{"id":528520,"date":"2026-03-09T09:10:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T09:10:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/528520\/"},"modified":"2026-03-09T09:10:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T09:10:13","slug":"brit-awards-and-baftas-criticising-genocide-and-the-rise-of-the-far-right-and-being-censored-for-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/528520\/","title":{"rendered":"Brit awards and Baftas: Criticising genocide and the rise of the far-right and being censored for it"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last week\u2019s Brit Awards in Manchester saw several political comments by artists. Equally noteworthy were public reactions to broadcaster ITV\u2019s censorship of political comments in its coverage of the acceptance speeches. <\/p>\n

ITV deliberately drowned out comments \u201cFree Palestine and fuck ICE\u201d by drummer Max Bassin of the band Geese.<\/p>\n

Geese (band) at White Oak Music Hall Upstairs, Houston, TX, 2024-05-05 [Photo by Redolta \/ CC BY-SA 4.0<\/a>]<\/p>\n

Viewers complained at the censorship on social media, with one commenting, \u201cI\u2019ve never known the Brits bleep out so much stuff.\u201d <\/p>\n

The Brits are a showcase event for the British music industry. Even in this corporate environment, artists spoke from the red carpet and the podium about the rise of Reform UK, the continued genocide in Gaza and domestic repression in the United States.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the most interesting comments came from Irish artist CMAT, nominated for international artist of the year. She spoke out against \u201canyone trying to argue that art is not a political place.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything is politics,\u201d she said. \u201cMore than ever, art is politics because you don\u2019t get to make art in a fascist state. Fascism is on the rise in every single country in the world.\u201d Fascism was \u201cshowing its ugly head in Ireland\u2026 all over the UK and don\u2019t even get me started on America.\u201d<\/p>\n

She singled out the call by Berlin film festival jury president Wim Wenders for artists to \u201cstay out of politics,\u201d calling it \u201ccowardice.\u201d<\/p>\n

It shows, she said, \u201cthat these people are extremely separate from how normal people live their everyday lives\u2026 They\u2019ve become successful artists\u2026 and so they have wiped their hands clean of having to do anything with the working classes or having to do anything with anyone who is oppressed in any nation because they have the luxury of doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wenders\u2019s<\/a> comment was part of a campaign to ensure that the only politics on display were those of the German government<\/a>. The systematic efforts to suppress criticism of the genocide in Gaza, particularly, have met a determined and public backlash from artists.<\/p>\n

CMAT has been consistent in her support for Palestinians. In 2024, she pulled out of the Latitude Festival because of its sponsorship by Barclays, which was financially involved in the Gaza war. She ended her set at Glastonbury<\/a> last year with a pro-Palestinian statement.<\/p>\n

Singer CMAT performing at Union Pool in 2022 [Photo by Collin Knopp-Schwyn \/ CC BY-SA 4.0<\/a>]<\/a><\/p>\n

Other artists have also consistently protested the Gaza genocide. When Sharon Osbourne accepted a Lifetime Achievement award on behalf of her late husband Ozzy, Scottish singer-songwriter Jacob Alon held aloft a Palestinian scarf. Alon, who won the critics\u2019 choice award, included the words \u201cFree Palestine\u201d in the song \u201cFairy in a Bottle\u201d at a Mercury Prize performance last year.<\/p>\n

Sharon Osbourne has long been active in campaigns against critics of the state of Israel, including backing antisemitism smears against Jeremy Corbyn\u2014of whom she said, \u201cI want to physically hurt this man\u201d\u2014and opposing any boycott of Israel from the Eurovision Song Contest in 2024. <\/p>\n

When Irish rap trio Kneecap led thousands in a chant of \u201cfree Palestine\u201d at the Coachella<\/a> festival last year, Osbourne joined the vendetta against them. She called for revocation of their work visas to the US. This was part of a systematic campaign that saw Kneecap refused entry to Canada and facing baseless terrorism charges in Britain.<\/p>\n

Theo Ellis, bassist with group of the year, Wolf Alice, pointed to a wider crisis of information and media censorship. He said musicians \u201chave a power to expose people to information they might not have got somewhere else\u2026 Some of the major news outlets over the course of 2025 particularly were downplaying things and artists were taking up the mantle.\u201d <\/p>\n

He spoke with concern of the \u201cshocking\u201d rise of the far-right, \u201ca really bad thing that people should take very seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many British artists, including Wet Leg, pointed to the rise of Nigel Farage\u2019s Reform UK with concern. Singer Self Esteem, nominated for best artist, said, \u201cThis country\u2019s getting scarier and scarier\u2026 a dark place, darker than where we are already.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked what she meant, she said, \u201cThe party that is doing the best in the polls at the moment.\u201d She warned that \u201cA lot of people don\u2019t actually understand what certain parties are gonna do.\u201d Even under these conditions, however, she insisted, \u201cI just can\u2019t not say what I think because it\u2019s too frightening.\u201d<\/p>\n

Loyle Carner, nominated in the hip-hop category, also spoke of \u201cscary times,\u201d saying \u201cit\u2019s not hard to say\u201d that \u201cI hate Nigel Farage.\u201d He hoped a \u201cmore powerful\u201d response was to \u201ctry and find ways to express some sort of hope and generosity to the people like me who maybe feel marginalised or oppressed or left behind.\u201d <\/p>\n

Even the tamest of political comments requires censorship. ITV censored a joke about Peter Mandelson by the host, comedian Jack Whitehall. There is an anxiety in the ruling class that comment on such a detested figure could reveal the depths of hostility to the political system.<\/p>\n

ITV claimed Bassin\u2019s ICE comment was censored because of his swearing. As it was not possible to isolate the single swear-word in the five-second delay between live event and transmission, they claimed, they also removed the \u201cFree Palestine\u201d comment.<\/p>\n

Whitehall joked that any swearing would be covered by \u201cthe best in the business on the bleep button tonight\u2026 the guy who did the Baftas.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Baftas was presented by the BBC a week earlier. A social media storm was whipped up over an incident there involving Tourette\u2019s campaigner John Davidson.<\/p>\n

Davidson\u2019s Tourette\u2019s involves coprolalia. When he is ticking, he involuntarily shouts extremely offensive things. This is not something he can control, and it is intensified at moments of stress. His life inspired the film I Swear, which shows the condition with sympathy and in depth. Robert Aramayo, who plays Davidson, won best actor.<\/p>\n

Davidson was ticking when he arrived at the ceremony. The audience were alerted to this, but other performers seem not to have been. When Delroy Lindo and Michael B. Jordan were presenting an award, Davidson shouted an offensive racial slur.<\/p>\n

The BBC, which had a microphone at Davidson\u2019s table, chose not to edit this out when it was broadcast later that evening. But much of the social media furore that followed was directed against Davidson.<\/p>\n

Davidson has spoken of his distress, as the BBC had assured him that they would edit any of his involuntary swearing out of the broadcast. StudioCanal and Bafta had both made clear swearing would be edited out. Warner Brothers flagged concerned during the event. They were assured the BBC would be notified and the racial slur would be edited out. It was not.<\/p>\n

Davidson had made four documentaries with the BBC, he said, and \u201cfeel that they should have been aware of what to expect from Tourette\u2019s.\u201d <\/p>\n

While they were broadcasting comments guaranteed to cause distress to Davidson, Lindo and Jordan, the BBC also cut the words \u201cFree Palestine\u201d from the acceptance speech of Akinola Davies Jr.<\/p>\n

Akinola Davies at 2025 Cannes Photocall for My Father’s Shadow [Photo by Kacy Bao – Own work \/ CC BY-SA 4.0<\/a>]<\/p>\n

The director won Outstanding Debut by a British writer, director or producer for My Father\u2019s Shadow, about a family reuniting after the 1993 Nigerian election. He thanked \u201call those whose parents migrated\u201d after escaping persecution or genocide. \u201cYour dreams are an act of resistance,\u201d he said, concluding, \u201cFor Nigeria, for London, the Congo, Sudan, Free Palestine,\u201d which was greeted with applause. The last two words were censored.<\/p>\n

Davies commented, \u201cIt was really important\u2026 to say that in a room full of artists, because we have an opportunity to influence people because they watch our films.\u201d He pointed to recent years of demonstrations \u201ctrying to show solidarity with the people of Palestine, we\u2019ve had some of the largest political solidarity demonstrations in the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n

The anxiety this provokes in the ruling class is driving the censorship and suppression of any critical comment. This censorship is posing ever more sharply the need for a genuine political alternative, revolutionary and socialist programme against genocide and war that can mobilise the international working class.<\/p>\n

Join the fight for socialism! <\/p>\n

Fill out the form to be contacted by someone from the WSWS in your area about getting involved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Last week\u2019s Brit Awards in Manchester saw several political comments by artists. Equally noteworthy were public reactions to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":528521,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[64,63,169251,222758,134,27567,250757,262687,136],"class_list":{"0":"post-528520","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-brit-awards","11":"tag-cmat","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-geese","14":"tag-john-davidson","15":"tag-max-bassin","16":"tag-music"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528520","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=528520"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528520\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/528521"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=528520"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=528520"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=528520"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}