Islamophobe: Meat and the Manchester Bomb

~ wintersnowmoon

On the 7th July 2005, 52 people in London were killed by Islamist terrorists. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-33253598

Morrissey blamed Tony Blair, the UK’s Prime Minister, and George W. Bush, the President of the United States of America.

If not for Tony Blair’s self-interests, the people who were blown to pieces on London’s transport system that July morning would more than likely still be amongst the living. Although Bush and Blair collectively made the world a more dangerous place, neither of them, then or now, leads an unprotected life and neither is susceptible to the dangers… (Morrissey, Autobiography, Penguin, 2013)

And claimed, to have been investigated by the intelligence services in the UK and the USA becuase he had denounced the war in Iraq, and wished that Bush had died instead of ex-President Reagan.

The former lead singer of the Smiths tells British music paper NME that he believed he had been interviewed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and British intelligence agents because he was deemed a threat for speaking his mind. “They were trying to determine if I was a threat to the government, and similarly in England,” NME quotes the 46-year-old singer as saying. “But it didn’t take them very long to realize that I’m not.” In June 2004, Morrissey came under fire for interrupting a Dublin concert with news that former U.S. president Ronald Reagan had died, adding that he wished Bush had died instead. Months later, Morrissey urged U.S. voters to get rid of Bush, calling him a terrorist and adding that he “single-handedly turned the United States into the most neurotic and terror-obsessed country on the planet.” (Billboard, 26 February 2006) https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/59579/morrissey-claims-investigation-by-us-uk-intelligence/

In 2008, he wanted to tour Iran because he admired Arab pop star Kazem al-Sahir.

Heaven knows I’m Muslim now, Morrissey lines up Iran gig: Never mind the fundamentalists, here’s Morrissey. The rock singer is planning to play a concert in Iran as his contribution to the international healing process. The singer, whose songs include Bigmouth Strikes Again and Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now, is in talks with the Iranian government and the Foreign Office about staging a performance in Tehran later this year. (Maurice Chittenden, the Sunday Times, 3 February 2008) https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/heaven-knows-im-muslim-now-morrissey-lines-up-iran-gig-pw809hlmjjw

The former Smiths frontman hopes to appear onstage with acclaimed Arabian pop singer Kazem Al Sahir, one of the star’s professed heroes, and is currently in talks with the Iranian government to play a gig there later this year. (Irish Examiner, 8 January 2008) https://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/arid-30343497.html

On the 7th January 2015, 12 people were killed by Islamists targeting the left-wing satire magazine, Charlie Hebdo, for blasphemy, and a Jewish supermarket, for Jewishness. Morrissey didn’t say anything. But later his Je Suis Morrissey t-shirts, circa 2004-09, were erroneously linked to the free speech debate that had been symbolised in the solidarity slogan Je suis Charlie. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-30708237

Charlie Hebdo’s former offices are located in a liberal neighbourhood of Paris, where nobody disputes the necessity to protect freedom of expression. But critics insist that one can be in favour of free speech without kowtowing to the “Je suis Charlie” mantra. (Mehdi Chebil, France 24, 4 January 2018)

Sporting a “Je Suis Morrissey” t-shirt, he deems himself a bastion for free speech while calling for a ban on Eid celebrations in the UK. (Darya Rustamova, Mangal Media, 25 May 2019)

New York, 2007, Pieter M. van Hattem

On the 13th November 2015, 130 people were murdered, most of them in the Bataclan music venue, by Islamic State. The motivation of Islamic State seemed to be more about killing unbelievers than freedom fighting. Their vision of an Islamic Caliphate was Imperial, supremacist and genocidal. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34827497

In paying tribute to the victims at a gig on 14th November in Santiago, Morrissey reportedly said, “As you know, as you’ve heard, the war of religion is upon us, or the religion of war is upon us. And we say ‘no thank you, no, no, no, no, no, no, no’.” https://www.stourbridgenews.co.uk/leisure/showbiz/14033038.morrissey-pays-tribute-to-paris-massacre-victims-by-playing-im-throwing-my-arms-around-paris-in-front-of-a-french-flag/

But, he very quickly got involved in an unseemly row over re-releasing I’m Throwing My Arms Around Paris, with his record company Harvest. https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/morrissey-universal-paris-tribute-single-6776961/

I couldn’t go through a Harvest Records situation again — they almost killed me, and probably regret that they didn’t. I find that if you are a genuine artist in 2016 you must look after yourself, but if you are trivial and fluffy then a label will hype you and help you and buy Paid Content space on online news pages to make you appear important. I paddle my own canoe. (Morrissey, News Com Au, 3 August 2016)

Fan made Twitter image @Stracy1675 posted on True To You, then posted on Morrissey Solo. David Joseph is the head of Harvest.

A year later, on the 12th June 2016, 49 people were killed at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, by Omar Mateen. In a call to the police just before the massacre, Mateen, had pledged allegiance to Islamic State. Morrissey was angry at Donald Trump, heterosexuality & guns. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-36511778

Hate-rosexuality: although the gunman who massacred 49 people at an Orlando gay club is said to have been ‘repulsed’ by homosexuality, he nonetheless left behind a slew of self-adoring ‘selfies’; a handsome man gazing enchantedly at his own face. It is therefore acceptable for him to lovingly admire his own maleness, but it is not OK for other men to like other men. Does Islamic scripture say it is fitting for a man to sit alone taking adoring photographs of himself? I doubt it.
Meanwhile, Donald Thump, probably America’s next President, reacts to the Orlando massacre by explaining how, if the people within the club were themselves armed with guns, then there would have been fewer casualties. This, of course, is his way of avoiding any words of support to the Orlando gay community (it is their own fault for going into a nightclub without hand grenades). Donald Thump would therefore probably claim that the massacred children of Sandy Hook would still be alive today if only they’d had the common sense to carry sawn-off shotguns to school. The Thump response to Orlando is therefore anti-gay and pro-gun possession. Ann Coulter will be waving her baseball cap and cheering. It’s all going so well for America!
Unfortunately, CNN obliged the gunman once again with a flashing flood of publicity – which is all he ever wanted, and which will encourage the next shooter to prepare for international fame. Why show the gunman’s face? Nobody needs to see it. (Morrissey, True To You, June 2016)

In August that year, Morrissey was denounced as a racist for mentioning Nigel Farage, leader of hard right UK independence party UKIP in the same sentence as hard left, pro-Islam, Iranian and Russian state media employee, and politician George Galloway, and for complaining that London mayor Sadiq Khan eats Halal butchered beings (he had spoken in favour of halal meat) and talks too fast (Khan is a Londoner, with a London accent, Morrissey has never said anything that would relate his voice to his religion or ethnic heritage).

The BBC now do not give you news, but they give you their opinion, and therefore they give anyone a very hard time if that person does not suit the convenience and prejudices of the established elite. Therefore liberal educators such as George Galloway and Nigel Farage are loathed by the BBC because both men respect equal freedom for all people, and they are not remotely intimidated by the BBC. The Mayor was eventually elected on very few votes, and of course he eats Halal butchered beings, and talks so quickly that people can’t understand him … and that suits the British media perfectly. (Morrissey, News Com Au, 3 April 2016)

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2012/apr/29/george-galloway-interview-bradford-west

Chicken Cottage is a British product that is doing a fantastic amount in our country…over the last period Chicken Cottage has created 1,000 new jobs in our country, added £50m to the UK’s GDD and over the next five years will be creating 400 new jobs as well… And here’s the beautiful thing. This is a British product…selling Islamic products, selling halal products…that is niche and general but it’s gone mainstream… When Chicken Cottage started in 1994, the aim was to be as excellent, or as good as, the market leaders…now, the aim is to be the best in its own right, and now the market leaders are Chicken Cottage… long may you have a prosperous future! (Sadiq Khan, Chicken Cottage Award Ceremony, 22 May 2012)

It’s the emphatic inclusion of “halal” that adds a spicy hint of racism to Morrissey’s animal rights campaigning, doesn’t it? (Hadley Freeman, the Guardian, 4 August 2016) https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/lostinshowbiz/2016/aug/04/oh-god-morrissey-talks-about-galloway-farage-and-sadiq-khan

Nearly, everyone else gets to make spicy comments without being permanently branded a racist.

On the 22nd of May 2017, 22 people (many of them children) were killed at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester Arena. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-40010124

Morrissey had a statement about it posted on Facebook in which he blames the authorities – politicians, the Queen, Islamic State – Theresa May’s immigration policy and complained about inexact language.

Theresa May’s immigration policy was the Hostile Environment. He’d previously complained about George Bush’s immigration policy being too harsh, and immigration officials in Australia being rude. And would go on to accuse May of turning the UK into an international target. So it’s likely that he thought the Hostile Environment was antagonising people into becoming terrorists. And he’d previously explained that he believed inexact language meant governments intended to do nothing about a situation.

With all my heart I urge people to vote against George Bush. Jon Stewart would be ideal, but John Kerry is the logical and sane move. It does not need to be said yet again, but Bush has single-handedly turned the United States into the most neurotic and terror-obsessed country on the planet. For non-Americans, the United States is suddenly not a very nice place to visit because US immigration officers – under the rules of Bush – now conduct themselves with all the charm and unanswerable indignation of Hitler’s SS. Please bring sanity and intelligence back to the United States. Don’t forget to vote. Vote for John Kerry and get rid of George Bush! (Morrissey, True to You, 28th? October 2004)

It doesn’t take much to be thrown into a cell at LAX! You will notice that the Immigration Officers are persistently ordering you to ‘stand there’, which is a test to see if you will bow to their orders… they can be as illegal as they wish. Incidentally, when I arrived in Sydney last year the officer at Passport Control did her best to insult me and to cause a scene when there was no need… They use the ISIS issue as an excuse to denigrate everyone, and they absolutely love it. (Morrissey, News Com Au, 3 August 2016)

I despise racism. I despise fascism. I would do anything for my Muslim friends and I know they would do anything for me… Theresa May’s policies have turned Britain into a international target… 
(Morrissey, Morrissey Central, April 2018)

But increasingly we see how civilian murders don’t actually matter at all with governments.  The recent Malaysian plane attack is a perfect example.  In the first few days the media referred to it as an attack, and then suddenly it became a disaster.  By ‘disaster’ they were telling us that nothing would be done about it, as if it were a flood or something.  We all see how civilian deaths do not register with world leaders unless a loss of oil or gas is involved… (Morrissey, Vegan Logic, 5 September 2014)

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/aug/27/hostile-environment-anatomy-of-a-policy-disaster

It’s also, worth remembering that one of his closest friends, a woman he considered having a child with, Tina Dehghani, is from Iran.

Tina Dehghani, on the left

He was immediately accused of blaming all muslims and all non-white immigrants, and denounced as a racist.

Perhaps the final straw was his reaction to the terrorist murders at Manchester’s MEN Arena. Transparently Islamophobic, and published at a time of heightened community tensions, it was unforgivable. ‘In modern Britain everyone seems petrified to officially say what we all say in private,’ he dog-whistled. (Michael Calderbank, Red Pepper, 2 December 2017)

Northern Irish comedian, Michael Legge, who once wrote an article that could be paraphrased into “Muslims are fucking nutters who should be put in asylums before they bomb us” (and if Morrissey wrote it, that’s exactly how it would have been paraphrased) posted abuse on Facebook and then spent years calling Morrissey fans racists on Twitter.*

Just like Moses and Allah and Thor and Spock never existed. The very fact that in 2008 this STILL has to be pointed out to people is terrifying to me. We wait until unspeakable horror happens, like a bomb going off, before we arrest people who are doing things in the name of their god but why? Why wait. Anyone going to any church, synagogue, mosque or Games Workshop should be immediately arrested for living inside a daydream. At the very least put the fucking nutters in an asylum. (Michael Legge, his blog, 29 November 2008) http://michaelleggesblog.blogspot.com/2008/11/religion.html

*Maybe it’s the rawness of “the troubles” or embarrassment at his Irish background, but another Northern Irish arts/media worker, Guardian journalist, Eamonn Forde, has also been extensively using social media to “satirically” denounce him.

Although Morrissey’s negativity isn’t a natural fit for a sentimental tribute concert, the controversy likely led to him being excluded from One Love Manchester. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-40134567

Talking about it, he said: “because I do look back in anger! I would have sang ‘World Peace Is None of Your Business’ or ‘Life is a Pigsty’ – or something truthful and meaningful. If my child had been killed at Manchester Arena I wouldn’t be lighting candles and swaying… I’d be in a complete rage.” (Morrissey, Morrissey Central, 24 June 2019) https://www.morrisseycentral.com/messagesfrommorrissey/234417-the-interview

World Peace attacks governments:

World peace is none of your business
You must not tamper with arrangements
Work hard and sweetly pay your taxes
Never asking what for
Oh oh, you poor little fool, oh oh, you fool
World peace is none of your business
Police will stun you with their stun guns
Or they’ll disable you with tasers
That’s what Government’s for
Oh oh, you poor little fool, oh oh, you fool
World peace is none of your business
So would you, kindly keep your nose out
The rich must profit and get richer
And the poor must stay poor
Oh oh, you poor little fool, oh oh, you fool
Each time you vote, you support the process
Each time you vote, you support the process
Each time you vote, you support the process
Brazil, Bahrain, Egypt, Ukraine
So many people in pain No more you poor little fools
No more you fool

Life Is A Pigsty is about how disgusting life is, but we still fall in love.

It’s the same old S.O.S.
But with brand new
Broken fortunes,
And once again I turn
To you
Once again, I do
I turn to you It’s the same old S.O.S
But with brand new
Broken fortunes
I’m the same
Underneath
But this, you
You surely knew Life is a pigsty
Life is a pigsty
Life is a pigsty
Life, life is a pigsty
Life, life is a pigsty
Life, life is a pigsty
Life, life is a pigsty and if you don’t know this
Then what do you know?
Every second of my life
I only live for you
And you can shoot me
And you can throw me off a train
I still maintain
I still maintain
Life, life is a pigsty
Life is a pigsty and I’ve been shifting gears all of my life
But I’m still the same underneath
And this you surely knew I can’t reach you
I can’t reach you
I can’t reach you anymore Can you please stop time?
Can you stop the pain?
I feel too cold
And now I feel too warm again
Can you stop this pain?
Can you stop this pain?
Even now in the final hour
Of my life
I’m falling in love again
Again
Again

Both songs predate the Islamophobia accusations, but feelings were running so high against him, that even though, he was angry at the UK authorities who 3 years later would have significant failings revealed in a public inquiry: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/sep/08/greater-manchester-force-had-no-plan-to-police-arena-on-night-of-bombing

& Islamic State, who styled itself as a government, & was brutal to the people who found themselves living in the territory it conquered: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-29052144

World Peace, would likely have been seen as divisive.

And despite, knowing that Morrissey & Islam are in total agreement that eating pigs is a bad thing (for different reasons) – pig in a song title is likely to have been interpreted as a racist insult.

In April 2018, Morrissey was denounced as an Islamophobe and a racist for saying that Eid al-Adhar wasn’t joyous because animals are sacrificed for it – Qurbani is the tradition of sacrificing an animal for God – and for saying that Halal slaughter is evil, and certified by ISIS supporters (I take it he means only hardliners would want an animal’s throat cut, he has never elaborated).

Theresa May was always a Prime Minister uninvited. She is incapable of leadership. She cannot say her own name unless it’s written down on a cue card in front of her. I recall her speech on Eid al-Adhar, and how she referred to it as a ”joyous celebration” … as millions of animals had their throats slit to mark the occasion. I wondered what kind of compassion she could possibly have. The answer is none... If you have any concern for animal welfare, for example, you cannot possibly vote for either Conservatives or Labour, because both parties support halal slaughter, which, as we all know, is evil. Furthermore, halal slaughter requires certification that can only be given by supporters of ISIS, and yet in England we have halal meat served in hospitals and schools! UK law is pointless! … animals rights must come before  religion. Religion must cease to be the ONLY word. I am not interested in what people did ten thousand years ago. I am concerned about what is happening today... I am not saying that stunned slaughter is acceptable, because it couldn’t ever be... I think the point is that we cease to put ourselves first. It is not about what we frivolously want. Every animal even during slaughter fights and kicks until its very last breath. It has one instinct and that is to survive. I stopped watching television because of animal death commercials. I couldn’t allow that into my living space for one more day. I feel liberated without it. They won’t show cigarette commercials but it’s OK to show butchered lambs? And  to laugh about it?  (Morrissey, Morrissey Central, April 2018)

In July-August 2018, he worked with Sameer Gadhia on California Son and went to see his band, Giant the Younger, in LA… just … just … magnificent. Catch them if you can. Sameer is the best singer in the world today. And yesterday. And tomorrow. (Morrissey, Morrissey Central, 10 August 2019)

In April 2019, he was bewildered about why he was denounced as a racist and was blaming the meat industry as a whole for the world’s problems.

I can’t see how opposing Halal slaughter makes me racist when I’ve objected to ALL forms of animal slaughter all of my life… successive governments receive support and cash and sponsorship from pharmaceutical companies and farmers associations, so therefore governments are obliged to repay them. The idea, I think, is to keep people unwell, sick, or dying, and the best way to do this is to convince them that fat slices of sheeps faces are good for you. (Morrissey, Morrissey Central, April 2019)

As ever, it made no difference – everything he says is chopped up into tiny snippets, sometimes one word, sometimes an imagined word, and added to the canard that he’s a dangerous racist.

Once the torches are lit & the pitchforks are sharpened, it’s very hard to avoid being chased to the windmill.

On a Side Note: As the son of immigrants, Morrissey’s acutely aware of the identity crisis that comes from having two cultures. It’s one of the reasons he has a strong Chicano fanbase. Like him, they left their Catholic country (Mexico/Ireland) to live in a Protestant/Secular country (America/England) that often doesn’t acknowledge, like or understand them.

“my family has myriad tales of living in a golden Mexico during the 1940s and 1950s. Those stories helped foster a deep-seated melancholy within me about where I truly belong. Not quite American; not wholly Latino, living in all the spaces in between. Growing up in rural Ohio, these duelling identities caused me an incredible amount of angst, as I tried to traverse the space between home and school. It’s easy to see where so many of Morrissey’s songs that deal with identity crisis, with a sense of alienation, of being an “other”, would appeal to people such as me. Feeling ostracised, not part of a homogeneous American culture – that’s enough to make anyone morose and woebegone.” (March, 2016) https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/07/morrissey-popularity-mexicans-smiths-chicanos-california

“Morrissey’s ‘Irishness’ is partly contained in this idea of the ‘outsider’, a fascination with writers including Oscar Wilde, his black wit, and as he has says” – “Ireland has always been a very credible and very poetic place, with no-one under any illusions about themselves – we all end up in the same bucket etc.”  (Siobhan Kane, Event Guide, August, 2006 – transcription by David Tsang, on Morrissey Solo, 24 August 2006) https://www.morrissey-solo.com/article.pl?sid=06/08/24/1713247

He wrote a song, In Mexico, 2004, about the border.

I went for a walk to inhale
The tranquil, cool, lover’s air
But I could taste a trace
Of American chemical waste
And the small voice said
“What can we do?”In Mexico
I went for a walk to inhale
The tranquil, cool, lover’s air
But I could sense the hate
From the Lone Star state
And a small voice said
“What can we do?” It seems if you’re rich and you’re white
You’ll be alright
I just don’t see why
This should be so
If you’re rich and you’re white
You’ll be alright
I just don’t see why
This should be so In Mexico
I lay on the grass
And I cried my heart out
For want of my love
Oh, for want of my love
Oh, for want of my love It seems if you’re rich and you’re white
You think you’re so right
I just don’t see why
This should be so
If you’re rich and you’re white
Then you’ll be OK
I just don’t see why
This should be soIn Mexico
I lay on the grass
And I cried my heart out
For want of my love
For want of my love
For want of my love
For want of my love

The UK’s anti-Irishness and anti-Catholicism are near forgotten these days but were still prevalent well into Morrissey’s adulthood. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/irish-butt-english-racism-more-eight-centuries-1342976.html

Zionist

~ wintersnowmoon

In 2006 Palestinian groups had called for an academic & cultural boycott of Israel. On July 29th 2008, Morrissey played his first gig there.

https://electronicintifada.net/content/morrissey-celebrating-apartheid-tel-aviv/821https://electronicintifada.net/content/morrissey-celebrating-apartheid-tel-aviv/821

In July 2012, he told Israel’s channel 2 news that:

“There’s no point in punishing an entire nation for something its leader says or does.”

In his November 2017 interview with Der Spiegel he dismissed the idea of a cultural boycott, seemingly not previously aware of the BDS movement.

“It is narrow-minded. Being politically correct is incorrect. It means forbidding the freedom of speech. This is how the BDS movement sounds to me.”

and

“I love this city [Tel Aviv]. The rest of the world does not like Israel well. But the people there are very generous and friendly. You should never judge a people by their government. It is very rare for the government to reflect the wishes of the people.'”

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/british-singer-morrissey-slams-bds-movement-as-absurd-514833

His 2017 album, Low In High School, had 3 songs set in Israel.

The Girl From Tel Aviv Who Wouldn’t Kneel, which included a side-swipe at American intervention:

Of princes and kings and their costly parade
Blitz them all back to the Stone Age
The American way displayed proudly
Is to show lots of teeth and talk loudly
And the land weeps oil
The land weeps oil
What do you think all these armies are for?
Just because the land weeps oil

When You Open Your Legs, in which the song’s narrator forgets everything because of sex:

4am and once again
I am asked to leave this club in Tel Aviv
It’s 4am and once again
I am asked to leave this club in Tel Aviv, oh Everything I know deserts me now
When you open your legs
Everything I know deserts me now
When you open…

& Israel, which mixes sex with religion, envy and threat.

Realize if you’re happy
Jesus sends you straight to hell
Israel Israel
And should you dare, enjoy your body
Here tolls Hades welcome bell
Israel Israel
You’ve found a middle course existance
We’re all bones and flesh and shell
Israel Israel
I can’t answer for what armies do
They are not you They are not you
They are not you
In other climes they bitch and whine
Just because you’re not like them
Israel Israel
The sky is dark
For many others
They want it dark
For you as well
Israel Israel
Earth is just one big asylum
An explodes a prison cell
See us squirm in our own damaged spell
You were born
As guilty sinners
Before you stood up right, you fell
Put the fear of many gods
In Israel
Nature gave you
Every impulse
Who are virgin priests to tell
Who, how to love
How to live
Israel
And they who reign, abuse, upon you
Upon you
They are jealous of you as well
Love yourself
As you should
Israel

There’s nothing to suggest that it has anything to do with the conflict between Israel & Palestine.

Tel Aviv sells itself as one of the most gay friendly cities in the world.

Tel Aviv is known internationally as one of the most gay-friendly cities in the world, welcoming gay tourists with open arms, and also offering a safe refuge for those from the LGBTQ community of surrounding countries in the region. (Tourist Israel, 2021)   https://www.touristisrael.com/why-tel-aviv-is-the-ultimate-lgbtq-travel-destination/26062/

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/21/gay-lgbt-muslim-countries-middle-east

And as the Vegan capital of the world.

The “vegan capital of the world” is what proud locals dub Tel Aviv. With 400 vegan and vegan-friendly kitchens catering to most of Israel’s 200,000 vegans, going meat-free isn’t just easy, here; it’s a chance to sample the best food in town. (Jasmine Phull, the Independent, 6 November 2017) https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/middle-east/vegan-food-tel-aviv-best-restaurants-israel-vegetarian-friendly-port-capital-meshek-barzilay-orna-ella-bana-a8036081.html

If Morrissey was racist towards Muslims he’d hardly have Istanbul as one of his favourite cities.

I had a timid childhood. My past is also full of repression. I still do not know what it means to have fun and to enjoy physically. Istanbul has a feature that dissipates this mood and crisis. When you return to the British land, you are left with the same despair, it’s separate. This is the secret of Istanbul, the people of Istanbul: It is very alive, very real. This is also something I admire. I don’t see myself as a ‘living person’ as much as you do. I’m an extra head in the crowd, that’s all. (Morrissey, Hurriyet, 24 November 2014) https://www.hurriyet.com.tr/kelebek/hayat/morrissey-cinsel-hayatim-koca-bir-cahillikten-ibaret-27621773

And he felt his boycott of Canada was a failure.

My decision to return to Canada after almost 15 years of protest against its savage and Neanderthal annual Baby Seal Kill is entirely because my stance was ultimately of no use and helped no one.  My voice was drowned out by the merciless swing of spiked axes crushing the heads of babies. (Morrissey, Morrissey Central, 20 September 2018)

Desite that, as usual, it was interpreted as genocidal, reactionary racism by the press.

…to argue that Israel is beset with ‘dark’ hostile forces seems to conflate the very existence of Arab and Muslim populations with the most extreme forms of Islamist ideology. The legitimate grounds for Palestinians to feel oppressed or denied justice by the Israeli state are conjured away, or represented as inherently life-denying forces… For Morrissey, the legitimate demands of Arab and Muslim opinion in the region are denied, and millions of people only represented as dark impersonal forces, motivated by hate and jealousy. It’s a deeply racist and reactionary line of thought. (Michael Calderbank, 2 December 2017) https://www.redpepper.org.uk/where-did-it-all-go-wrong-morrissey/

Two songs about sex & one about defying authority had to be about Zionism.

The Quietus review, bylined “Mr Agreeable”, said: “That’s opposition to Likud, Netanyahu kissing Trump’s arse, the f**king settlements programme, the f**king bulldozing of protesters, all sussed for what it really is — plain old green-eyed jealousy.” Guardian music critic Alexis Petridis also poured scorn on the notion. “Don’t worry, everyone, he’s got it all worked out: anyone who criticises Israel’s actions — say, the bulldozing of Palestinian homes in the occupied territories — is ‘jealous’.” Meanwhile Guardian TV critic Stuart Heritage asserted: “It has got to the point that just reading the track list of his new album — including song titles such as The Girl From Tel Aviv Who Wouldn’t Kneel and Israel — is enough to send your sphincter zooming up through your intestines and into your windpipe.” (Lee Harpin, Jewish Chronicle, 27 November 2017) https://www.thejc.com/news/uk/critics-attack-israel-in-morrissey-album-reviews-1.449077

And he got denounced by social media.

On a Side Note: Morrissey has a fairly well documented admiration for Israeli actor Lior Ashkenazi & that it’s possible the songs were inspired by his films. https://morrissey-shot.livejournal.com/1140439.html

Morrissey, Lior Ashkenazi

Trump

~ wintersnowmoon

Morrissey hates Trump, but that doesn’t stop people from assuming he supports or is like him.

On the 2nd September 2020, News Thump, took aim.

Giving Moz this to say:

Despite him condemning Trump’s response to the Orlando Massacre, in June 2016, as anti-gay and pro-gun.
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/jun/14/morrissey-trump-response-orlando-attack-anti-gay-pro-gun

Having ‘Trump Will Kill America’ etched on to a Record Store Day release in April 2017.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/apr/24/trump-will-kill-america-smiths-record-store-day-release-morrissey

And, in November 2017, saying he would (hypothetically) kill Trump:

Morrissey says he would kill “pest” Donald Trump “in the interest of the human race”

Guardian T-shirt

~ wintersnowmoon

On the 26th of October 2019, at a gig at the Hollywood Bowl, Morrissey wore a ‘Fuck the Guardian’ t-shirt.

In 2010 the Guardian had taken up the NME’s homophobic hate campaign that started in 1992.

Having his words relentlessly hyper policed for racism after he was violently attacked for being (perceived as) gay led him to believe that Anne Marie Waters, an Irish, lesbian, vegan, feminist, wannabe politician (an unlikely background for a British nationalist), was similarly a victim:

I despise racism. I despise fascism. 
I would do anything for my Muslim friends and I know they would do anything for me… do not be influenced by the tyrannies of the MSM who will tell you that For Britain are racist or fascist – please believe me, they are the very opposite…  This is my last political strike. No wish to upset anyone! (Morrissey, Central, April 2018)

By May 2019 he dropped For Britain:

I am not an activist, I have never voted for a political party, I do not belong to any political party… I do not believe the most important thing about a person is the colour of their skin. (Morrissey, Kipper Central, June 2019)

But was (and often still is) wrongly described as the supporter of a far right party or aligned with the far right.

The t-shirt caused more frenzy in the press and social media:

His distress at the Guardian was framed as a right-wing attack on the liberal-left:

But at times, he couldn’t help himself, at one point donning a T-shirt bearing a profanity directed at the Guardian, a left-leaning British newspaper that has criticized his rhetoric in recent years. (August Brown, Los Angeles Times, October 2019) https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2019-10-27/morrissey-concert-hollywood-bowl-fans

Despite his band wearing Fuck Trump t-shirts:

And the homage to his heroine, Patti Smith:

Side Note – no matter how moral the excuse for demonising someone seems to be – racists are bad – it quickly decends into the same type of attacks that have tradiontionally been aimed at outgroups and misfits – on their known or supposed sexuality, intelligence, gender idenity, ethnic/religious background, mental health, suicidal ideation, bodies, social isolation & deviance.

Norway Massacre

~ wintersnowmoon

In July 2011 Morrissey was playing a gig in Warsaw and introduced Meat Is Murder by saying:

“Despite the love, we do live on a murderous planet, as you will have seen over the last few days in Norway, murder, murder, murder. Really every single day worse things happen in Kentucky Fried Chicken & McDonald’s, murder, murder, murder, murder, murder, murder.”

Animal liberationists believe that animal and human life are equal.

He wasn’t saying that the murders in Norway are less important – he was saying that we’re not seeing that animals are slaughtered in great numbers everyday as he was about to show a gruesome film of animals dying in extreme pain and fear.

He’s consistently linked his suicidal depression to a documentary on abattoirs that he saw when he was a child.

“When I was young I saw a documentary accidentally about the abattoir and I fell into an almost lifelong depression. I couldn’t believe I lived in a society that allowed this.” (Morrissey, The Times, November 2017)

He’s hyper-aware of the treatment of animals and is an avid PETA supporter.

https://www.kentuckyfriedcruelty.com/w-whykfc.php

https://www.mccruelty.com/why.php

Very few people are animal liberationists but to misrepresent his philosophical position & ignore his mental health to create a drama that would hurt the parents of murder victims is pretty poor even by the standards of the news industry.

The Daily Mirror broke the ‘story’ paraphrasing it to make it sound worse – also misquoting it as Kentucky Fried Shit, connecting shit, as well as (in most people’s view) lower life-forms, to murdered children.

There was a storm on social media, other papers picked up the clickbait.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/morrissey-says-norway-massacre-is-nothing-144337

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2011/jul/28/morrissey-norway-attacks-mcdonalds-kfc

He tried to explain:

“The comment I made on stage at Warsaw could be further explained this way: Millions of beings are routinely murdered every single day in order to fund profits for McDonalds and KFCruelty, but because these murders are protected by laws, we are asked to feel indifferent about the killings, and to not even question them. If you quite rightly feel horrified at the Norway killings, then it surely naturally follows that you feel horror at the murder of ANY innocent being. You cannot ignore animal suffering simply because animals ‘are not us.” (True To You, July 2011)

It made no difference.

When he was booked to play The Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Norway, in December 2013, there was an unsuccessful campaign to have him cancelled.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/war-words-breaks-out-norway-over-morrissey-s-nobel-peace-gig-singer-unforgiven-comparing-anders-behring-breivik-massacre-killing-animals-fast-food-8970855.html?amp

Morrissey performs at Nobel Peace Prize Concert – watch

HP: Do you write when you’re happy/sad/drunk/sober or a combination of all four?
Morrissey: I don’t say this for affect, but I’m never not sad… which is lovely grammar, I know…
HP: How did appearing alongside the likes of Jake Bugg, Mary J. Blige, James Blunt and Claire Danes at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert rate in terms of surreal gigs?
Morrissey: I didn’t know it would be so stately and ceremonious. They were very courteous, but the local mayor fought to have me taken off the bill because he didn’t like my views on mass-murderers. There’s always something, I suppose.” (Morrissey, Hot Press, August 2014)

On a Side Note: A Guardian ‘comedy’ article crassly ignored his history of mental illness & lumped it in with some comments he made about the suicide of a nurse who gave confidential information about The Duchess of Cambridge to Australian radio DJs in order to associate him with racist terrorism.

“a man who could once rightly claim to be a genius reduced to being rock music’s answer to an internet troll, flaming away then whining on about free speech and how there’s a vast conspiracy against him when anyone picks him up on it. It points to the way he brilliantly put the 2011 Norway terrorist attacks into perspective as “nothing compared to what happens in McDonald’s every day” – a rightwing Islamophobe extremist murdering 77 people because he hated multiculturalism being entirely analogous to eating a sweet chilli crispy chicken wrap – and asks: does that even remotely resemble the kind of thing a moron would write in the comments section of a website?”

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/lostinshowbiz/2012/dec/13/morrissey-rock-genius-internet-troll

It was The Guardian turning into the internet troll. Using a massacre in a wisecrack aimed at a ‘moron’ Indie singer is less edifying than mentioning it before a song against cruelty.

It’s esp. unedifying when there’s always been an indication that Morrissey’s melancholy is linked to the media. Becoming obsessive about things that are given a huge amount of coverage, like the Royals. On The Queen Is Dead:

“I didn’t want to attack the Monarchy in any beer monster way. But I find as time goes by this happiness we had slowly slips away and is replaced by something that is wholly grey and wholly saddening. The very idea of the Monarchy and the Queen of England is being reinforced and made to seem more useful than it is… But I do feel in an absolute way I’ve been sleepwalking for 26 years. On the bleak moments when I come to consciousness I was reading The New Statesman. You see I never did all those trivial pursuits. I did read all those music magazines.” (NME, June, 1986)

And his remarks about the Dutchess were not a conspiracy theory… it was just gossip that had been flying around combined with his belief that the Royals use PR to stay popular – which is true.

“It wasn’t because of two DJs in Australia that this woman took her own life, it was the pressure around her… [Kate Middleton] she was in the hospital, as far as I could see, for absolutely no reason… she’s saying nothing about the death of this poor woman. The arrogance of the British royals is absolutely staggering.” (December, 2012)

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/dec/12/morrissey-royal-family-nurse-death

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/lostinshowbiz/2012/dec/13/morrissey-rock-genius-internet-troll

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/11/jacintha-saldanha-took-blame-prank-call-duchess-cambridge-australian-djs-inquest

He also resents that the Royals are born or marry into publicity while he feels art is neglected – after an awkward interview with Dermot O’Leary on Radio 2, 30 April 2011, he said:

I’m sorry I made the Detergent O Leary radio interview so difficult but I was in a foul mood, having spent a full week surrounded by the royal dreading. England may very well be a Windsor dictatorship, but – PR Weddings aside, it is usually quite bearable.
If my Front Row (Radio 4) interview sounded chopped and cropped, that’s because it was. I had spoken fluently about the royal dreading, but an Iranian censorship confiscated all of my views. It is distressing, but in all manner of British media in 2011 we are only allowed to hear the same old thoughts and feelings expressed over and over and over again.
During the week of the royal dreading, Poly Styrene died. Having made an enormous contribution to British art and sound – at a desperate time when so many of us needed her, Poly Styrene’s death was all but ignored by the British television news media, who instead rained hours and hours of blubbering praise onto Kate Middleton – a woman about whom nothing is known on a personal level. The message is clear: What you achieve in life means nothing compared to what you are born into. Is this Syria??
To top off all the pageantry, ‘Very best of Morrissey’ (EMI/Major Minor) has yet to tunnel its way into what we older types refer to as Record Shops – six days after intended release. The gallant HMV has yet to stock it, and did not manage to stock the ‘Glamorous glue’ single until four days after its scheduled release. In fact, the CD of ‘Glamorous glue’ did not EVER make it to HMV. With ‘Very best of’ I face my first ever non-chart placing – which I shall bear with dignity, although I could never be unkind enough to express my views on EMI’s failings. It was John Lennon who coined the phrase ‘Every Mistake Imaginable’. I shall not repeat it here.
I am delighted that the June dates sold out so quickly. Beware, we are looking at four more: Copenhagen, Aarhus, Helsingborg and Stockholm.
The follow-up to ‘Years of refusal’ is ready and fluttering wildly against the bars. There is still no record label and the years shuffle like cards. My talents do not lie in DIY.
I shall be in Perth – older, but no wiser. (Morrissey, True to You, 30 April 2011)

Dermot O’leary & Morrissey, 30 April 2011

Rick Astley

~ wintersnowmoon

In September 2021, singer Rick Astley and the band Blossoms announced a couple of gigs where they would play the music of the Smiths.

Tweets and articles raved that Rick was the solution to the Morrissey question, and a think piece defending him, published on Morrissey Central – as well as dips into the usual list of distorted quotes – was used to denounce him for objecting to being erased from his own work. https://www.morrisseycentral.com/messagesfrommorrissey/morrissey-astley

Morrissey has yet to comment directly, but his website carried an article saying: “Maybe Rick Astley will perform well in the upcoming shows… but make no mistake, no other artist can bring to the table what Morrissey can.” The irony being that what Morrissey “brings to the table” these days – support for far right politicians amid accusations of Islamophobia and racism – is exactly what makes him such a problematic hero now. He might have been guilty of wearing a dodgy trench coat in the 1980s, but unlike Morrissey, Astley has never suggested that “everyone prefers their own race”, claimed “the Chinese people are a subspecies”, or argued that the world “would be a more interesting place had Prince Charles been shot”. (Sarfraz Manzoor, the Times, 30 September 2021)

Songs about being a social outcast, written by a social outcast, stolen by a dominant mainstream that revels in his marginalisation.

Morrissey isn’t increasingly problematic. He’s been demonized. Held to a standard no one “normal” would have been held to. Had motives assigned to him that he doesn’t have. His words & actions twisted & spun into a narrative that has at its core a homophobic lie. https://folk-devil.com/tag/nicky-crane/

The Full Morrissey

~ wintersnowmoon

In line with the comforting theory that all radicals become reactionary before they threaten your aga and with Morrissey being the worst example, people asserted that if John Lennon hadn’t been murdered by a fan, he would have gone full Morrissey.

In a similar way, George Michael, was posthumously recognised as having all of the good qualities people had mistakenly assigned to Morrissey.

(They’re wrong about the clip. Morrissey is talking about authenticity in art. George is concerned about the fame game. They’re both smart.)

On a side note: while he was alive, George was hounded for his sexuality, fought to escape a stifling record contract and was mocked for his drug addiction, cottaging exposés and car accidents.

And sometimes still is.

Unmarried Humasexual

~ wintersnowmoon

I can still be surprised by bigotry, inaccuracy and smearing in the press – it’s stunning that in 2022, Dan Cairns, in the Sunday Times, can use Morrissey’s sexuality and martial status to negatively contrast him to married heterosexual, Johnny Marr.

While Marr has built a reputation as a modest and fundamentally decent man, still married to his childhood sweetheart, Angie, with whom he has two children, and still living in the Manchester area, his former bandmate has steadily dismantled his own reputation. Morrissey in 2022 cuts a sorry figure: a cantankerous, Los Angeles-based king across the water, and a self-described “humasexual”, his increasingly truculent and often borderline racist comments and postings have quashed, surely for ever, any hopes of a Smiths reunion. (Dan Cairns, the Sunday Times, February 2022)

They also deliberately lied that he was aligned with the far right – it’s been 3 years, there’s no justification for guilt by association on this scale.

I despise racism. 
I despise fascism. 
I would do anything for my Muslim friends and I know they would do anything for me… do not be influenced by the tyrannies of the MSM who will tell you that For Britain are racist or fascist – please believe me,
they are the very opposite…  This is my last political strike. No wish to upset anyone! 
–  Morrissey, April 2018

.. she [AMW] wants everyone in the UK to live under the same law. I find this compelling, now, because it’s very obvious that Labour or the Tories do not believe in free speech… I mean, look at the shocking treatment of Tommy Robinson… (Morrissey, June 2018)

for every shade and persuasion … we shall always be alongside each other – everyone’s culture of value; no more fashionable outrage; cows are friends to humans – don’t kill them… (Morrissey, Central, May 2019)

I am not an activist, I have never voted for a political party, I do not belong to any political party… I do not believe the most important thing about a person is the colour of their skin. (Morrissey, Central, June 2019)

Even the basic facts are wrong. He hasn’t lived in LA for years. Or been celibate since the 1980s – when the press didn’t believe him anyway.

It’s also cruel and sick to relentlessly accuse Morrissey of “diatribes” and being “cantankerous”. He occasionally posts on his nephew’s website. He plays gigs. And he’s been seen in Manchester pubs. He hasn’t spoken to the press since 2017. And he has struggled with shyness and mental health issues his entire adult life.

Not to mention that Marr’s moral perfection has nothing to do with the Smiths getting back together. Morrissey has never wanted a reunion.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/johnny-marr-interview-i-had-to-defend-myself-against-morrissey-dplgx6dcs

Side Note – the untrue racism allegations stem from a homophobic hit piece in the NME in 1992, after Morrissey was violently attacked by homophobes at a gig & they accused him of inciting it because of his sexuality.

https://folk-devil.com/2021/09/05/sexually-ambiguous/

https://folk-devil.com/2021/01/14/finsbury-park-union-jack/

Here is Marr playing beneath the NME’s idea of racist imagery – although perhaps the Union Jack needs to be held by a “poofy bastard” to be described as racist?

The men’s men in the crowd offer the opinion that Morrissey is a “poofy bastard” and elevate many a middle finger. (Select, October 1992. Review of the Finsbury Park gig that saw Morrissey branded as a racist by the NME for holding a Union Jack).

Marrgate

~ wintersnowmoon

On the 25th of January 2022, Morrissey Central published an Open Letter from Morrissey to Johnny Marr requesting him to stop talking about him.

This is not a rant or an hysterical bombast.  It is a polite and calmly measured request:  Would you please stop mentioning my name in your interviews?
Would you please, instead, discuss your own career, your own unstoppable solo achievements and your own music?
If you can, would you please just leave me out of it?
The fact is: you don’t know me.  You know nothing of my life, my intentions, my thoughts, my feelings.  Yet you talk as if you were my personal psychiatrist with consistent and uninterrupted access to my instincts.  We haven’t known each other for 35 years – which is many lifetimes ago.  When we met you and I were not successful.  We both helped each other become whatever it is we are today.  Can you not just leave it at that?  Must you persistently, year after year, decade after decade, blame me for everything … from the 2007 Solomon Islands tsunami to the dribble on your grandma’s chin ? 
You found me inspirational enough to make music with me for 6 years.  If I was, as you claim, such an eyesore monster, where exactly did this leave you?  Kidnapped?  Mute?  Chained?  Abducted by cross-eyed extraterrestrials?  It was YOU who played guitar on ‘Golden Lights’ – not me.
Yes, we all know that the British press will print anything you say about me as long as it’s cruel and savage.  But you’ve done all that.  Move on.  It’s as if you can’t uncross your own legs without mentioning me.  Our period together was many lifetimes ago, and a lot of blood has streamed under the bridge since then.  There comes a time when you must take responsibility for your own actions and your own career, with which I wish you good health to enjoy.  Just stop using my name as click-bait.  I have not ever attacked your solo work or your solo life, and I have openly applauded your genius during the days of ‘Louder than bombs’ and ‘Strangeways, here we come’, yet you have positioned yourself ever ready as rent-a-quote whenever the press require an ugly slant on something I half-said during the last glacial period as  the Colorado River began to carve out  the Grand Canyon.  Please stop.  It is 2022, not 1982. https://www.morrisseycentral.com/messagesfrommorrissey/open-letter-to-johnny-marr

Marr replied on Twitter linking Morrissey to Donald Trump to reinforce the myth that Morrissey is right-wing.

Morrissey was against Trump.

But guilt by association doesn’t need you to actually associate – so there was a pile-on. Marr underlined it by changing his profile picture to his Simpsons character. Morrissey’s character had been depicted as a fat, gay, meat-eating racist.

With no stand out word or phrase in the letter to demonise him with, it was denouced wholesale as bitchy, moany, odious (Rock’s Back Pages emailed their subscribers the NME’s homophobic hit piece from 22 August 1992 to remind them that Morrissey is a racist) & untruthful – with journalists insisting that Marr has to be cajoled into talking about Morrissey as if Morrissey should know that esp as Marr is cajoled nearly every time.

It’s not quite clear what Johnny Marr said recently to piss off Morrissey, but it resulted in an extremely bitchy “open letter” from the former Smiths singer to his one-time guitarist and songwriting partner. (Rolling Stone, January 2022)

And they added in a selection of old scandals from words taken out of context and negatively editorialised.

The Guardian chose Hitler, Brexit, Rape Apologist, Immigration, Merseyrail, and For Britain. The Independent chose For Britain, Hitler, Own Race and Khan’s Accent. Consequence went for Con-Vid and For Britain.

Morrissey last mentioned For Britain – a party he didn’t vote for, join, or give money to – in May 2019.

Side Note 1: The NME kept it general with ‘controversial‘ Morrissey & ‘legendary‘ Marr. Which is the what they’d wanted since the Smiths split.

I must admit, pestered Marr. A relentless mixture of journo and fan… the true story of The Smiths has become a prisoner of Morrissey’s whimsical memory and busy tongue, and, worse, the loaded imaginings of hacks… Marr has steeled himself and agreed to do a once-and-for-all, no-holds-barred interview about the band that, more than any other, illuminated ’80s Britpop.
He has chosen his moment with care. The imminent release of Electronic’s second single (‘Get The Message’); and the album that’ll quickly follow, will place Marr at the creative crux of his second great band. It will confirm him as one of the most gifted and influential musicians of the last decade. Maybe the most.
Before we start, one more thing needs making crystal clear; Johnny Marr is a Very Happy Man. And why not? At 27 years of age (27? Shocking, isn’t it?) he has it all, sorted. A career on the very brink of new pinnacles: a blessed marriage to Angie; a collection of guitars vast enough to satisfy even as voracious an axe-freak as he; a car too big for most of the streets of his native Manchester; a studio refuge in the depths of his home. Did I say ‘happy ? This, people, is the proverbial pig in shit.
But best of all, though, is Johnny Marr’s healthy relationship with his past. He has refused to let it haunt or hinder him. Nor is he cramped, like some, by an undue reverence for Morrissey. Indeed, he (like all the Factory mafia) now refers to his former soulmate as ‘Dorissey’ and has re-christened the limpid lad’s last 45 (‘Our Frank’) as ‘Alf Wank’. (Danny Kelly, NME, April 1991) https://mycuttings.blogspot.com/2021/03/1991-04-20-johnny-marr-nme.html

Side Note 2: if Morrissey mimicked a Black artist it would have been a scandal:

This is nervy, routine business-avoidance. We’re here to talk Smiths. Start at the start.
“I was born a poor black chile …” he grins, in one last attempt at stalling. (Danny Kelly, Johnny Marr, NME, April 1991)

Side Note 3: more evidence that straight male rock stars can say anything.

The Guardian defends Neil Young’s right-wing homophobic phase:

Politically-speaking, its hard to exorcise the ghost of his 1980s pronouncements, when he swung hard-right behind the Reagan presidency and lashed out at gays (“you go to the supermarket and you see a faggot behind the fucking cash register, you don’t want him to handle your potatoes”) and welfare spongers. “Stop being supported by the government and get out and work,” Neil advised. “You have to make the weak stand up on one leg, or half a leg, whatever they’ve got.” Set against all this, however, is some of the finest music of the last 30 years; a body of work that’s at once earthy yet haunting. Marshalling the case for the defence I would direct the jury, in particular, to listen to Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, After the Goldrush, the wonderfully sepulchral Tonight’s the Night, choice portions of Harvest, Zuma and Rust Never Sleeps, and the whole of On the Beach (recently reissued and every bit as good as I remember it) (Xan Brooks, the Guardian, September 2003) https://www.theguardian.com/music/2003/sep/17/popandrock.neilyoung

And fabricates Morrissey into a right-winger because of a couple of out of context quotes. Morrissey had expressed support for left-winger Bernie Sanders in June 2016 and left-winger Jeremy Corbyn in September 2015 and had released a political manifesto that was all about animal welfare in March 2016 when he considered running for London mayor on behalf of the left-wing Animal Welfare Party.

Did he and Morrissey have similar politics? “Yeah, we did back then.” And now? “I wouldn’t expect so. Probably not.” In recent years, Morrissey has made headlines for suggesting that immigration is compromising British identity; he sued the NME (successfully) for defamation, releasing a statement that “racism has no place in our society”. In a 2010 interview with this magazine, he described the Chinese as a “subspecies” when it came to their treatment of animals. Marr prefers to talk about the days when Morrissey reserved his bile for Margaret Thatcher. (Simon Hattenstone, the Guardian, October 2016) https://amp.theguardian.com/music/2016/oct/29/johnny-marr-the-smiths-morrissey-simon-hattenstone

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/mar/07/morrissey-considers-running-for-london-mayor-animal-welfare-party-boris-johnson

https://www.nme.com/news/music/morrissey-16-1200365

https://www.nme.com/news/music/morrissey-48-1224576