Friday, July 25, 2014

It should come as no surprise...

...that a university marching band led by John Waters, above, would get into trouble with the authorities. Waters, also known as the "King of Bad Taste" or the "Pope of Trash," has built a reputation for shocking audiences. From his Wikipedia page:

Waters is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, stand-up comedian, journalist, visual artist, and art collector, who rose to fame in the early 1970s for his transgressive cult films. Waters's 1970s and early '80s trash films feature his regular troupe of actors known as the Dreamlanders—among them Divine, Mink Stole, David Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce, and Edith Massey. Starting with "Desperate Living" (1977), Waters began casting real-life convicted criminals (Liz Renay, Patty Hearst) and infamous people (Traci Lords, a former pornographic actress).

He's at it again, apparently. From the Times (my emphasis):

Ohio State University fired the director of its renowned marching band on Thursday and released a report describing a culture of harassment and alcohol abuse in which students were told to mimic sex acts, march down the aisle of a bus while others tried to pull their clothes off, and march on the football field in their underwear.

The report, by the Office of University Compliance and Integrity at Ohio State, described the hazing as being by students against other students, particularly new band members, but said that the band’s director, Jon Waters, did not do enough to stop it.

“The misconduct described is highly sexual, frequent, and longstanding as part of the marching band’s culture,” it said.

Oops. I guess that's Jon Waters, not John Waters, a different guy altogether. Never mind.

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