceived.

Mobs after all are formed of individualists. No one joins a mob because they want order; people join a mob because that way, they get what they want, without having to sacrifice themselves to get it. A more individualistic pursuit is hard to imagine.

As the time of individualism fades, people are looking for orders, namely organizations and social frameworks like tribe, culture, customs, faith, and purpose. Black metal tapped into this by pointing out that in the hands of the herd, everything had become a popularity contest or trend and lost its meaning.

For example, black metal criticized religion for essentially losing its fascination with death and judgment and focusing on being “nice” to everyone, and had the same barbs ready for democracy, tolerance, pluralism, corporate chains, and the modern lifestyle. In the name of the self, everything had become passive because groups of selves need a kind of pacifism in order to be selfish together.

The fading of this prole-rule brings a doubling-down on what worked in the past. States are more interested in nations than nation-states now, a change called populism. People are rejecting mass religion and embracing traditional private religion or outright paganism. Faith in the global order and egalitarian ideas like liberal democracy, equality, diversity, and tolerance are fading.

Singapore follows the West in cracking down on metal music for what is essentially hate crimes legislation — “denigrating religions and promoting violence” — using similar language to the proposed anti-Semitism bill now floating around the halls of American government. On the other side of the globe, Singapore has banned Swedish death metal after encountering Watain:

Singapore banned Swedish death metal group Watain Live (sic) from performing a concert on Thursday over concerns about the band’s history of “denigrating religions and promoting violence”.

“MHA has expressed serious concerns about the concert, given the band’s history of denigrating religions and promoting violence, which has potential to cause enmity and disrupt Singapore’s social harmony,” the IMDA said in a statement.

Singapore keeps a tight rein on public speech and the media, especially when it comes to matters related to race and religion, but bans are fairly rare.

We now have two groups trying to police speech and art: those who want to defend the traditional, and the much larger group, the Leftists, who want to prevent anything but egalitarian dogma from getting to the audience. This shows the two forces gearing up for world conflict in the coming century.

In the meantime, we might recommend to Singapore that they take another look. Organized religion has proven itself inept at defending tradition, but accurate when it comes to nailing altar boys. Even more, this religion is now preaching equality instead of the idea of an order larger than the individual, and therefore the most devout should throw it out the window if they encounter it.

People want order. Order requires standards, norms, and a sense of purpose. In the West, we tried to derive these from Christianity, but because it was focused on the individual and the universal, it assumed something like equality in the mental awareness and cognitive abilities of its followers, and so it was easily taken over.

For those of us who hold to the Old Ways, which state that religion is an offshoot of the customs of your land and consists with direct contact with nature, these newfangled religions seem to have failed, even if we recognize that they are mostly written statements of our knowledge that was passed down through experience between the generations.

We are sailing into uncharted waters with this new conflict. The idea that has led our societies for the past half-millennium is dying, falling apart as it comes into conflict with itself, since the world that it has created it is the opposite of what it promised. Swedish death metal will lead the way, no doubt.

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6 thoughts on “Singapore Gets In On The Hate Crime Crusade Against Heavy Metal”

  1. Krabapple says:

    Whenever a set of laws can apply to a group of people equally not in terms of punishment but in terms of ‘dessert’ (we are all endowed with…, we are all ensouled… etc.) then it is of course easily co-opted when the implicit hierarchy buttressing them is uprooted. At this point they are then ‘co-opted’ by power seekers into not only presuming we have things by birth, but then using this point as a further justification that people ‘deserve more’ in this life than they already have . “Principals” are the ethical darlings of the Enlightenment, rather than a wisdom being taken for granted by the codifiers of legislation (authors of Bible, maybe Lycurgus and Numa Pompilius) and then written without concern for whether or not the people below it ‘understand why’. Or something.

    Though on this Singaporean issue it’s simply that Watain is a big sore thumb to the ‘social fabric’ that the government has a finger in and HAS had a finger in by design for quite some time. Whenever that happens ‘examples’ are usually needed in order reinforce obedience. If anything I think that this is an illustrative example of how that kind of enforcement works.

  2. Henry Lee Kwan Lucas says:

    Singapore is a fascinating fascist like country…
    Prostitution is legal and heavily regulated… Just Google red-light houses in Geylang.
    Chewing gum is legal, and if you are caught with drugs,you may face the death sentence by hanging.For Death row inmates, you can harvest their organs with their consent…. Watain might be targeted due to the Strong Evangelical Christian presence in the ruling PAP government… Plus, anything that touches Religion and Race is heavily scrutinised. During the old days , if you are wearing any gruesome Heavy Metal band T shirt, with long Hair to enter their customs checkpoint … They will just wisk you to do a urine drug test or just plainly reject your entry…

  3. gottlieb says:

    Singapore did well to protect their population from crappy black metal like Watain. As a modern city-state, they are a success story and don’t need any lessons from the US. They are capitalism + nationalism + high-living standards + traditional moral order.

    You’re always criticizing modern thinking while at the same time proposing a return to a past moral order that is simply impossible.

    The Greek aristocratic ethic of having a social order that mimics nature (more precisely, the natural capabilities each is born with) has been permanently replaced by the modern ethic that has its roots in Christianity and that values personal freedom and merit above all else: you are what you make of yourself, regardless of what you’re born with. It’s obvious why this latter perspective will always be more popular and thus win people over in the long run, and I agree with it, because it means nobody gets a high status for free.

    On the other hand, the exaggerations of modern Leftism (from equal chances to demanding entitlements for every freak) can be restrained and are not thus a necessary development – they are already provoking a populist reaction.

    We should be more like Singapore and – while giving everyone an equal start chance – still see the wisdom in the old traditions, since they are a way to keep an equilibrium between our personal freedoms and the natural world.

  4. berzerker says:

    Brett is a kind of socialist really. He hates individualism. He is scared he doesn’t measure up. Just like all socialists, he wants to be part of a collective. He can’t big himself up, because he has no achievements, but he can big up the white race or the WASP demographic or Western civilization or whatever and bask in its achievements. The fact that his need for collectivism stops at a certain racial or national or ethnic point doesn’t stop the essential fact he needs to be part of a herd. He doesn’t seem to realize the people who achieved things in and for those demographics he exhorts were not doing it for those collectives but for themselves. They might have been doing it for God, but that is the just a way of rationalizing doing it for yourself. All the greats of the Western civilization were individualists, usually succeeding despite not because of the idiots who surrounded them.

    1. goldilocks says:

      If I recall correctly, Brett/Prozak was some sort of a Marxist in the 90s, which would explain the totalitarian tendencies in my opinion. Nevertheless, his philosophic view on metal is still probably the best stuff around of this sort. Plus, the fact that the guy won’t ever admit being wrong makes it a worthy challenge ahaha.

      I agree with almost all of your points, BUT just remember that the great people of Western culture were never pure individualists – they always thought about the others/society and oriented their actions accordingly. The main flaw of pure individualism is ignoring the fact that with must live with others and that we live under their influence regardless.
      Keep close to your roots, but strive for greatness.

    2. canadaspaceman says:

      meh.
      IF this is true (Brett WAS a commie), than that should speak volumes how a hollow system it is, and not gratifying.
      A slave system will only work for non-whites who never tasted freedom.
      In Canada, we are stuck.
      We enjoy some socialism (healthcare for example, but illegal immigrants,and unwanted invaders are driving the costs up);
      but we also want the the protection that comes from being British subjects and an American neighbor.

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