On March 29th, Chris Brown made headlines once again. something strange happened. Multiple photos were released online of musician Chris Brown, with his hands wrapped around on his female friend's throat. While he and the female friend claim that it was all fun and games, it’s important to remember that this is not Brown’s first questionable moment when it comes to violence against women.
In fact, in 2009 he was sentenced for domestic abuse against his then-girlfriend, Rihanna and that was not the end of his streak of violence. Since then he has had repeated patterns of violence against women. For example his next girlfriend, Karrueche Tran issued a 5-year restraining order against Brown for his abusive behavior during their relationship and shortly after he had to reappear in court for threatening a woman with a gun.
With all of these instances of questionable behavior, it’s hard to believe that Chris Brown is still being supported by his millions of fans. It seems that musicians are often excused for their behavior simply because people enjoy the music, take for example R.Kelly, the famous R&B singer who has been accused of sexual assault, abuse, pedophilia and even starting a cult. However, all of those actions are often ignored in favor of his catchy tunes.
While Chris Brown and R. Kelly have their images marred by their past behavior, both of these men are still able to consistently release music and win Grammys to the glee of their fans. Maybe the controversy of their actions adds to their appeal? I don’t really know. What really irks me about musicians like Chris Brown is that they are often given so many chances simply because of their “talent”. I mean, even after all of these reports were released to the public, he wasn’t dropped by any talent agencies.
Instead, it seemed that the music industry worked tirelessly to make him seem like a sympathetic character just so they can continue to build his fan base and continue to make money. Even Netflix releases a documentary about Brown’s life where it seems like we should forgive Brown for his multitude of mistakes. However, my only question is why should we all continue to give Brown and the other men in Hollywood a chance after chance when people in everyday life are hardly given another one.
Sure, Brown music is at times catchy, that does not mean that we should forget and forgive his abusive behavior. Especially in today’s time where we are seeing so many of our favorite celebrities fall from grace as their behavior is exposed, we should not continue to give them multiple chances and also support their lifestyles with our money. It’s important to remember that the more we continue to ignore behavior like Brown’s, the more normalized it becomes in everyday life.
