Me say war

NB: Each week I’m posting something from the archives of my more than 20 years of writing on the web. Sometimes it’s a social media post, sometimes a blog post, or (like today) it’s an excerpt from a newsletter issue published in 2019. Each entry gets updated with some modern context or point of view. – HH

Back in 1992, Sinead O’Connor caused a sensation when, on Saturday Night Live, she tore up a picture of the Pope in protest of clergy sexual abuse. She was a young star on the way up, and it seriously set back her career and cost her a lot of fans. This was more than a decade before the worst abuses of Roman Catholic clergy abuse would come to light.

In retrospect, she wasn’t wrong, merely early. 

Two weeks later, she was at Madison Square Garden for a Bob Dylan tribute. She was introduced by Kris Kristofferson, who praised her integrity. The audience began booing her and would not let up. She stood there, stone faced, as they booed her. Finally, she asked for the mic to be turned up, and she launched into an a cappella recitation of War by Bob Marley.

Over the haters, she nearly shouted into the mic:

And when she finished, she walked off the stage, giving them her back, as my Latina friends would say, and fell into Kris Kristofferson’s arms and sobbed. 

It is one of my favorite images: a 25-year-old woman, in front of a hostile audience, standing firm to her principles, refusing to be cowed. Afraid, but convicted. Not without fear, but standing up for what she believed despite that fear. Speaking the truth, even though her voice shook. 

UPDATE:

Another tidbit about this story that I love. In the picture I used for this piece, Kris is whispering in her ear, “Don’t let the bastards get you down.”

Sinead replies, “I’m not down.”

It’s then she asks for the mic to be turned up.

It’s been six years since I wrote this. A lot has changed. Sinead has died. Kris has died.

But much hasn’t. It’s still war. And we still need people to speak, even when your voice shakes.