This petition is just a total crock.
They said Jay-Z would bomb when he headlined there, and then Beyonce when she did, but both of them totally kicked-ass, and apparently went down a storm.
Glastonbury was never intended to be purely a 'rock festival', and it isn't, this isn't 'Download' or the 'Slipknot Fest' .... it's full title is Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts, I went once and there's all sorts of weirdness goes on there.
I don't remotely see the problem with having Kanye West at Glastonbury, and anyone who does needs to get a life - I totally hate his music, with a passion, as I do all rap music, but there must be a reason why he's one of the biggest acts on earth.
Thing is, Glastonbury for YEARS has had an entire 'Dance Village' right there on the site, and with a massive 'Dance Tent' which is packed to the roof every year, and which features countless dance, rap, hip hop acts etc, so then where is the petition protesting against them having 4 days of rap music artists in the 'Dance Village'? ... so it's quite okay to have it, just providing it isn't on the main stage?
Bullshit.
Glastonbury covers every kind of music and performance under the sun, as it should do, they have a huge jazz tent, an acoustic tent, and every genre of music is catered for, folk, pop, metal, 50's nostalgia, classical, soul, punk, blues, so are we saying that everything else is acceptable, EXCEPT for the single biggest music genre of the modern age? (rap music) .... and probably it's leading exponent? (Kanye West) ?
These 'rock-purist' people who are objecting are morons, in recent years Glastonbury has had Shirley Bassey, Rolf Harris, Dolly Parton, Neil Diamond, and Tony Bennett all on the main stage, so you're not telling me than Kanye West has any less of a right to be there than Dame Shirley Bassey ffs???
But actually, I guarantee most people who signed this thing aren't really objecting because he's a rapper, like I said Glastonbury has had rap music artists performing for years, they're objecting because he often comes across as being an ass and an idiot, and he also comes up with a lot of controversial public statements, which in NO grounds to try and get him removed from the bill, on that same basis you would also have to ban Ted Nugent, Gene Simmons and Kiss, Oasis, Sinead O'Connor, Eminem, Marilyn Manson, Dave Mustaine from ever appearing, the list goes on of idiot musicians who come across like neanderthals as soon as they open their mouths....
I mean the guy in the quote at the top of this thread says it right there, ..... "Kanye has been very outspoken on his views on music" .... so there you have it, in black and white, a full admission that they don't want him to perform because they don't like his views, so therefore he should be silenced, and the invitation to perform should be withdrawn.....well, there's another word for that, 'censorship'...you want to start banning people from speaking/singing/performing because you don't happen to like what they say, it's pretty much also sometimes know as fascism...when did Glastonbury, England, 2015 ... suddenly turn into Mississippi, USA, 1965???
And anyways, Glastonbury Festival is 100% the property of Michael Eavis and his daughter, who own and run the festival, with the festival site being at their private property/farm/home, and so they can invite whoever the hell they want to attend without taking a show of hands to decide who is 'acceptable' and who isn't.
If people bought a ticket, and they hate Kanye, then when he's on stage go off and watch any of the other 50 bands who will be playing all around the festival site on the same night as Kanye, nobody is forcing anybody to stand there and watch him, and if they didn't even buy a ticket at all, which I guarantee that most of the fools who signed this petition didn't, so they won't even be there, and so it's costing them nothing, then what difference does it make to them who headlines the festival?