Skeptic Project

It's truly an only-in-America saga: a high-wattage right-wing talk show host trading culture-war jibes with a gothy neo-emo-rock band from New Jersey.

Yes, as the Guardian reports Thursday, Glenn Back is brawling with My Chemical Romance.

It started on April 28, when the outgoing Fox News Channel anchor devoted a segment of his 5 p.m. hour to a recent episode of "Glee" in which the cast performs My Chemical Romance's hit anthem, "Sing."

"I've watched it with a sense of horror, combined with a sense of admiring awe," Beck said of the massively popular musical comedy-drama, which airs on his program's flagship sister network, Fox. "It is a brilliant, brilliant show, very very well done. But it is a horror show."

The specific horror Beck was referring to in this case? Ten lines from "Sing," which he recited as they flashed across the screen:

Cleaned up, corporation progress
Dying in the process
Children that can talk about it
Living on the railways**
People moving sideways
Sell it till your last days
Buy yourself the motivation
Generation nothing,
Nothing but a dead scene
Product of a white dream

"This is propaganda, and it's an anthem," said Beck. "It's an anthem saying, 'Join us.' How can you and I possibly win against that?"

As the Guardian notes, "Beck appeared to take lyrics from the song, which is set in a post-apocalyptic California, literally." Which prompted the following response from My Chemical Romance frontman Gerard Way on the band's blog two days later:

I think the word Glenn Beck was looking for was "subversion" not "propaganda", because I don't know what it would be considered propaganda for- truth? sentiment?
And I can't tell what he's angrier about- the fact that it's how I feel about the persistent sterilization of our culture or the fact that it's on network television for everyone to hear.
And railways? Is it 1863? Seen any children living on these lately instead of the internet?
I'm actually shocked that no actual fact-checking was done on the lyrics. I mean Fox is a major news channel, covering factual topics in an unbiased and intelligent-
oh wait-

**The actual lyric is "living on the Web ways," not "railways."

In any case, My Chemical Romance probably won't have to worry about their lyrics being misrepresented on Fox News for much longer: Beck's show is slated to cease production sometime before the end of the year.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thecutline/20110505/ts_yblog_thecutline/mano-a-emo-glenn-beck-vs-my-chemical-romance