Marilyn Manson Issues Statement, Says Abuse Accusations are “Horrible Distortions of Reality”
Marilyn Manson has issued a brief statement regarding several allegations of physical and emotional abuse by former girlfriends and associates.
This morning, Westworld star Evan Rachel Wood wrote a post on Instagram in which she said that Manson, her former fiancée, “horrifically abused me for years.” While she has implied in the past that Manson abused her, this was the first time she explicitly named the shock rocker.
Later in the day, Wood shared the stories of three more women — Ashley Lindsay Morgan, Sarah McNeilly, and Gabriella — who all also say that Manson abused them. She also shared testimony of two of Manson’s former assistants. One of them, Ashley Walters, says she was abused by Manson; the other, Dan Cleary, says he witnessed Manson’s abusive behavior towards others firsthand.
Manson’s label, Loma Vista, promptly dropped the singer and scrubbed their website of his likeness and merchandise.
Manson took to Instagram this evening to share a placard with the following text:
“Obviously, my art and my life have long been magnets for controversy, but these recent claims about me are horrible distortions of reality. My intimate relationships have always been entirely consensual with like-minded partners. Regardless of how – and why – others are now choosing to misrepresent the past, that is the truth.”
Notably, comments on the post have been disabled.
This past November, Manson abruptly ended an interview with Metal Hammer when they asked him about the allegations. Reps for Manson subsequently released a statement in which they implied that Wood was actually referring to Wood’s The Wrestler co-star, Mickey Rourke; questioned why Wood became engaged to Manson if he was abusing her; and pointed to Manson’s ongoing friendship with a different ex-finacée, the actress Rose McGowan, a leader of the Me Too movement (the implication being that McGowan wouldn’t be friends with Manson if Manson was an abuser).
The allegations against Manson are made all the more unsettling by the fact that in 2017, the singer parted ways with his longtime bassist and collaborator, Jeordie “Twiggy Ramirez” White, after White was accused of rape by his ex-girlfriend, Jack Off Jill frontwoman Jessicka Addams.
