TikToker Criticizes Metallica for Supposed Problematic Past and Calls Them ‘Ancient,’ Here’s How Fans Reacted

Despite Metallica’s obvious mainstream success, a huge portion of zoomers only got introduced to their music after “Master of Puppets” appeared on the 4^th season of “Stranger Things.” The exposure of classic metal to zoomers, however, goes in two directions. While some will explore the band’s discography, others will find ways to criticize Metallica and find ways to nitpick everything and label it as problematic.

In a new TikTok video shared by user Serena Trueblood, we have the latter. The TikToker has covered Metallica amid the band’s rise in popularity among younger generations. This particular video is done as a part of her series named “Is Your Fav Problematic.” In case Metallica is your “fav,” then let’s see what Serena had to say about them:

“This band is ancient so let’s just jump straight in because it’s going to be very, very long. [The video is 3-minutes-long]”

After sharing a content warning label on the video, she proceeded to explain (transcript by Killer Guitar Rigs):

“And starting off with a bang, there is their anti-Semitism. First, there’s this picture of Hetfield and Ulrich doing a nazi salute. More recently, Hetfield plays on this guitar that contains Iron Crosses. And if you don’t know, Iron Crosses are neo-nazi dog-whistle symbols.”

“Then there’s also the fact that he hung out with Kerry King, this Aryan Brotherhood-looking motherfucker right here, who is obviously very proud to be wearing a confederate flag.”

She also reflected on a few other topics, some of which blame James Hetfield for supposedly using racial slurs in the 1990s and various other claims. Then she also went into the band supposedly making fun of addiction issues, mentioning jokes that they made about Layne Staley and Kurt Cobain. She adds:

“What I find weird about this is that they’re so quick to make fun of somebody’s drug addiction, but when James himself was put into rehab, that’s when they started taking drug addiction seriously. But, of course, they only care about issues when it pertains [to] them.”

You can watch the entire video below.

Of course, this caused an avalanche of fan reactions online. As Loudwire reports, one of the Tweets read:

Here are a few other interesting reactions.

Photo: TikTok screenshot, DoD News Features (James Hetfield (2) – Concert for Valor in Washington, D.C. Nov. 11, 2014)