Pop Stars Utter A Collective ‘Whoopsie’ For Having Performed for Muammar Gaddafi
By Travis Woods
Today in Pop Stars Say/ Do The Darndest Things!, a handful of our brightest pop stars (including Beyonce, 50 Cent, Usher, and Mariah Carey) are responding to the finger-pointing and accusations that have developed since it was revealed that they performed concerts put on by Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi (if you haven’t been around a television, computer, newspaper, magazine, radio, cell phone, or other human being in the past few weeks, you may have missed the news that Libya has been under severe scrutiny for crimes against humanity—oh and then there’s the whole state-sponsored terrorism thing of the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s, approved by Gaddafi).
So I’m sure Mariah Carey has a totally reasonable explanation, aren’t you?
According to Entertainment Weekly, some stars have taken the money they received for their services and given it away to charity:
“Yesterday, Beyoncé’s publicist released a statement saying that the singer had done just that: “All monies paid to Beyoncé for her performance at a private party at Nikki Beach St. Barts on New Year’s Eve 2009, including the commissions paid to her booking agency, were donated to the earthquake relief efforts for Haiti, over a year ago. Once it became known that the third party promoter was linked to the Qaddafi family, the decision was made to put that payment to a good cause,” the statement reads.”
Others, like Mariah Carey, are totally sorry about this, you guys:
“Mariah Carey, meanwhile—who received $1 million after performing for Gaddafi’s son Muatassim in 2008—has issued her own statement on the matter: ‘I was naïve and unaware of who I was booked to perform for. I feel horrible and embarrassed to have participated in this mess. Going forward, this is a lesson for all artists to learn from. We need to be more aware and take more responsibility regardless of who books our shows. Ultimately we as artists are to be held accountable.”
Which is pretty cool of her to say, even if she texted that apology while sitting on top of a pile of $1,000,000 in Libyan dinars.
What do you think of pop stars having performed for Gaddafi and his family?
Wednesday, March 9, 2011 12:32PM
[...] As we previously reported, many pop stars—here’s looking at you, Beyonce, 50 Cent, Usher, and Mariah Carey—are doing their best to publicly make amends after accepting money from Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi to perform at shows for himself and his family (oops). Some have gone the philanthropic route (Beyonce), and donated the money to charity. Others (Mariah Carey), have taken the more interesting “hey, this sure sucks, and I totally promise not to perform for dictators who enact state-sanctioned terrorism ever again, pinky swears (but I think I’ll hang on to the moolah, if that’s cool)!” direction. [...]