Morrissey Won't Back Down

• 4th Dec 2007

Controversial Smiths legend Morrissey has defended accusations of racist comments in a recent interview with the NME. The front cover of the NME shows Morrissey with the words “The gates of England are flooded. The country's been thrown away.” Then throughout the interview the NME badger Morrissey to comment on the state of the country's immigration. Morrissey made comments throughout the interview some such as ''the higher the influx into England the more the British identity disappears,”.

In statement on the singer's website today Morrissey explains why he issued a writ for defamation against the NME and its editor Conor McNicholas last Friday, claiming the magazine was out to get him. “I believe they have deliberately tried to characterise me as a racist in a recent interview I gave them in order to boost their dwindling circulation. I abhor racism and oppression or cruelty of any kind and will not let this pass without being absolutely clear and emphatic … Racism is beyond common sense and has no place in our society.”

The NME call it a love affair they have had with Morrissey over the years but if you read the interview it is actually very very amateurish and clearly goes on and on trying to poke Morrissey into saying something controversial. Although the NME say that it was clearly a printed Q&A session and that they didn’t want to stitch the singer up, you can clearly tell from the badgering nature of the questions it may be a stitch up.

Having said that Morrissey's comments weren't racist he was clearly stating the obvious England is losing it's national identity and that's not a racist thing to say!