PLATFORM : Wretched Excess: Manson as Pop Idol

Charles Manson, this convicted mass murderer, the man who caused so much agony for so many people, has become the latest symbol of the entertainment industry’s glorification of violence and its profiteering at the expense of crime victims.

Guns N’ Roses’ decision to perform Manson’s song virtually guaranteed that the album would generate the kind of controversial firestorm the industry uses to sell records. It was a calculated business decision by Guns N’ Roses and Geffen Records, the company that released the album. To them, violence is an easy way to turn a profit, even if it bankrupts society by fueling the mayhem around us.

Guns N’ Roses and Geffen Records are now promising to donate profits from the album to some of the people who have suffered at the hands of Charles Manson. But they just don’t get it. We don’t want their blood money, nor are we advocating censorship. We want them to think more carefully about the impact their products have on impressionable young minds and realize that they’re contributing in a very real way to the violence that is tearing our society apart.

The peddling of violence by the entertainment industry is nothing new. From Al Capone to Bonnie and Clyde, the industry has been romanticizing criminals for years, no matter how vicious or mindless their actual crimes might have been. But today’s absolute lack of restraint by the industry has reached dangerous levels. Music videos that glamorize gangs and offer violence as a legitimate solution are routinely marketed to teen-agers.

Meanwhile, Beavis and Butt-head are seen as role models for a new generation, while trading cards once reserved for sports heroes now carry the portraits of serial killers. And so it is with Charles Manson, whose menacing face now appears on T-shirts worn by middle-class teen-agers who weren’t around when he committed his unspeakable crimes--the same teen-agers who will likely buy Guns N’ Roses’ new album, never stopping to think just what it really represents.

We can end this celebration of violence simply by refusing to provide an audience for murderers and their promoters. By boycotting movies and records released by companies attempting to cash in on violence by glorifying criminals, we can send a clear message: Crime doesn’t pay, and the monsters who commit crimes should not be made into heroes.