Maynard James Keenan (Tool) gets candid about the world’s decline in new interview

Maynard James Keenan expressed his dismay and confusion at the status of the world once more in a recently released interview with azcentral.com, as per theprp. These subjects came up during discussions on Puscifer‘s most recent album, “Normal Isn’t.” The document, which was made public last month, provides some humorous insights and sobering tales about the state of civilisation. Keenan, who also leads Tool and A Perfect Circle, was asked by the aforementioned outlet what he believes brought us to this point and stated that a long-failing educational system is one of the root problems. Keenan gave this response when asked how he thought we came to these uncomfortable times.

Uh, well, I mean, that’s. … That’s a long conversation, right? But you could see, historically, and of course, the whole point of education is for you to understand historically what that means. And so having been the son of an educator and his whole family are teachers as well, I watched in the ’80s, ’90s where the education system was undermined and, you know, you weren’t allowed to fail kids.

And so I feel like that just kind of lowers the education bar. That’s definitely historically where regimes start is to make sure that the people are kind of dumb and then they can just kind of tell them whatever they want and they don’t have the frame of reference or the tools to debunk what they’re being told, to critically think, to reason out puzzles, and then you end up here.

When asked if he thought there was a way to return to the relative normalcy we formerly experienced, he responded with this.

I think it will just have to come to a head. You know, right now, artistically, you have a lot of people kind of flipping out about AI. There’s a million arguments from many angles, but one of the ones is that it’s going to somehow replace actors, artists and all that. And of course, we heard that when drum machines were invented, and we heard that when the cameras were invented.

I think there’s other considerations of why AI is a bad idea. But as far as being replaced, I don’t feel like that’s legitimate. I guess my point is that it’s somehow. … This has to find a balance. It has to be a breaking point when you have religious fundamentalists calling all the shots. True believers are scary. It doesn’t sustain, right?

Historically, when you have people that are choosing violent oppressions, it doesn’t last. It lasts long enough to hurt and do damage, like generational damage, but it doesn’t last. So I don’t know. I don’t know where that breaking point is in this crashing wave. I’m hoping it’s soon, but I don’t know, man. It’s gonna get darker before it gets better.

This sparked a conversation about how rare it is to see younger people lured to religious fundamentalism these days. Here are Keenan’s thoughts on that.

The separation of church and state, I absolutely believe that, because when it comes to state, it’s like … it’s a mechanism. It’s a car, it’s an engine, it’s mechanics. There’s no faith involved. There’s a mechanics to this thing. You can have your faith, but it shouldn’t affect how your car runs. It shouldn’t affect any of that. That’s why separating church and state is important to me, ‘cause the government should not be an emotional being. It should be a mechanism. It’s a machinery. No faith involved.

Keenan also bemoaned in this new conversation the extent of manipulation that feeds the continuous online tribalism and cultural conflicts, especially when it comes to the malicious use of bots and algorithms.

It’s just constant. And, you know, it’s, of course, a rabbit hole of conspiracy theory here, but there are entire bots and chat rooms that all their job was is to drive wedges between us online, just start fights that were not fights and then get people to join the fight, and then they just step back and let you guys fight over everything. Over anything. Litter boxes in classrooms. F*ck off.

Right down to like, you know, I think pronouns are important, but I don’t think that it’s a die on this hill fight. I respect whatever you want to call yourself. That’s completely fine. I don’t think you need to have a fistfight with a stranger in a parking lot that you met 30 seconds ago because they didn’t acknowledge your pronouns. That’s absurd. I just feel like that algorithm and those bots have been feeding that over the last 10, 15 years. Just cultivating and just feeding that division and those just absolute silly fights.

Maynard James Keenan gave this in response to the observation that people these days seem more inclined to argue and fight than to even try to have an honest conversation.

Yeah! Absolutely. Everything I just said, someone’s gonna take a piece of what I just said out of context, and there’s gonna be a fight online over five words instead of 200 words.

Keenan explained why he chose to represent modern times with this new record, despite his tendency toward more theatrical and absurdist endeavours with Puscifer.

It just grabbed me. You know, you go in a certain direction with a song and then something comes up and it just changes the direction, especially nowadays. It’s an endless barrage of madness and inhumane behavior toward each other.