Drummer Pete Parada of The Offspring Fired for Refusing the COVID Vaccine

Redstate ^ | 8/2/2021 | Jerry Wilson

[pepsi_junkie]

Lots of offspring love on this thread! I’ll say this, any band that lasts 20+ years is a surprise. Small bands just fade away and large hit making bands fall into ego-driven discord. A few, very few, somehow stay together. So my comment is equal parts tongue in cheek ribbing that they haven’t exactly been topping the charts coupled with respect their longevity.

[Yardstick]

That is a very good statement. He’s more than justified in refusing the vaccine for three solid reasons:

- previously infected by Covid

- childhood Guillain-Barre Syndrome

- advised by doctor to skip it

I wonder if the band’s decision was driven by the band itself or was mainly them caving to industry pressure. The fact that he has a libertarian view of the vax issue makes me think maybe he was at odds with the band over his politics and this was a breaking point. Would be interesting to hear more from the band.

RE smart rockers, Tom Sholz is another one whose name comes up. He designed some of his own electronic sound effect boxes and went on to market them pretty successfully. I want to say he had an engineering degree from MIT.

RE the Offspring being punk, they’re probably a little too polished and poppy for the purists to consider them real punk. They sure had some catchy songs back in the day tho.

[gr8eman]

Cool...at least we’re finding out who the really “tolerant” people are!

[Oshkalaboomboom]

Not unless he has song writing credits. Most musicians that don't only really make money when the group tours.

They came to Spain, where I live, the year before the Pandemic started. They must have been touring in the years before that. Even bands with as many millions of records sold as Metallica have to tour to pay the bills. Between lowball streaming deals and piracy there is no money in songs anymore.

[Oshkalaboomboom]

What I don't understand is why someone with a PhD in molecular biology wouldn't accept Parada's reasons for not getting vaccinated. And you're right about Sholz, he is an MIT grad who worked for Polaroid before he hit the big time.

And the rocker who wins the award for a degree most relevant to his music has to be Tom Morello of Rage Against The Machine, who was an honors grad in political science from Harvard.

[Tallguy]

I’ve heard that. Saw an interview Joe Walsh gave on Darryl Hall’s TV Show where he was very gloomy about the music industry and how music streaming services have taken all the money out of it for the artists.