​Morrissey Responds to For Britain Pin Backlash: "The Print Media Write As If Someone Is Coming to Get Them"

As originally published by Sarah Murphy on Exclaim!

Morrissey has come under fire (more than usual) in recent weeks for sporting a For Britain pin at live shows and on his TV performance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. After record stores started refusing to stock his music and his posters were pulled down from train stations, Moz has finally broken his silence.
 
The former Smiths frontman addressed the recent controversy over his support of the far-right For Britain party — in characteristically vague and melodramatic style.
 
In a new post on Morrissey Central, he thanked BBC Radio 2 (and only BBC Radio 2) for their support in recent weeks, before going on a tirade about the print media in the UK.
 
"I am sorry the UK print media's contorted interpretation of who and what I am has gone all wrong," he wrote. "In these days when most people are afraid to even whisper, the print media write as if someone is coming to get them. This aching nervousness brings on the vengeful and paranoid. Inventing Britain's doomsday is the preoccupation of the tabloids, and they can hate you for having lived."
 
He continued, offering a manifesto of sorts that appears to condemn socialism and fascism, as well as "fashionable outrage" and "disingenuous media cluelessness."
 
It reads:
 
I straighten up, and my position is one of hope. The march backwards is over, and life has begun again. With voice extended to breaking point, I call for the prosperity of free speech; the eradication of totalitarian control; I call for diversity of opinion; I call for the total abolition of the abattoir; I call for peace, above all; I call for civil society; I call for a so-far unknowable end to brutalities; "No" to Soviet Britain; prayers not to gods but to forces; an end to disingenuous media cluelessness; the people have the power; hatred and beheadings belong in the furnace of history; music might still be your only friend; for every shade and persuasion … we shall always be alongside each other - everyone's culture of value; no more fashionable outrage; cows are friends to humans - don't kill them; beware of those who write in headlines; moral fiber means holding on … to your friends; give up on inferior arguments; God gave you your life to enjoy - you will cry for your life in years to come … death always answers back; do not be a nobody; you have survived this far in order to make the remainder peaceful and funny; your very survival proves that you have a right; ignore the cold eyes of fascism; your life is Art.
 
Morrissey previously denounced racism and fascism in a post that also stated his support for For Britain.
 
Nevertheless, the party continues to be widely criticized for anti-Islam ideology, and leader Anne Marie Waters and her followers were deemed "Nazis and racists" by UK Independence Party members Nigel Farage and Henry Bolton.
 
Waters personally thanked Morrissey for his support earlier this week.