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It’s probably safe to say that Ed Sheeran is having a rough September.
There are people who have it worse. Particularly in Gaza, which is sort of the whole point of the controversy.
Sheeran is condemning and calling out the atrocities against the Palestinian people, all while having seemingly shorn himself in shame.
In his on-stage statement, Sheeran broke down in apparent tears and shared that the backlash had him afraid for his life.
Ed Sheeran talks about his thoughts and feelings after everything that’s happened
On Saturday, September 19, Ed Sheeran performed at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia.
He performed solo, after all of his supporting acts quit the show after Macklemore was iced out of the tour.
Before he got to singing (not even his backing band remained with him), he addressed the crowd.
“In these situations you really find out who your friends are. It’s been a weird week,” Sheeran acknowledged.
“It happened very quickly,” he admitted. “At the same time, I had so many people telling me to cancel this tour and so many people I’ve known for years and years and years they’re kind of backing away.”
If anyone tells you that ticket sales don’t matter to the megawealthy, just listen to this
When it came to continuing his tour, Sheeran said, it came down to the numbers.
“In the back of my mind, I saw the ticket sales for this gig and I didn’t see cancellations, I saw people buying tickets for this gig,” he claimed.
“Everyone’s telling me to cancel,” Sheeran shared, “and I’m feeling all of my friends and family and people I know abandon me.”
His cousin, Jethro Sheeran, publicly blasted him as a bad person on Thursday, September 17.
“I look at the end of the week and I see 50,000 people who haven’t abandoned me,” Sheeran announced with clear gratitude.
There are still problems with this statement, even if it’s an improvement
Though Ed Sheeran gave his fans a tribute, he also admitted to taking new security measures — including not stepping onto the B Stage in light of the controversy.
(Any controversy can be the excuse that someone with violent impulses uses to lash out, but realistically, anyone still attending his concerts at this point is presumably either a diehard fan or someone who got free tickets through work or someone who’d already bought tickets and just decided to go.)
He did speak about more important things, including that no one — including stadium owners — should get to preapprove the content of shows that play in their arenas.
(As we have previously noted, there may be First Amendment issues with the venues that involve governments in ownership and operation; when it comes to the privately owned arenas, including on owned by Robert Kraft, the actions are morally repugnant but likely legal.)
More importantly, Sheeran did condemn the ongoing slaughter of Palestinians, including children, in Gaza. That’s progress, up to a point. It didn’t feel like his focus, however.
At times, his use of passive voice sounded like how newspapers cover police shootings
Unfortunately, as Matt Bernstein points out in the video above, Sheeran calling the ongoing wholesale slaughter, maiming, kidnapping, and torture of Palestinians “complex” sort of betrays how little progress he’s made.
“If you don’t name a perpetrator, Israel, and a cause, Zionism, then no one gets held accountable and nothing changes,” Bernstein accurately pointed out.
Sheeran reading his statement off of a teleprompter is not necessarily a bad thing. Many people do not feel comfortable speaking on important topics without organizing their thoughts.
However, in the context of Sheeran’s caution, it feels like he made this statement while walking on eggshells — even though, as someone with an estimated net worth well into the 9 figures, it is difficult to imagine what he felt that he had to lose.
Perhaps the most troubling element of Sheeran’s statement is that, even after a couple of weeks of controversy, so much of what he said seemed to be aiming for sympathy — his security fears, his reassurance about his fans, his friends and family pulling away from him. Kind of like how Pink crashed out about her fear.
Macklemore was quick to emphasize that none of this is about him. Perhaps Sheeran should ditch the PR consultants and just learn about the plight of the Palestinian people.
