OPINION
On Decapitated
The Perserverence of Rape Culture in Rock and Metal
by Dan Chilton Illustrations by Vivian Veidt
THE PACIFIC SENTINEL
Content Warning: This article includes details of sexual assault. In September of 2017, all four members of the Polish death metal outfit Decapitated (Michał Łysejko, Wacław Kiełtyka, Rafał Piotrowski and Hubert Więcek) were arrested on charges of kidnapping and rape following a show they played in Spokane, Washington. The charges came from two women who were reportedly held against their will on the band’s tour bus after the show. One was able to escape. The other reported that she was then raped by all four members of the band in the bathroom of the bus—with police citing “significant bruising and abrasions on her arms that were consistent with being restrained.” That October, while being held in the Los Angeles County Jail, they were all formally
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charged with rape. Awaiting their upcoming trial that was scheduled for that January, they left on bail of $100,000 each after spending a total of 96 days in jail. Come January 5, 2018, all charges against the band are dropped with the victim’s well being cited as the sole reason. Shortly after, Decapitated released a long winded letter expressing desire to “move forward” from this event and claimed complete innocence—even going so far as to call themselves victims of false accusations, saying that “[w]ords hurt. Words matter. Truth matters.” Decapitated has since returned to the scene in full force. Touring all over the world with such acts as Napalm Death, High on Fire, Inferi, and Archspire, it seems that the community has been more than willing to look past the victim’s horror stories of sexual violence in the continual allowance of rape culture that has
long pervaded the rock and metal scenes since their inceptions. One needn’t look far to find instances of this culture. Courtney Love’s reported sexual assaults at her own shows; The Scorpions’ pedophilic original artwork on their album flagrantly titled “Virgin Killer;” the countless reports of assault at both Woodstock events; the continued admiration for late womanizer, abuser, and pedophile GG Allin; Manowar’s Karl Logan’s recent arrest and guilty plea on possession of pornographic content of girls as young as four years old; the rape and murder of Mia Zapata (of The Gits) in 1993. The list of transgressions goes on, with an untold number remaining unreported. Sexual assualt, pedophilia, murder, and other forms of violence against women, the queer and trans communities, and others, have long been an
