Lindsey Way and MSI: my final thoughts, because apparently there must be "judgement"

People keep dragging out the same dead horse to beat, so here's my condensed opinion. It will not change for the foreseeable future.The big criticism of Lindsey Way is about her band. I think we all know that JU is a pedophile at this point, not only from the court case but from a lot of stories from fans from before 2021. This discourse should be applied to Gerard as it is to Lindsey, because after they got married, he associated with JU just as openly as she did. The issue is the double standards.Some people think Lindsey knew JU was a pedo all along, some people think she didn't. We will probably never know. I think people want to point to one person to blame for the fallout, and because she's a woman, they point to Lindsey. This shit isn't uncommon in the scene, there's creeps everywhere who aren't given half as much negative attention as she is. No one wants to give this energy to Jared Leto, or All Time Low, or Brand New. No one wants to talk about the structural issues in the music industry that allow people like JU to get away with shit like this, everyone wants to point to one person because it's easier. I'd like to point out that in the lawsuit, the defendants were MSI's label, their manager, and JU - no mention of Lindsey at all, which makes sense because she wasn't involved with the band when the grooming and assaults took place. Jane Doe clearly thought that the institutions in place allowed for the abuse, and should be held accountable.The other issue with msi is their heavy use of slurs, particularly the n word, as “shock value”, and their dog whistle lyrics about pedophilia. I guess they were seen as “progressive” or “punk” by a lot of white queer kids at the time, but nowadays I think most people have realised it's hacky, racist and basically just a grab for attention rather than any kind of “rebellion”. While I understand there are some young gay people who found comfort in them, and probably still do, i think this says more about how much white people are willing to ignore the racist things in the media they like. Case and point, Elvis Presley (another weirdo who co opted black music and aesthetics for profit and was a pedophile. Funny). Again, it's a structural issue. In 2025, msi is less than relevant. In other words, pointless and disappointing. I struggle immensely to give this band any grace, if you couldn't tell. They have one song where JU rages about hating Jimmy Page, and then the rest of their discography is stuff like “five year old panty shot” and “I wanna be black”. Fucking gross.Which is another thing - if you look back at old photoshoots, they had a huge issue with appropriating black aesthetics that were used in Gangster rap. On the whole JU has a weird obsession with wanting to have more “street cred” than he really does. Again this is a structural issue, punk as a genre has VERY black roots, but it was co-opted by white people. Msi reminds me of the Sex Pistols - "revolutionary" for their time, and, as with all subjective art, some people thought they were good. However they are both washed up artifacts now, their messages ring hollow, with frontmen who need to fuck off and never show face again; especially JU, who would be better off rotting in prison forever. (That being said, I think that some of the lyrical content of Sex Pistols songs is actually very good and far superior to msi; Johnny Rotten just doesn't understand his own goddamn work).I hate msi myself, and I used to really like Lindsey when I first got into mcr. I enjoyed her art projects and she is an important introduction to many young girls to show that girls can be musicians/performers in a male dominated field like rock music. I wanted to learn guitar because of her. I never bothered to look into her band deeply, I wasn't into that kind of music, I listened to maybe one or two songs from them - I was 15 and impressionable.Unfortunately, I was then dragged into the lynzwayuglyliar blog's baseless claims about cheating, some miscellaneous bullshit, and accusations of some kind of online bullying that I have since never seen credible receipts for. That being said, if someone came forward, I would believe them on the basis that I think nobody wins anything by coming forward about abuse. Point is, the blog was just misogyny central, pulling "evidence" out of scraps. She didn't create the nowaymikeyway blog, they're grasping at straws with that. I do not fucking care about whatever went on between her and Jessicka Addams. It's literally none of my business, and none of yours.By the time I shook off the damage that blog did, the lawsuit against JU came out, and I felt disappointed again. I will never be able to look at Lindsey the same way again because of her being associated with that band, but it's obviously a dead project - unless JU decides he's too strapped for cash and has to drag it out to reimburse himself after paying off his victim. But I don't think that will happen. I think Lindsey has some kind of moral backbone about that, or I'd hope that's so.The big thread that seems to connect the discussion about Lindsey/msi is disappointment. People are disappointed. And while I understand she served as an important figure to some people, I think it would be best if we rid ourselves of celebrity worship entirely, and discard our emotional attachments to flawed people we don't know - but that's a whole nother discussion. (Again I must point out that this kind of discourse almost never occurs about Gerard. People never seem to be disappointed by Gerard unless it's about his complete exit from the public eye.)As the Lindsey misinformation carrd mentioned, Lindsey doesn't go by her stage name anymore, and I think that's her way of distancing herself from msi, but again we will probably never know. Speculation is just that, speculation. She's not online anymore, for obvious reasons, and there's no point in bringing this up every year just to get the same answer. There's other things that she's allegedly said and done, which I won't get into here because I'm not informed enough (and I don't know if there's going to ever be a solid reliable source for those things), including making really fucking callous and gross comments about the 2011 tsunami in Japan, but that was over a decade ago. Not to say that doesn't deserve criticism, I just like to believe people can change and grow, that's the only way I stay sane. Personal preference. Form your own opinions.But I will never be able to look at her and Gerard the same way again because they proudly stood by a pedophile and gave him a platform, whilst profiting off the racism built into msi for years. Everyone draws their lines in the sand - and that's my line.