Wednesday, October 5, 2011

So Defensive...

This is a subject that creeps back up for me, usually around major awards' ceremonies, but it showed up again this past week. It concerns the level of defensiveness that some fans of more popular music artists seem to exhibit at any level of (mostly imagined) criticism of that artist. Don't get me wrong, I realize that not every Bieber fan freaks out when someone else wins the Grammy and not every Lady Gaga fan is sending death threats to Adele.

I do find it interesting, though, that I seem to see these reactions more around popular artists and more within the past couple of years (thank you, perceived Internet anonymity). Some cases:

  • When Arcade Fire won Record of the Year at this year's Grammys over some more commercially successful artists, many fans couldn't comprehend how a band that they hadn't heard of could possibly be any good. I admit, this one's really mild, just pisses me off.
  • At the same Grammys, Esperanza Spalding was awarded Best New Artist, which prompted some Justin Bieber fans to deem it appropriate to send her death threats via Twitter. 
  • After the nominations for this year's VMAs were announced, it turned out Adele had amassed more nods than Lady Gaga. The Little Monsters (Gaga fans), thusly felt it appropriate to attack Adele via Twitter.
  • Just this past week, Rihanna was filming a video on a farm in Ireland. True to Rihanna form, the shoot was fairly revealing, so the farmer that owned the land asked her to cover up. Reasonable request, it is his property and his prerogative to not see Ri-Ri breasts. Rihanna fans, however, were not too happy about it. The farmer has since been receiving hate mail from Rihanna fans.
So, news flash for fans of mainstream music (mainly those under the age of 15): not everyone is going to like the same music as you and not everyone is going to coddle those musicians. Learn to deal with it and accept that we all have different tastes.

When the band that wins is one you're unfamiliar with, don't take it as a threat to the band that didn't win, take it as an opportunity to discover some new music.

Finally, realize that nothing on the Internet is truly anonymous and you may come to regret what you wrote about Esperanza Spalding once you realize you no longer enjoy the Biebs (it happened with me and NSync, it will happen to you, too)!

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