Otep Shamaya Explains Why Phil Labonte Shouldn’t Use Gay Slurs, Calls Butcher Babies “Moronic Bimbos”
Otep Shamaya apparently doesn’t really drink or do drugs. But I really wish I could buy her a congratulatory apple juice right now.
The outspoken vocalist has given a characteristically-blunt new interview to Jamey Jasta on Jamey Jasta’s The Jasta Show featuring Jamey Jasta podcast, during which she takes down some of metal’s dumbest, inexplicably popular acts.
She begins by articulately explaining why Phil Labonte shouldn’t use slurs against the LGBT community. That might sound fairly self-explanatory, yet Labonte and people like him defend it by saying “it’s just a word” and “we don’t mean it against gay people.” Says Shamaya:
“There are kids who listen to your music and who go to school every day and they are picked on and they are called that term… he was calling people ‘faggots’… there’s a reason why they call gay people ‘faggots.’ They used to burn gay people alive. Because a ‘faggot’ is a bundle of sticks, that’s the original [definition] for the word.”
She continues:
“He said ‘I don’t mean it in the way you think I mean it, I don’t mean ‘fag’ as in ‘gay,’, and I said, ‘Okay, you’re a straight white guy, You don’t get to decided what is offensive to the people who are being attacked.”
Eventually, the subject turns to Shamaya’s other “rock beefs” (i.e. feuds with metal musicians)… which is when the Butcher Babies come up. First, familiarize yourself with this horrible song (or at least its lyrics):
She likens herself as
To one of the greats
But if you look in her eyes
All you see is hate
She screams her insecurities and
The foolish things she thinks
She’s just a broken toy in
A land of make believe
Well, it turns out the song is about Shamaya. Understandably, Shamaya is not flattered, describing the band’s co-vocalists, Heidi Shepherd and Carla Harvey, as “moronic bimbos” and alleging that Shepherd has a “sugar daddy” and called Shamaya “a cunt” on YouTube before continuing (transcription courtesy of The PRP):
“I hate them, I hate those motherfuckers. Heidi can fucking suck a fart out of my ass. Fuck that bitch man, she called me a cunt on YouTube. I was nice to them. I took them out as my direct support on my tour and they weren’t even signed—I did that as a favor.
“The reason why they got so mad at me was ’cause I wouldn’t hang out and do blow with them after the show. I wouldn’t come and do cocaine. I don’t do drugs. I don’t do drugs… I’m not sober because I had a problem, I just don’t like drugs, I don’t like the way they make me feel. I don’t drink because I just don’t really like the way it makes me feel. I’ll have the occasional cocktail if it’s celebratory.
“But they got so mad that I wouldn’t fucking hang out and do drugs with them and party with them every night. I’m like ‘dude I got a show tomorrow, you guys should be paying attention too cause you sound like fucking shit, every night. You look like shit. You should be taking care, you should maybe drink some apple juice or something, take care of yourself.’”
Shamaya goes on to claim that Shepherd “got some fucking, like grandpa, lawyer—something—some high powered lawyer in Los Angeles who pays for all her plastic surgery and shit like that.” When Jasta interrupts her to say to say “allegedly,” Shamaya responds, “No, it’s true. You can say ‘allegedly’ to protect your podcast, but that shit’s true.”
Which is when “Dead Poet” comes up:
“Honestly they wrote a song about me called ‘Dead Poet’ all this crazy shit… Because I didn’t know anything about it either, it wasn’t until they started talking shit about me on YouTube. I was like ‘what?” I really thought I was nice to them. I gave them… I shared dressing rooms with them—stuff that like a lot of headliners don’t do.
“A lot of headliners treat their opening acts like dirt. I try to set the example, like, one day you’re gonna be a headliner, be nice to your opening acts. I thought I was being real nice to them but then apparently they were just like mouthing, mouthing, mouthing, talking shit, calling me a cunt and all this stuff—like it’s not the first time I’ve been called a cunt; but I feel like when you’ve been nice to somebody and then they just turn around and—I don’t know if she was just trying to start beef and they get more attention or whatever, I don’t know. You’re the first person I’ve ever really told about it outside of my private circles.
“I saw her at ‘Knotfest‘, ’cause we played ‘Knotfest‘. I saw her at ‘Knotfest‘ and I was like ‘Yo Heidi, I’m right here’ and she just like ran away as fast as she could. She don’t want this bro, like fucking throwing a tiger a piece of meat.”
Elsewhere on the podcast, Shamaya discusses Donald Trump (who she doesn’t like), Milo Yiannopoulos (who she doesn’t like), Bill Maher (who she thinks isn’t the liberal people say he is), why it’s not fair to lump all Muslims in with Islamic extremist terrorists, and tons more. You should really listen to the whole thing, it’s great stuff:
