News > M.I.A.
The New York Times Really Screwed Up This Time
By Johnny Firecloud
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Some music superstars build a shell around themselves with their success, making calculated moves to improve their PR status and rocking the boat as little as possible. As she’s proven time and time again, M.I.A. is not that kind of superstar.
In a recent New York Times article titled “The 31 Places to Go in 2010“, the top spot was given to Sri Lanka, with the paper praising the island nation’s “pristine coastline” and claiming it to be like “one big tropical zoo”. If by “pristine” they actually meant “corpse-covered,” and “tropical zoo” was to be taken as “cauldron of human atrocities,” they’d have been spot-on. But for Sri Lankan native M.I.A., who has seen the massive atrocities of human rights firsthand in her homeland, the promotion of the area as a vacation destination for Americans was beyond enraging.
“HERE IS THE LUSH COASTLINE THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT,” wrote the singer in one of several outraged posts on her Twitter. “FUCK NEW YORK TIMES! DO YOU THINK YOU NEED TO GO HERE ON VACATION?” she said in another Tweet, accompanied by a gruesome photo of stacked, dead children covered in mud. I’d link directly, but trust me, that’s some shit you cannot unsee. Click wisely.
The 26-year civil war between the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers technically ended in May of 2009, when the Tigers admitted defeat. M.I.A.’s father was a political activist for the Tigers, and she’s been highly vocal in voicing her disapproval of the Sri Lankan government’s conduct.
As for the Times article, Ms. Arulpragasam makes a very strong point: Just two days after running an article with the headline “Video of Sri Lankan Executions Appears Authentic, U.N. Says” on their news blog The Lede, The New York Times Travel section published “The 31 Places to Go in 2010” with Si Lanka at the top. Evidently North Korea and Afghanistan didn’t grease the right palms this year.
As for the music side, M.I.A. is hard at work and aiming high on her new album, which finds the musician digging deeper for honesty than ever before. “The last album, I didn’t actually sit anywhere long enough for it to really be in my life and to really think about it,” she recently told Rolling Stone. “Now I’m putting out my next album, and the world has changed. I came up talking shit about Bush, and it’s great that it’s changed, but I don’t know how much it’s changed, and I’m exploring that.”
“I just want to be real, whatever that is,” she adds. “Even if my songs are shit, and if I have flaws and if I’m confused, if I offend people or if I don’t offend people, I might try to work it out in public, just so you know that it’s OK to think, that thinking’s not a dirty word.”
I think it’s a good thing she’s trying to make her music less shitty.
Actually, that was harsh. I don’t like her music at all, but I’m glad to see she’s trying to improve it and “prove herself as a musician”.
if you don’t dig an entire genre of music, there’s no point in bagging on individual artists in it.
I don’t dislike hip-hop and she still was by far the most repetitive and hard to sit through act I caught at Voodoo in ‘07. She seems to be trying hard enough, but what she’s done so far just lacks talent or insight, hopefully she’s grown since then.
as a side note, quit it with the god-damned gun samples, I fucking get it, you grew up in the ghetto in a war-torn nation, I don’t need to here SMGs firing 49 fucking times during your set just in case I forget
It is VERY typical of a very large majority of people there in the USA to make those kind of mistakes. We see that a lot from here, outside those borders. We get the impression that most of the people there just don’t care about anything that isn’t broadcasted by E! or Mtv. Of course, there’s a tiny minority who does care and are interested enough to know what’s up outside uncle sam’s house, and I know I’m writing right now to that minority. Still, that’s one more thing that should be looked at.
Of course, I would love to be wrong on that one…
Don’t know anything about her music, but I love her last quote in that article. Thinking is not a dirty word, indeed.
Question, though, aren’t the Tamil Tigers also known for some atrocious violence and also for using children as soldiers? Seems both sides of that conflict are responsible for some fucked up shit.
On a related note here is a link to a new M.I.A song/video:
http://twitvid.com/B54ED
Yeah, you definitely can’t unsee that. The world we live in truly is stunning.
M.I.A and her gang of terrorist sucking supporters should be banned in the US!!! MIA is Tamil Tiger terrorist supporting slut with loud ugly music. I would reco that Homeland Security takes a look at the bitches credentials. All throughout the world the LTTE or Tamil tigers have been banned, yet MIA cries for them.
We have such fascinating readers…
Enrico, you should read some books man. Nonfiction ones i mean.
Enrico, that’s the kind of stupid that school can’t help.
Sri Lanka is a rich cultural melting pot, MIA has never mentioned in her interviews anything about the positive side of Sri Lanka’s diverse past…due to colonialism the Portuguese,Dutch,English and other European countries all been to Sri Lanka…sinhalese and tamils are so diverse..it was was the english who in th first place brought the small tamil population from the southern part of India “Tamil Nadu”..years on it is the Tamil Tigers(LTTE terroist group) who want to divide Sri Lanka all that ignorant people such as MIA do is stirr up more political problems for Sri Lankans all over the world…if MIA actually talked about something positive, for example the fact that Sri lankans are united, even through civil war, in Sri Lanka (sinhalese/tamils/buddhists/catholics/christians/muslims all live & work together on that tiny island together) sri lanka has so much beauty in its rich artistic history due to all the different ethnicities which have been there…every country has political struggles, the middle east is far worse off than Sri Lanka…or in Australia, the indigenous aboriginal tribal communities have been ruined due to Europeans interference…right now if u read the current sri lakan news the country has worked hard to finally reach peace, but off course this is not good enough for MIA ,she just a one-sided, narrow minded brat who just makes noise always about the bad, plus if she really wants to help Sri lankans instead of complianing so much she needs to actually go to Sri lanka and help the people, there is no good in her jus shouting about some comments in a newspaper..she is a classic attention seeker making noise to get more popular..she is bad representation for the Sri Lankan people..it is mostly westerners who support her because they know little abt the true struggles of the sri lankan people/history…In regards to her music, she always samples and rips off other artists, for example tht song paper planes is only a catchy tune because she took the music from the song “Straight to Hell” by the Clash..i have no respect for wannabe artists tht get credit from other artist’s genuine talents…originality in the arts is soo rare these day its very diappointing :(
MIA has found out that she can make herself heard only by playing dirty. She slept with many and finally found a ‘harmelss shy ‘ rich American with lots of money. She did not marry her for love but for money and fame. How come Helen Thomas is given the boot for her opinion on Israel ( so much for freedom of speech) and MIA is agiattingly comfortable in promoting a terrorist group. I think she is a foul mouthed bitch who happens to sing rap. Go to Sri Lanka’s north and do something worthwhile for the poor Tamil people who have suffered so wage war asking for a piece of USA .