Ask Lemmy

Maybe read a little more about the history before you start whitewashing it.

Elvis Presley in particular was seen as a problem specifically because he was a white man singing black music to young white girls. The same people hated that Rock and Roll before white artists adopted it, but it only really became a problem after a boom in popularity with white children. Rolling Stones were still singing black music to white audiences. While the contemporary trend might have been to stigmatize the sex and drug lifestyle, that lifestyle was still seen by racists as a black influence. Those prejudices were still firmly rooted in a pervasive racism that still very much gripped the country. The war on drugs and free sex (like sex and marriage between races) was very rooted in racism.

Metal, Glam, and Marilyn Manson is a couple generations removed from the black roots of rock music. But, the people promoting these satanic panic ideas were at the same time fighting to censor and restrict the growing Hip-hop scene. It was all the same fight, which is how you get people like Dee Snyder from Twisted Sister and Frank Zappa speaking out about legislation targeting censorship of Hip-Hop and Rock music. Maybe race wasn't the only issue for conservative fascists, but it never stopped being a factor.