“I am exercising my human right to freedom of speech and freedom of expression.” This is how the UK singer Rebecca Ferguson’s Twitlonger, released on Thursday (May 10), begins, an open letter against the cruelty and oppression artists suffer in the music industry.
The 2010 X Factor UK runner up opens up about the struggles she has been through and continues to face, as she unveils the truth hidden behind the dream-come-true façade the music industry set up. Knowing that “where there is power, there is often corruption”, she brings to the spotlight her own story and what she has been through over these past 9 years, facing different kinds of abuse and oppressors.
“I have written this statement today unable to stay silent anymore” she reveals later on, “however still fearful and also at a great risk to my future career in music but choosing to exercise my human right of freedom of speech and human expression, this is something I cannot continue to run away from I refuse to operate in fear.”
Statement of truth..
Read: https://t.co/9Iqr167Zip
— Rebecca Ferguson (@RebeccaFMusic) May 10, 2018
To some of the comments Ferguson reveals she has received, such as “when you earn as much as you do you don’t get a say in how you live your life you do as we say” and “black people are only good for entertaining and running, and not for sitting as CEOs of companies”, she adds they “come from years of unchecked systematic abuse that has been allowed to continue as people that speak out are first.”
“Discredited
Financially oppressed or Bankrupted
Or made to appear crazy within the press and the media who often work to the oppressor’s favor (…), so they are therefore able to create any narrative they wish about whomever they want to.”
Another UK act, Lily Allen, showed her support through her Twitter account, commenting on the Twitlonger with “Wow. So sorry you have been subjected to this @RebeccaFMusic . Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”, to which the singer replied, “Thank you #metoo #notoabuseinthemusicindustry”.
Thank you ? #metoo #notoabuseinthemusicindustry https://t.co/bktGQ11y0q
— Rebecca Ferguson (@RebeccaFMusic) May 10, 2018
The #MeToo hashtag was also written at the end of the statement, a way of showing that she’s not the only one who’s been through this, as she later adds “I’m doing this statement to support all victims of systematic abuse in every field of work and who are currently living in fear and that have had their stories silenced with an NDA.”
She concludes the Twitlonger with an important message to all artists, as she believes they “need to come together as one and demand their be a governing body that protects us from fraud and criminality.”
“As humans we do not evolve if we stay silent I have been brave today although I have not named my oppressors I have made the first move in fighting back against them.”
Below you can find a poem written by the American writer Maya Angelou shared by Rebecca Ferguson on Twitter, followed by two simple words, “I RISE”.
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