Oh, Justin Bieber fans – where will today’s Internet be without you? Probably a much better place on Twitter. Fans of the Canadian ‘singer’ have been sending abusive messages to The Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney after a comment he made about Beiber’s lack of a Grammy nomination.
And you may be wondering why this is being posted on a site called techgeek.com.au – since we usually don’t cover this type of stuff. I’ll explain later on. Bare with me for the moment.
The entire fiasco started after when TMZ interviewed Carney, asking if Beiber should feel “burned” because he didn’t get a nomination at the Grammys. He told the reporter that the “Grammys are for like music, not for money … and he’s making a lot of money. He should be happy.”
The comment was a little bit harsh (The Black Keys were in the industry for several years, while Bieber rose through the ranks really quickly), but not mean. In response to Carney’s comment, Bieber tweeted that he “should be slapped around”.
After that, fans on Bieber’s side have sent abusive messages to the drummer. Fans have called him a “pedophile“, a “fa—t“, and a whole bunch of death threats. Carney isn’t taking it personally, however. He’s retweeting the abuse and changed his name on his profile to “Justin Bieber Carney”. Of course, fans went ballistic.
It’s not the first time Bieber fans went mad. Back in 2011, they attacked Esperanza Spalding because she won best new artist at the Grammys that year, not their ‘beloved’ Justin Bieber. They vandalised her Wikipedia page, along with the usual sending of hate and death tweets. This also happened when Kim Kardashian and Bieber had a friendly exchange on Twitter; and also when Beiber was first spotted with his then-girlfriend Selena Gomez.
It’s sort of sad that I know this information – you can blame the usual glances on Mashable and The Huffington Post.
However, what’s different about this attack compared to the other ones were that this one was started by Bieber. All the other ones were just fans going crazy. He obviously knew that his 34 million followers on Twitter were willing to protect him. It makes, more or less, Bieber a dick.
But more so, it makes Beiber a bully. Let’s remove the two famous people in the scenario and replace them with ordinary students. One student says something that another student doesn’t like – something that would make him obviously jealous (apparently, Bieber really, really, really wants a Grammy). The other student then gathers his friends and compounds him with abuse every day.
That’s bullying. And it should not be tolerated.
It’s alright to disagree with the comments. It is not alright to be abusive.
I’m no way a fan of your music, I think it is horrible garbage that should be in the pits of hell. However, you have 34 million followers who enjoy your music. Ignore the people who dislike your music – like me – and continue producing ‘music’ to your fanbase.