The Macklemore Controversy

Everyone has the right to say “this is the cause I support.”

Everyone else has the right to say “That’s cool and good for you, but it’s not my cause, so maybe promote it on your time at your event, not mine.”

Macklemore’s Pro-Palestine stunt was the equivalent of being a guest at someone else’s wedding, waiting until the cake is about to be cut, then dragging your girlfriend out in front of the happy couple and going down on one knee.

She’ll probably say yes, and people will probably be indifferent or happy for you, but you’ve put the main event in a really awkward position, and there are probably also a lot of pissed off people who signed up for exactly none of this.

It’s not so much that Macklemore said “Free Palestine”. If that had been all that he did it wouldn’t even make a headline, after three years of most of Hollywood and the arts doing the same.

Parents in the audience took issue with graphic war imagery being displayed on inescapably large screens in front of their kids without so much as a content warning. Jews in the audience had to do a split second risk assessment on whether it was safe to stay for the Ed Sheeran concert they’d signed up for, or if they’d have to leave before the stadium turned into a mob baying for Jewish blood, as happened in several other sports stadiums in Amsterdam and the UK.

That’s the thing that most people are angry about. Some artists are loud about their activism, with protest songs and media statements and grand speeches. Others are quieter, and you only hear about it when someone else brings it to the world’s attention.

Ed Sheeran is one of the latter. He’s participated in multiple peace concerts, including one raising money for Peace in the Middle East, and is an activist for indigenous rights and education for the underprivileged, among many, many other causes. Outside of benefits, his activism is quiet, because everyone has their own priorities and not everyone is comfortable demanding that others drop everything to support their cause.

Macklemore is free to say and do whatever he wants in his own time and on his own stage, such as the Pro-Palestine tour he’s currently organising.

What’s not OK is standing up on another artist’s stage and using their platform to boost your opinions.

As Pink pointed out, standing up against a mob with a contradictory opinion can be frightening and lonely. In 2024, I got death threats for asking how much aid a single boat with a cargo capacity of 550 kg and the need for supplies for a two-week voyage could realistically be carrying, when Greta did her Madileen stunt.

For my own sanity, I rarely interact with Pro-Palestine people on Social Media. Enduring Death threats, calls for physical and sexual violence to be inflicted upon me, and similar comments for the high crime of pointing out verifiable facts is, surprisingly enough, bad for my mental health. I don't blame anyone who wants to steer well clear of becoming the next target, celebrity or not.

In 2024, Ed Sheeran donated and fundraised for War Child, a humanitarian charity operating in conflict zones across the globe. The fundraiser in question was specifically for Syria, Ukraine and Gaza. I think it's safe to say that Sheeran does care, he's just not willing to make his stance on Palestine his entire personality, unlike Macklemore and certain other celebrities.

By all accounts, Ed Sheeran is the kind of artist who just wants to make music, perform for people who enjoy said music, and spend time with friends. Being famous is an unfortunate side effect that he uses to platform friends and upcoming musicians who aren't as popular. Macklemore apparently requested to be added to the Opener line-up, so it's hard not to think that he was planning to use Ed Sheeran's visibility to boost his opinions from the start.

If Macklemore did have this planned from the start, then that's an incredibly bad faith, and bad friendship, thing to do, and he fully deserved to be dropped from the tour for that alone. One could argue that Macklemore's views are hardly a secret, and that maybe Ed Sheeran should have expected it and locked down the contract accordingly.

On the flip side, it's not unreasonable for friends to expect friends not to deliberately torpedo a year-long concert tour.

Because this is Ed Sheeran's tour. That's who everyone who bought a ticket came to see. That's who is paying all the roadies, techies, drivers, and everyone else involved in the tour. That's who bears the brunt of any fallout, because Macklemore was attached to his tour, and everyone is demanding a statement from Sheeran, not Macklemore.

(He already gave his opinion, anyway...)

Yes, Ed Sheeran is wealthy enough not to be too badly affected by any howling Pro-Palestinians with zero sense of perspective. But money isn’t everything, nor does it buy happiness.

This is probably unironically Ed Sheeran's biggest nightmare come to life. Not because he was forced to drop a friend from his tour or because he had to make a statement, though I'm sure he could have happily done without that, too.

Sheeran has always been open about having been severely bullied during his school years, before he discovered the guitar and songwriting and performing. I can say from experience that it leaves scars, even well into adulthood. I still have a freeze or fawn response whenever genuine conflict happens in my vicinity, and I've been in therapy for over ten years.

There's probably a small part of Sheeran that wondered if any of it would last. The popularity, the acceptance, the being able to just do what he loved, the not being mocked. A part that feared that all of it could be taken away again in an instant.

And then it was.

Not all of it, obviously. Ed Sheeran still has plenty of fans who don't see his not jumping on every available bandwagon and sticking to his own causes as a flaw. But the backlash, watching the people he lifted up drop him like a hot potato as soon as it's the fashionable thing to do, listening to friends and family call him a disgrace and a coward... that's rough on anyone, even people who don't have childhood trauma.

I actually appreciated that in his speech at the Gillette Stadium, Sheeran made a point of stating that the Gaza War is not one-sided, or a simple black and white issue. I appreciate that he acknowledged that it's not something he's particularly educated on, and that he doesn't feel confident giving definitive statements.

I honestly wish that more people were willing to admit ignorance on topics they're still learning about. If they were, we might have been spared the bulk of this drama to begin with.

He also admitted that he had made mistakes. It was a mistake not to speak up after Macklemore's first night, and a mistake to hope that it would all blow over. It was a mistake not to be more transparent about who removed Macklemore and why, and to let the headlines blow up like they did.

He's willing to learn from it.

Perhaps the howling mob baying for Ed Sheeran's head on a pike would be willing to do the same. Somehow I doubt it.