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The Lady Gaga apology is disappointing. I like the action of removing the song from streaming, and I'm in her corner as far as the Oscar race, but if she was going to wait that long to make a public statement, it could've been so much stronger
And when I say "wait this long," I'm not referring to the past two weeks-ish. I'm talking years. There are plenty of rope-a-dopes who can claim ignorance of R's allegations until very recently and I'd believe them. She is not one.
I DO believe it's possible she was insulated from the discourse on Twitter surrounding the #SurvivingRKelly airing, possibly working on a new project or getting each strand of her hair individually dyed to match her Globes gown or whatever she was doing. So I don't mean this week
I think a skilled PR person could've helped her lean into all that she's been through and how the pop recording industry is hell on earth for young women, and maybe in her knowing how lucky she is to have her status, she didn't consider similar survivors of lesser industry status
Or maybe lean into her state of mind at the time, which she sooooorta did in mentioning the song content itself, but didn't follow through. OR she could've started there and said she learned more about him in the immediate aftermath but the cat (single) was out of the bag, maybe?
Even that would require a direct pivot to the gendered unfairness of the music industry, but that leads us right back to at least one element of how R has prospered, so to me that sentiment serves victims more than ANY iteration of "I didn't know"
Sidebar: I was today years old when I learned that Terry Richardson directed the (scrapped?) video and uhhh holy shit that's like learning someone partied with Charles Manson's and is now sorry to learn of his crimes oh by the way Jim Jones was bartending whaaaaat
Bottom line is something I've said before: no one can control how ppl receive a statement (esp. an apology!) but you can control how you give it. The harsh truth is that your apology might make no difference to some, I just ask that it not contain fiction.
IMO, the longer you wait to address something, the higher your degree of difficulty in doing so with a positive outcome for yourself. Most wrongs can be addressed with compassion at the very least. The one thing you can't do is go back in time.
