no day but today

So yeah, they are destroying the biggest ecosystem that is the Amazon right now. And the world must know.

Here you have some examples of what is going on here rn:

Anti-lgbt stickers to put on house doors or even restaurants and caffees where queer people aren’t welcome or even won’t be allowed

People starting actions like #nietankujenabp (I don’t tank on BP) or #niekupujewempiku (I don’t buy in Empik), which is basically boycotting companies that don’t want to sell newspapers with those anti-lgbt stickers

People handing out anti-lgbt pamphlets (‘Stop Pedophilia’, ‘How to stop homopropaganda in schools’, 'Stop sexualising our children’ and many more)

Various organisations saying that lgbt equals pedophilia and that we should 'get the fuck away from their children’

People getting beaten up for wearing rainbow socks or bags or being seen with same-sex romantic partners

All sorts of petitions and protests against 'homopropaganda’

Blocking or planning to block Pride parades

People throwing rocks, bricks, eggs, petards and other things, beating up people, using all sorts of slurs and generally being absolutely hateful towards lgbt people during Pride Parade in Białystok

An artist being arrested for putting a rainbow flag on Mary’s halo

And a less lgbt associated fact: a journalist getting beaten up for critiquing a fascist graffiti on walls in Wrocław

I’m honestly scared for me, my friends and all other lgbt people in Poland. Our government doesn’t give a shit, openly supports those hateful acts and uses our pain and discrimination as a way to win the next elections: because homophobes are the majority of Polish people. I’m scared, sad and frustrated. No country should be like this and call itself civilised.

For years I asked, pleaded for a chance to own my work. Instead I was given an opportunity to sign back up to Big Machine Records and ‘earn’ one album back at a time, one for every new one I turned in. I walked away because I knew once I signed that contract, Scott Borchetta would sell the label, thereby selling me and my future. I had to make the excruciating choice to leave behind my past. Music I wrote on my bedroom floor and videos I dreamed up and paid for from the money I earned playing in bars, then clubs, then arenas, then stadiums. 

Some fun facts about today’s news: I learned about Scooter Braun’s purchase of my masters as it was announced to the world. All I could think about was the incessant, manipulative bullying I’ve received at his hands for years. 

Like when Kim Kardashian orchestrated an illegally recorded snippet of a phone call to be leaked and then Scooter got his two clients together to bully me online about it. (See photo) Or when his client, Kanye West, organized a revenge porn music video which strips my body naked. Now Scooter has stripped me of my life’s work, that I wasn’t given an opportunity to buy. Essentially, my musical legacy is about to lie in the hands of someone who tried to dismantle it.

This is my worst case scenario. This is what happens when you sign a deal at fifteen to someone for whom the term ‘loyalty’ is clearly just a contractual concept. And when that man says ‘Music has value’, he means its value is beholden to men who had no part in creating it. 

When I left my masters in Scott’s hands, I made peace with the fact that eventually he would sell them. Never in my worst nightmares did I imagine the buyer would be Scooter. Any time Scott Borchetta has heard the words ‘Scooter Braun’ escape my lips, it was when I was either crying or trying not to. He knew what he was doing; they both did. Controlling a woman who didn’t want to be associated with them. In perpetuity. That means forever. 

Thankfully, I am now signed to a label that believes I should own anything I create. Thankfully, I left my past in Scott’s hands and not my future. And hopefully, young artists or kids with musical dreams will read this and learn about how to better protect themselves in a negotiation. You deserve to own the art you make.

I will always be proud of my past work. But for a healthier option, Lover will be out August 23. 

Sad and grossed out,

💔

Here’s how you can help:

Donate to the United Nation High Commissioner for Refugees: https://donate.unhcr.org/int/south-sudan/~my-donation

Donate to the Sudan Relief Fund: https://sdnrlf.com/campaign-cat/featured/ 

Donate to the International Medical Corps for Sudanese Medical Aid: https://www.gofundme.com/f/sudanese-medical-aid

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