Vancouver’s own Matthew Good received a ton of backlash after a video clip of him went viral on various social media platforms.
The track was recorded at a concert in Nanaimo, BC. During his performance, Good starts talking about people who “protest in front of hospitals”.
“I guess what I’m saying is I want to put those people on planes and fly them to the Congo and they can get off and, like, 14-year-olds can shoot AK-47s at them,” the musician said, and the crowd at the venue alternates between cheers and boos.
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Most viewers believe that when Good mentioned these protesters, he was talking about those who speak out against the COVID-19 vaccines and refuse to take them. That line of thinking makes sense, since anti-vax groups have made headlines across the country several times over the course of the pandemic for protesting in front of hospitals.
“The suggestion that I am against unvaccinated people is categorically false,” Good said in a statement emailed to Daily Hive. “When I started my concert tour earlier this year, some venues still had vaccine requirements to enter shows. I was 100% against this and only accepted offers to play shows where everyone could attend.”
Several news sites that covered the video clip blatantly said that Good was talking about anti-vax protesters. But most of them have revised their posts on the matter since Good provided a statement to iHeartRadio.ca saying people are misunderstanding him.
“I never mentioned unvaccinated people or vaccines. I don’t even know where that came from, and I would never argue that a person doesn’t have the right to govern their own body,” Good said.
“I talked about people who believe they are living in tyranny in Canada, and yes, I said I want to put those people on planes to the Congo, and when they get off, 14-year-olds can fire at them with AK-47s, so they know what it’s like to live in a real tyranny.”
He added that he was simply making a point about true tyranny and using an extreme, hyperbolic example to illustrate it. He doesn’t actually want people to be shot. “It’s ridiculous. The whole thing is ridiculous.”
Good, whose 16-stop Canadian tour begins Nov. 10, also said he’s shocked by the kind of coverage Canadian media is giving him.
“They didn’t reach out for comment or to confirm what I said, they just took a post from Twitter further out of context. It’s really staggering.”
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