During an appearance on The MetalSucks Podcast , Dee Snider surprised listeners by defending David Ellefson Megadeth bassist who was removed from the band after being involved in a sex scandal involving a young woman who was allegedly underage when their contact began.
During the conversation, Snider argued that "creative people are damaged goods by definition" and that this would be the main reason why they pursue artistic careers. "I don't know why people get so shocked when evidence of this damage surfaces. When Dave from Megadeth is caught masturbating, well..."
“First of all, many of you do the same thing, but secondly, he’s a musician. He’s not a priest. You can’t expect him to be like a priest. You can’t even expect a priest to be like a priest,” said Snider. Interestingly, David Ellefson had been serving as a Lutheran pastor for a decade.
Dee Snider continued his arguments, stating that, in his opinion, art should not be "despised and thrown away" just because "the artist proved to be a flawed human being," and mentioned other names. "If we discovered that Michelangelo [the painter] was a pedophile, would we stop visiting the Sistine Chapel? Would we paint over it? Would it no longer be good art because the painter happened to be a pedophile? Hypothetically speaking."
“All artists and creative people have some skeletons in the closet, and suddenly that skeleton is discovered and we think, ‘Well, he’s not funny anymore,’ ‘He’s not a good actor anymore,’ ‘We can’t watch Kevin Spacey movies anymore . ’ He’s one of the best actors of our time, but he’s dead [to the public],” Snider concluded.
The Twisted Sister clarified that he wasn't trying to "make excuses" and that his main focus was the disregard for art following scandals involving artists. "People should be very careful. Most of us live in glass houses."
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