Recommendations of the Editorial team
Shirley Manson hasn’t changed her stance on beach balls, even after she went viral for insulting an audience member who kept hitting balls towards the stage at Garbage’s recent performance at Melbourne’s Good Things Festival. Nor has it changed its stance on the humanitarian crisis in Palestine. And she’s using the viral attention to point out just that.
“The only thing that shocks me a bit is that there was more fuss made about me insulting beachballs than about 20,000 Palestinian children who are now fucking underground,” Manson said during a headlining gig in Brisbane. “While the British are cooking up some crazy anti-Christian rhetoric, I just want to remind you what’s really important in life.”
“Maybe a beach ball will make you happy, and for that I apologize,” Manson continued. This apology followed an encounter with the viewer she had previously criticized and to whom she hurled: “You’re a fucking middle-aged man in a ridiculous hat… I literally want to ask people to punch you in the fucking face. But you know what? I’m a lady, so I won’t do it.”
Shirley Manson doesn’t care about traditions
Beach balls are somewhat of a tradition in some live music settings, and Manson is simply not a fan of the beach. In her first response to the controversy, she doubled down. “I got into a band because I HATED THE DAMN BEACH,” she wrote on Threads. “And I got into a band because I wanted to listen to Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Cure and be dark and beautiful… I’m so tired of people taking music for free and treating us all like we’re circus performers.”
“If I have upset you with your blessed beach balls, I humbly apologize,” Manson continued onstage. In front of a sea of even more beach balls. “However, I would really like governments to apologize for what the hell is happening in Palestine.”
Last week, UN General Assembly President Annalena Baerbock stressed the need for “decisive action” to end the conflict between Israel and Palestine. “Everything that has happened in the last two years has only underscored what we have known for decades. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict cannot be resolved through illegal occupation, de jure or de facto annexation, forced displacement, recurring terror or permanent war,” she said. “We must ensure that the ceasefire is consolidated and leads to a permanent end to hostilities.”
Baerbock also noted that at least 67 children have been killed since the ceasefire began in October. In November, Gaza’s health ministry reported that the Palestinian death toll since 2023 had now reached 70,000, according to the Associated Press. Of these deaths, 352 occurred after the ceasefire came into effect.