For Today Care About Human Rights (Unless You’re Gay)

For Today’s new video is for a song called “Fight the Silence.” And what, pray tell, is the silence the band is fighting? Explains a press release:

“’Fight The Silence’ has a strong social message and proceeds from the sale of this song and forthcoming album will go to support the A21 Campaign to help shine a light on the issue of human trafficking.”

That’s obviously a great cause on which to shine a light, and the band’s efforts to spread the word to their fanbase are admirable.

Still, it’s hard to forget that it wasn’t even a year ago that For Today’s then-guitarist, Mike Reynolds, had to quit the band amid a flurry of controversy surrounding his extremely homophobic comments… and that eleven months later, the band still has yet to publicly declare that homosexuality isn’t a sin, as Reynolds claimed. The closest they ever got was when vocalist Mattie Montgomery apologized to fans who felt “alienated” by Reynolds’ comments, which is hardly the same thing, and most certainly makes Montgomery and the other members of For Today guilty of the sin of omission. (Montgomery even gave out what was allegedly his phone number to talk to any fans who were offended by what Reynolds said; he never returned MetalSucks’ calls requesting a comment.) Given the number of OTHER bands that explicitly spoke out against Reynolds during the incident — including members of Trivium, Touche Amore, This is Hell, Evergreen Terrace, and Winds of Plague — I still find it baffling that no one from For Today has said anything. And I can only assume they haven’t said anything because, ultimately, they agree with Reynolds’ assertion.

I guess what I’m saying is this: how can anyone be expected to take a message about human rights seriously when it’s coming from a band that has a history of not respecting human rights?

“Fight the Silence” is the title track from For Today’s new album, which comes out February 4 on Razor & Tie.