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Canadian rocker Bryan Adams apologized Tuesday after a backlash and accusations of anti-Chinese racism for his online speech on the pandemic that forced the cancellation of his London shows this week.
The “Cuts Like a Knife” singer issued a statement offering “apologies to each and every one who took offense at my post yesterday,” adding, “I have love for all people.”
Adams had said in previous expletive Twitter and Instagram posts that his performances at the Royal Albert Hall were rejected thanks to “eating bats, selling animals in the wet market, greedy bastards.”
He went on to say that “the entire world is now on standby, not to mention the thousands who have suffered or died from this virus,” and warned the Chinese to “go vegan.”
While animal rights groups praised his call to stop eating meat, others interpreted the disparaging comments as anti-Chinese.
“This is so irresponsible and so racist,” Amy Go of the Chinese Canadian National Council for Social Justice told AFP.
“He is a Canadian idol and is fanning the flames of anti-Chinese racism, and contributing to an increase in hate teasing and blatant (physical) attacks on Chinese and Asians in Canada and around the world,” he said.
Others called his comments “racist trash.”
Wet markets sell fresh food and produce, including farm animals and wildlife.
The World Health Organization last week identified one of those markets in Wuhan, China, as a possible source or “amplifying scenario” for the outbreak.
In his apology, Adams explained: “There is no excuse, I just wanted to talk about the horrible animal cruelty in these wet markets as the possible source of the virus and promote veganism.”
There has been anecdotal evidence of an increase in rhetoric and anti-Chinese violence linked to the pandemic.
Go cited, for example, the recent experience of a 92-year-old man deported from a Vancouver convenience store and on the sidewalk by the merchant because he was of Chinese descent.
A Chinese-Canadian woman was also punched in the face in an unprovoked attack last week while waiting at a downtown bus stop in the Pacific coast metropolis.
Adams has since removed the offending tweet, but the message remained on Instagram.
In it he also said that he missed his gang or “other family” while in isolation with his wife and children.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is posted from a syndicated channel)
