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. . . and believe it or not, in spite of all the Juggalosers who come here daily claiming that ICP isn't "about religion", this isn't recent news.
I will give them credit for their most recent number, "Miracles", which does in fact demonstrate a proper, Christian attitude toward science:
That's right! Scientists are liars, making stuff up so people will not appreciate the wonder of God's Creation!
They're now learning what it means to be Christian: Persecution.
Vulgarity and lyrics about raping and murdering aside, the Insane Clown Posse in fact has a positive message. God creates miracles, and science is lies which diminish God's beauty.
Now, if you will excuse me, I have to go write to some atheist who claims that "work[ing] my way from nothing to this sumptuously fleshy instantiation containing the complex residue of exploding stars is something I regard as a mark of considerable well-deserved pride" that he needs to get right with God.
You might dismiss them as just unbelievably misogynist and aggressive, and it is true that their lyrics are indeed incredibly offensive. Take, for instance, at random:
I'm hating sluts
Shoot them in the face, step back and itch my nuts
Unless I'm in the sack
Cos I fuck so hard it'll break their back.
ICP have been going for 20 years, always wearing clown make-up, which looks slightly lumpy because it's painted over their goatees. They've been banned from performing in various cities where juggalos have been implicated in murders and gang violence. ICP have a fearsome reputation, fostered by news reports showing teenagers in juggalo T-shirts arrested for stabbing strangers and lyrics like "Barrels in your mouth/bullets to your head/The back of your neck's all over the shed/Boomshacka boom chop chop bang."
All of which made Violent J's announcement a few years ago really quite astonishing: Insane Clown Posse have this entire time secretly been evangelical Christians. They've only been pretending to be brutal and sadistic to trick their fans into believing in God. They released a song, Thy Unveiling, that spelt out the revelation beyond all doubt:
Fuck it, we got to tell.
All secrets will now be told
No more hidden messages
…Truth is we follow GOD!!!
We've always been behind him
The carnival is GOD
And may all juggalos find him
We're not sorry if we tricked you.
The news shook the juggalo community to its core. While some fans claimed they'd actually had an inkling, having deciphered some of the hidden messages in several songs, others said they felt deeply betrayed and outraged: they'd been innocently enjoying all those songs about chopping people up and shooting women, and it was Christian rock?
I'm hating sluts
Shoot them in the face, step back and itch my nuts
Unless I'm in the sack
Cos I fuck so hard it'll break their back.
ICP have been going for 20 years, always wearing clown make-up, which looks slightly lumpy because it's painted over their goatees. They've been banned from performing in various cities where juggalos have been implicated in murders and gang violence. ICP have a fearsome reputation, fostered by news reports showing teenagers in juggalo T-shirts arrested for stabbing strangers and lyrics like "Barrels in your mouth/bullets to your head/The back of your neck's all over the shed/Boomshacka boom chop chop bang."
All of which made Violent J's announcement a few years ago really quite astonishing: Insane Clown Posse have this entire time secretly been evangelical Christians. They've only been pretending to be brutal and sadistic to trick their fans into believing in God. They released a song, Thy Unveiling, that spelt out the revelation beyond all doubt:
Fuck it, we got to tell.
All secrets will now be told
No more hidden messages
…Truth is we follow GOD!!!
We've always been behind him
The carnival is GOD
And may all juggalos find him
We're not sorry if we tricked you.
The news shook the juggalo community to its core. While some fans claimed they'd actually had an inkling, having deciphered some of the hidden messages in several songs, others said they felt deeply betrayed and outraged: they'd been innocently enjoying all those songs about chopping people up and shooting women, and it was Christian rock?
I've come to Milwaukee because ICP have just released their most audacious Christian song to date: Miracles. In it, they list God's wonders that delight them each day:
Hot lava, snow, rain and fog,
Long neck giraffes, and pet cats and dogs
Fuckin' rainbows after it rains
There's enough miracles here to
blow your brains.
The song climaxes with them railing against the very concept of science:
Fuckin' magnets, how do they work?
And I don't wanna talk to a scientist
Y'all motherfuckers lying and
getting me pissed.
Hot lava, snow, rain and fog,
Long neck giraffes, and pet cats and dogs
Fuckin' rainbows after it rains
There's enough miracles here to
blow your brains.
The song climaxes with them railing against the very concept of science:
Fuckin' magnets, how do they work?
And I don't wanna talk to a scientist
Y'all motherfuckers lying and
getting me pissed.
They're now learning what it means to be Christian: Persecution.
But they also seem melancholy and preoccupied with the negative critical response to Miracles. Saturday Night Live just parodied it ("Fuckin' blankets, how do they work?") and the internet is filled with amused and sometimes outraged science bloggers dissecting the lyrics. Violent J and Shaggy have been watching them, they tell me, feeling increasingly saddened and irate.
"A college professor took two days out of her fucking life to specifically attack us," says Violent J. "Oh yeah, she had it all figured out."
One of the ICP road crew locates the video on his iPhone, and it is indeed withering: "The [Miracles] video is not only dumb, but enthusiastically dumb, endorsing a ferocious breed of ignorance that can only be described as militant. The entire song is practically a tribute to not knowing things."
"Fuck you, man," says Violent J. "Shut the fuck up."
"Did you anticipate this kind of reaction?" I ask them.
"No," sighs Violent J. "I figured most people would say, 'Wow, I didn't know Insane Clown Posse could be deep like that.' But instead it's, 'ICP said a giraffe is a miracle. Ha ha ha! What a bunch of idiots.'" He pauses, then adds defiantly, "A giraffe is a fucking miracle. It has a dinosaur-like neck. It's yellow. Yeah, technically an elephant is not a miracle. Technically. They've been here for hundreds of years…"
"Thousands," murmurs Shaggy.
"Have you ever stood next to an elephant, my friend?" asks Violent J. "A fucking elephant is a miracle. If people can't see a fucking miracle in a fucking elephant, then life must suck for them, because an elephant is a fucking miracle. So is a giraffe."
We watch the video for another few seconds: "It becomes apparent that Shaggy and J consider any understanding of the actual workings of these 'miracles' to be corrosive. To them, knowledge is seen as a threat… For ICP a true understanding of 'fucking rainbows' would reduce them to, as Keats put it, 'the dull catalogue of common things'."
Violent J shakes his head sorrowfully. "Who looks at the stars at night and says, 'Oh, those are gaseous forms of plutonium'?" he says. "No! You look at the stars and you think, 'Those are beautiful.'"
Suddenly he glances at me. The woman in the video is bespectacled and nerdy. I am bespectacled and nerdy. Might I have a similar motive?
"I don't know how magnets work," I say, to put him at his ease.
"Nobody does, man!" he replies, relieved. "Magnetic force, man. What else is similar to that on this Earth? Nothing! Magnetic force is fascinating to us. It's right there, in your fucking face. You can feel them pulling. You can't see it. You can't smell it. You can't touch it. But there's a fucking force there. That's cool!"
"A college professor took two days out of her fucking life to specifically attack us," says Violent J. "Oh yeah, she had it all figured out."
One of the ICP road crew locates the video on his iPhone, and it is indeed withering: "The [Miracles] video is not only dumb, but enthusiastically dumb, endorsing a ferocious breed of ignorance that can only be described as militant. The entire song is practically a tribute to not knowing things."
"Fuck you, man," says Violent J. "Shut the fuck up."
"Did you anticipate this kind of reaction?" I ask them.
"No," sighs Violent J. "I figured most people would say, 'Wow, I didn't know Insane Clown Posse could be deep like that.' But instead it's, 'ICP said a giraffe is a miracle. Ha ha ha! What a bunch of idiots.'" He pauses, then adds defiantly, "A giraffe is a fucking miracle. It has a dinosaur-like neck. It's yellow. Yeah, technically an elephant is not a miracle. Technically. They've been here for hundreds of years…"
"Thousands," murmurs Shaggy.
"Have you ever stood next to an elephant, my friend?" asks Violent J. "A fucking elephant is a miracle. If people can't see a fucking miracle in a fucking elephant, then life must suck for them, because an elephant is a fucking miracle. So is a giraffe."
We watch the video for another few seconds: "It becomes apparent that Shaggy and J consider any understanding of the actual workings of these 'miracles' to be corrosive. To them, knowledge is seen as a threat… For ICP a true understanding of 'fucking rainbows' would reduce them to, as Keats put it, 'the dull catalogue of common things'."
Violent J shakes his head sorrowfully. "Who looks at the stars at night and says, 'Oh, those are gaseous forms of plutonium'?" he says. "No! You look at the stars and you think, 'Those are beautiful.'"
Suddenly he glances at me. The woman in the video is bespectacled and nerdy. I am bespectacled and nerdy. Might I have a similar motive?
"I don't know how magnets work," I say, to put him at his ease.
"Nobody does, man!" he replies, relieved. "Magnetic force, man. What else is similar to that on this Earth? Nothing! Magnetic force is fascinating to us. It's right there, in your fucking face. You can feel them pulling. You can't see it. You can't smell it. You can't touch it. But there's a fucking force there. That's cool!"
Now, if you will excuse me, I have to go write to some atheist who claims that "work[ing] my way from nothing to this sumptuously fleshy instantiation containing the complex residue of exploding stars is something I regard as a mark of considerable well-deserved pride" that he needs to get right with God.
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