The UTD Mercury

April 20 marks the nine-year anniversary of the Columbine High School shooting. With similar occurrences, like last year's Virginia Tech shooting, still making headlines nearly a decade later, I think it is important to re-examine the possible causes of such atrocities.

Since one potential cause, highlighted by the media, relates directly to my area of interest, I've decided to put some serious thought into the question, "Did the music make them do it?" because I don't see how it could.

Columbine High School shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were noted for being fans of two bands in particular: Marilyn Manson and Rammstein. Manson answered for himself in Michael Moore's 2002 documentary Bowling for Columbine, but I'll give Rammstein a closer look.

German industrial/metal band Rammstein formed in 1993, and over its decade-and-a-half history has faced numerous accusations of promoting violence and Nazism. In one instance pertaining to the 1999 Columbine High shooting, Christian author Johanna Michaelsen, in an interview on The 700 Club, attributed the massacre to Rammstein's influence.

However, accusations of rock bands influencing violent behavior were nothing new in 1999.

The Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC), formed in 1985 by, among others, Tipper Gore, warned parents about the dangers of exposing children to the violent or sexually explicit music of such artists as Judas Priest and Cindy Lauper.

But if 20 years after the fact no one, or at least no one getting national attention, blames Cindy Lauper for the spike in teen pregnancy rates in the late 80s, then no one should blame Rammstein for promoting school shootings.

Rammstein, however, has also been accused by the German press of promoting Nazism, according to a Hit Parader magazine article referenced by Rammstein fan Web site Herzeleid.com.

The band has been accused of Nazism for two main reasons. First the original album cover of 1993's Herzeleid, which featured the band members, shown from the chest up, standing shirtless with a giant orange flower in the background, supposedly depicts the six men as poster children for the Aryan race. To me this album cover looks like a cover for a gay nudie calendar. It would more effectively promote the gay lifestyle than German supremacy. On a side note, Rammstein are reportedly not gay.

The second accusation of Nazism arises from comparisons of singer Till Lindemann's tendency to trill his "r"s to the way in which Hitler speaks in recordings. This just seems like nitpicking. With that argument one could say anyone speaking German with a Russian accent is imitating Hitler as well.

More recently there is the ABC News broadcast of a story on Russian neo-Nazi skinheads, which showed video clips of savage beatings they made, scored by Rammstein's music. I'm willing to bet almost anything the skinheads didn't contact Rammstein's management to ask for permission to use their music.

The closest confirmed link between Rammstein and Nazism comes in the form of the band's admission of similarity to, and of having been influenced by, Slovenian industrial band Laibach, the members of which actually wear Nazi-style uniforms in many of their band photos for satirical purposes.

My own observations of Rammstein fans in the Dallas area further confirm my belief that there is no link between the band's music and killing sprees. As an occasional visitor of industrial-themed nights at Dallas's Lizard Lounge, a club that regularly plays Rammstein, I have yet to see a fellow club-goer shoot anyone. Hansel Von Quenzer, organizer and promoter of many of the Lizard Lounge's gothic/industrial events, explained that dark music doesn't produce a new breed of violence-prone people.

"There are certain people that have always been into the darker side of life, people that liked the Doors and KISS and The Damned from the 70s, and when (gothic/industrial music) came in, that was just right down their alley, and they just kept doing what they have always been doing," Von Quenzer said.

I honestly think that if the music of Rammstein can really influence people to do something, - that something is wearing black vinyl and dancing badly in clove-cigarette-smoke-filled clubs, not killing people.

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