#and everyone I've talked about this with so far don't even live anywhere near Southeast Asia

[glass-needles-and-futurisms]

#Thoughts Musers?#Mine are a bit mixed: apprehensive yes and also totally understanding that#(as someone FROM Asia—where they NEVER usually tour—they would want to avoid a situation where they stopped from playing)#along with bits of ‘shame that Muse feel the need to comply; just seems so un-Muse-like’#Muse band#musers#wotp tour#Muse Kuala Lumpur#Muse#muse band#2023#muse live#Wonder which song too

So full disclosure: I am in Kuala Lumpur right now because this is probably my best and only chance to see Muse live. And it's not just because I'm Asian; I'm from a very specific nationality whose movement in and out of the country is very tightly regulated and monitored (unless you're rich). We have one of the weakest passports in the world, and western countries like the US and UK are extremely strict about who they give visas to. You could be financially independent, acclaimed and successful in your field and still not get a visa for even a brief 3-day work conference in Cleveland. I spent the last couple weeks an anxious wreck because I have no idea if I could even make it to Malaysia... all because I have no idea whether the immigration officer I'll run into at the airport is gonna be a power-tripping douchebag or not.

I mention this because I'm bothered by the mismatch of privilege whenever these kinds of issues come up. It's not just this show or the 1975 incident; it came up back when Muse toured China in the Drones era too.

It's easy to lean back and boycott Band X when you have the luxury to pick and choose which artists are worth your time, or won't go against your principles. Is it a hypocritical money grab to agree to a gig even if it goes against the messages you espouse in your music? Sure. Is it bad to capitulate to the demands of controlling governments just for the sake of putting on a show? Sure. But do Malaysians who enjoy Muse deserved to be punished for the conservative values of a government/culture they didn't choose to be born into? Well...

Inevitably all this circles back to the kind of "no ethical consumption under capitalism"- style moral accounting The Good Place exists to dissect. We all make compromises when it comes to the things we consume or patronize, and we have different thresholds for what our personal values can and can't tolerate. People still buy smartphones and Shein clothes. They still listen to Chris Brown and Marilyn Manson and a whole ton of "problematic" musicians. They still look the other way when a celebrity they like does something horrible.

Policing every single thing other people like based on how moral or "problematic" it is may seem noble, but it is both an exhausting way to live and a gateway to a ton of insane gatekeeping/purity culture logic. And that goes double when your lived reality exists on a different plane from someone else's.

The Muse fandom is not a monolith. Not everyone holds the same values and principles... nor the same freedom to actually exercise them. We can argue 'til we're blue in the face about whether they're morally compromised by virtue of being an international stadium act beholden to higher powers. Or we can argue over whether role-playing political ambiguity deserves to be punished to the degree of, say, domestic abuse or sexual assault or open racism. Either way there's still gonna be some random kid who can't watch his favorite band for reasons completely unrelated to these culture wars.

Because unless all this Matty Healy discourse is actually going to uplift Malaysia's marginalized LGBT community through direct activism, all of this is just posturing by privileged white people and their enablers in an ethical pissing contest. Unless you're working to fight world injustices in a way that's not just "getting angry on the internet", you're not a better person for saying Muse are hypocrites for performing in a shitty country full of people who never asked to live there (or in the case of Southeast Asians, probably can't leave even if they wanted to). "Let he among us without sin" and all that.

I don't really know what my point is here. If you think one censored song is worth cancelling Muse over, that's up to you. Maybe if I could actually afford to go to more shows I'll even agree.

Muse have “pulled one song from their planned KL setlist owing to its title” following Matty Healy in Malaysia-gate. Huh.