Yesterday, the promoters of Mayhem Festival announced their lineups, including a Victory Records stage. The stage features a lot of acts the label is currently promoting. One of the acts NOT featured, however, is Otep. A lot of Otep's fans noticed and reached out to the band's eponymous frontwoman and she seemed to have a theory as to why she wasn't included:
Lots of ppl asking why we aren't on @MayhemFest this year. Could it be that one of their corporate sponsors is openly homophobic? Hmmm…
— ☆ OTEP SHAMAYA ☆ (@otepofficial) April 1, 2014
In the interest of full disclosure, we are one of the media sponsors of the festival, but (a) we have nothing to do with the lineups and (b) we are definitely not homophobic.
So who's Otep talking about? I guess fans prodded her and she eventually said it was the main sponsor, Rockstar Energy Drink.
@RayceRedbeard1 @MayhemFest rockstar energy drink
— ☆ OTEP SHAMAYA ☆ (@otepofficial) April 1, 2014
This is the first I've heard of Rockstar Energy Drink being homophobic. Apparently, the CEO of Rockstar is Russell Weiner, whose father is Michael Savage, a very well known conservative pundit and certainly no fan of the gays. In 2009, when the information surfaced of the relationship between the Rockstar CEO and Savage, an LGBTQ site called for a boycott of the drink. Rockstar distanced themselves from the allegations, saying they had no predjudice and even donated $100k to LGBT organizations, and stated that Savage in no way directly profits from sales of the drink.
Regardless, I doubt Rockstar even cares about anything other than how big their logo is on the admats. The promoters are the ones picking the bands. At least, that's me, but I have no insider knowledge on how these picks work. But then again, maybe Otep knows something we don't.
