There is a point in One Assassination Under God – Chapter 2 where the language of survival finally becomes the language of retaliation. “The Arsonist” is that point. The song is not simply about having survived an attempt to destroy you. It is about what happens afterward, when the person who has been burned decides that the fire did not finish him and that the scars it left behind have become part of his strength. Manson himself described the song as the moment when the narrative of the two chapters “crystallizes into a battle stance,” and, referring to the painting he created for it, said that the “burned scar tissue” had formed into armor. That description gets very close to the heart of the song. The fire has not disappeared. It has changed him. The title is important because Manson does not call the song The Survivor or The Victim . He calls it "The Arsonist." An arsonist deliberately starts a fire, and this changes the entire perspective of the song. The speaker is no...
Someone recently wrote me and said to me that there is no possible motivating factor for Evan Rachel Wood to target Marilyn Manson, and they argued this on the basis that she is a successful actress who is in no need of money or fame. After I explained that there are other factors, probably more powerful, besides money or fame for someone to target another person in order to destroy them, I was challenged to name just one. I replied that I have already made a private list of possible motivating factors, and they number 64 as of right now, but since I didn't want to burden anyone with the details of 64 possible motivating factors, I would narrow them down to 10, all of which I believe are highly probable factors why Evan Rachel Wood has targeted Marilyn Manson, and not one of them has anything to do with money or fame, though I do consider those two as possible motivating factors of a secondary nature. As time goes on and our knowledge of this case grows, I may modify this ...