Friday, January 29, 2010

Gay groups urge Grammys to denounce Buju Banton

....Gay groups urge Grammys to denounce Buju Banton - Yahoo! News
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Gay rights groups angry about a Grammy nomination for jailed Jamaican reggae singer Buju Banton took out a full page advert on Friday, protesting the honoring of an artist they said had "promoted the murder of gay people throughout his career."

Banton, 36, is up for a best reggae album award for his "Rasta Got Soul" release at the Grammys on Sunday. He is currently in jail in Florida awaiting trial on a cocaine charge and will not be attending the awards show.

In an advert in Hollywood show business paper Daily Variety, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation and the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center urged Grammy organizers to use Sunday's televised ceremony to denounce music "that promotes or celebrates violence against any group of people."

The lyrics of Banton's most controversial song "Boom, Bye Bye" in 1988, promote the murder of gay men by shooting or burning.....


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I am not gay, but I support your protest to denounce Buju Banton. I'm glad that you have brought this to the attention of everyone. These kind of lyrics that "promote and celebrate violence against any group of people" need to be silenced and certainly not ever rewarded with a nomination for a grammy. Freedom of speech was not meant to be a soapbox to incite pure hatred and evil. The Grammy Organizers have a duty to withdraw his name from their nominations.