People have a tendency to glorify all the best aspects of people after they die. On the one hand, this makes sense. No one wants to be seen talking sh*t on someone who can’t defend themselves, and dead people are the ultimate extension of that. But when that person also created a bunch of art that touched the lives of countless strangers, that focus on positivity can verge on beatification. Scott Weiland’s ex-wife is urging fans not to place the late Stone Temple Pilots singer on a similar pedestal.
Mary Weiland took the air out of the celebrations of Weiland with a heartbreaking account of the father that Weiland was (or, more accurately, wasn’t) to their two children in Rolling Stone. Mary talks about sobering up Weiland by throwing him in the shower so that he could sit up for recitals and the like. Steel yourself and give it a read here.
She closes the letter with an earnest plea that music fans don’t glorify Weiland’s actions and death, asking instead that people reach out to children like theirs in need of adult role models.
“Our hope for Scott has died, but there is still hope for others. Let’s choose to make this the first time we don’t glorify this tragedy with talk of rock and roll and the demons that, by the way, don’t have to come with it. Skip the depressing T-shirt with 1967-2015 on it – use the money to take a kid to a ballgame or out for ice cream.”
(Via Rolling Stone)
