Beyonce: Turns out Houston police sirens go waaaah, waaaah, waaaah

So Beyonce played a gig in Houston last night, and protestors turned up.

Did the police take steps to ensure the protest remained peaceful?

Well, not really. It was the police who were protesting:

Members of the Coalition of Police and Sheriffs (Cops) stood a mile away from the NRG Stadium and shone a blue light towards the venue.

They were protesting about Beyonce's Formation video, which they claim is "anti-police".

This is "anti-police" in the sense of "how dare you criticise the behaviour of any police anywhere", of course. There's a lot of that about, and it doesn't really do anyone any good. If COPS (seriously? That's the name of your protest gang?) want to ensure that the police get the respect they deserve, they might want to think about shining their blue light in the other direction.

Yasiin Bey experiences force-feeding as Gitmo protest

The US government are currently force-feeding prisoners, during Ramadan, at a sort-of prison they're supposedly trying to close down.

In an attempt to try and show what that force-feeding means, Yasiin Bey - who used to work as Mos Def - has had a go at being on the wrong end of the process. It's not pretty.

Westboro Baptist Church take on Radiohead

Having fought successive battles against gays, the Devil, gay devils, devilish gays, people who like gays, people who like devils, Devils' Food, the army, the dead, happiness and their own dignity, perpetually confused hate-geese Westboro Baptist Church have now added Radiohead to their busy schedule of trying to make everyone as miserable as they are.

The Church turned up to protest against the band playing Kansas, on the grounds that they are:

freak monkey’s with mediocre tunes

I like the idea of a church turning up to protest against mediocre tunes. If Noel Gallagher ever goes back to the US, boy, are they going to be busy.

6Music protests

Lots of coverage this morning of the 6Music protests in London.

It's probably the first time there's been a popular protest to save a BBC service since the march on Broadcasting House to keep Radio 4 on Long Wave. That march - mainly representing the voice of expats alarmed at a Radio 4 only on FM, and thus beyond the reach of their North European transistors - was a success. The upshot was that the planned rolling news and current affairs station was scrapped, and the original Radio Five was dumped to create a hybrid news and sports service instead.

The last march, then, killed the original Radio 6, and wiped out a bunch of interesting late-night music shows. Let's hope this march sort-of-reverses the effect.

Protest against the Digital Economy Bill

Tomorrow (or, if you're being sanely curled up in bed with a book and a mug of milky drink as I'm writing this, today) there's a chance to get out and protest against the Digital Economy Bill. I shall cut and paste this from Boing Boing, before CTRL+V is outlawed:

Come along to the ORG demo on Wednesday, 24 March at 17:30, and protest against disconnection and censorship on the internet.

We'll provide placards, just bring some black tape for gagging or blindfolding yourself.

Disconnection is collective punishment. It is unacceptable. It is unfair and it is disproportionate.

The demo will be held at Old Palace Yard (opposite Parliament, next to Westminster Abbey)

It's all being organised by the Open Rights Group.

Lady GaGa performs useful public service

The more time the poisonous Fred Phelps and his uncharitable church are protesting outside Lady GaGa gigs, the less time they'll be spending disrupting people's funerals.

What's Phelps' beef with GaGa?

Phelps describes Gaga as immoral and disagrees with her personal politics.

Let's hope it's pissing down with rain the night of the gig, eh?

Iran: Mohammad Reza Shajarian bans his own work

As his protest against the Iranian elections, Mohammad Reza Shajarian has demanded that the State broadcaster stops playing his music:

“After what happened, I said ‘no way’ and threatened to file a complaint against them if they continued to use my music,” Mr. Shajarian said in an interview with the A.P. Though the broadcast services complied with his request, the government has responded to hundreds of other artist protests — which have included boycotting state-sponsored awards and appearing at international events wearing green, the color of the opposition — by banning their work, detaining them or forbidding them to travel.

It's a small request, but a large act of bravery.

Against Trump

Donald Trump's bemusing desire to ruin the Scottish countryside by building a golf course on the coast is generating a pleasing amount of local opposition: There's a gig in support of the campaign this Friday, 25th, at the Aberdeen Blue Lamp. No word on who will be playing, but local artists of all types are involved.

You'll have noticed our logo has gone dark

It's not a mistake. It's about a mistake. New Zealand has just introduced an absurdly overwrought piece of legislation which establish "guilt upon accusation" for those accused of copyright theft - and enshrines in law the priciple that copyright "thieves" can be thrown off the internet by their ISPs.

It's a rotten piece of law, and in protest, you're being invited to join an internet black-out between now and the 23rd; if you have an internet presence, you might want to get involved, too.

The Daily Mail responds

Although they've not exactly been shaken to their core, the management team at the Daily Mail have responded to the shuffling fly-by of emo fans with a statement:

"The Daily Mail’s coverage of the 'Emo' movement has been balanced, restrained and above all, in the public interest. Genuine concerns were raised at the inquest earlier this month on 13 year old emo follower Hannah Bond who had been self-harming and then tragically killed herself," they explained in the statement.

"In common with other newspapers we ran an accurate news story recording the Coroner's remarks and the parents' comments. We also published two other articles, one of which explained the background to the Hannah tragedy in calm and un-sensational language.

"The other was a first person opinion piece by a well-known writer, written from the perspective of a mother concerned for her children. We have also run two prominent page lead letters from an emo music fan and from a fan of My Chemical Romance defending their point of view.

"Our music critic admires the music of the band and publicised the band’s UK tour last year. Since this protest was announced a great deal of misinformation has appeared on the internet, much of which confuses what the Daily Mail has actually published with the comments of website readers and 'blogs' over which we have no control and which have stirred up emotions."

Goodness: the poor old Daily Mail being made to look bad by third parties quoting things it published and twisting the way it appears? Who'd ever have thought that could happen in the media, eh? Terrible, that.

The emobeast is angered

Today, the My Chemical Romance army is marching on the Daily Mail, to overthrow their stereotype by complaining how they're so misunderstood and it's not fair. ThrashHits is blogging the event as it happens.