...Or not.

There's been a lot of drama in the Metal community lately thanks to a University of Melbourne study that apparently links Metal with depression...y'know, like it hasn't been linked before. But it's caused enough of a stir with at least one musician, Jason Foley, that he wrote a statement about it, to which the study's author, Dr. McFerran, responded, and he then rebutted.

To be honest, I was trying to avoid this topic, but some comments attached to the rebuttal have compelled me to speak out.

I haven't read the entire study, in fact, I've only skimmed the introduction and discussion (which are essentially the most important portions of any report), but what little I've read has already had an effect. The study indicates that teens choose music based on their mood, and that their mood can be changed by the music they listen to. This isn't news, folks, I've known for years (and I'm sure loads of other music-listeners have too) that I tend to choose music that reflects my mood and my mood can change based on what I am listening to.

The danger with this study, and all the research that McFerran refers to, is the fact that it was done by the academic establishment. Why do I think that's a problem? Because, unfortunately, academia is myopic and tunnel-visioned; I've addressed this problem before.  For some strange reason, academics limit themselves and generally wind up missing the point entirely, which results in reports such as this (which the media, and U of Melbourne then completely misrepresented and blew out of proportion).

In the case of this particular report, the inference is that the music is what causes the initial problem, when it's clear, from her own report, that the music is used to alleviate a problem that already exists. If you read the discussion at the end of the report you will see how she is forcing the data to conform to her ideas ("...some strong emotional experiences may result in an initial deterioration of mood, but ultimately result in an improvement...However this is an unlikely explanation in the context of this study since participants were reflecting on experiences in the past four weeks. It could be assumed that any delayed positive effect would have been enacted by this time, thus altering how they answered the question." [emphasis added]).

You know what they say about assuming...

In the immortal words of whoever said it first, "There are 3 kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics," and any report can say whatever the author or academic establishment wants it to based on how they manipulate the wording and the stats. What everyone needs to take away from this is the fact that all people react differently to different music and you cannot possibly make inferences across a population because there are simply too many confounding factors. Ergo, this "research" is useless.

I believe that we gravitate toward music that speaks to us, and we will make our own choices based on our life experiences. People like to vilify Metal and point to the few instances when Metal fans have either killed others, or themselves, as proof that Metal is harmful. Yet nobody bothers to comment on music when a rap fan does a drive-by, or a pop fan bullies a fellow student into committing suicide. I have long believed that what we don't understand we fear, and what we fear we try to destroy. Those who would try to destroy Metal are they who do not understand it. To those people who believe that Metal causes people to kill others, I would point to the thousands of Metal fans who have never killed anyone. And to those people who would like to believe that Metal causes depression, I would say, talk to someone for whom Metal has been a life-saver and helped them cope through stressful and depressing times (like me).

If we are going to bring music into the equation when a Metal fan commits a crime or suicide, then we need to bring it into the equation for every crime or suicide. Music is not the enemy, narrow-mindedness is.