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...
...continued from part one. It appears that Ashley Walters remained relatively quiet regarding her alleged abuse and anything that has to do with Marilyn Manson from March 2019 till February 1, 2021. Later we will find out that she was very much active during this time in regards to those things, but her first public statement about the abuse she allegedly suffered by her former employer Marilyn Manson came on the day Evan Rachel Wood first named her abuser. On February 1, 2021, Evan named Marilyn Manson as her abuser for the first time, and this was followed by others who made accusations of abuse and assault, many of whom coordinated before this time to issue their statements together on the same day. Among these women was Ashley Walters, a long-time friend of nearly all of Manson's accusers, who posted the statement above on her Instagram account, along with what appears to be three text messages from Marilyn Manson to Ashley W...