Music

Sometime in the late to mid 1970s, Prince announced himself not only as a musical genius, but as a social revolutionary.

By highlighting different lifestyles and playing with (in his music as wells as personal style) sexuality and androgyny, for instance, Prince opened all of our eyes to the way people live. That earlier Prince seemed to say that it’s okay to be who you are and for me to be who I am. That gave power to his fans and deepened his music.

The music. I love Prince’s music and I own practically as much of the music as anyone could. I’ve listened to all of his output. And it has colored my view of the world.

But, in an interview with the New Yorker magazine recently, a different Prince seemed to emerge, a less tolerant and, perhaps, bigoted one.

Speaking seemingly about Prop 8, which overturned the state’s Supreme Court ruling and outlawed marriage by same-sex couples, Prince said:

“So here’s how it is: you’ve got the Republicans, and basically they want to live according to this.” He pointed to a Bible. “But there’s the problem of interpretation, and you’ve got some churches, some people, basically doing things and saying it comes from here, but it doesn’t. And then on the opposite end of the spectrum you’ve got blue, you’ve got the Democrats, and they’re, like, ‘You can do whatever you want.’ Gay marriage, whatever. But neither of them is right.”

When asked about his perspective on social issues—gay marriage, abortion—Prince tapped his Bible and said, “God came to earth and saw people sticking it wherever and doing it with whatever, and he just cleared it all out. He was, like, ‘Enough.’ ”

I don’t know what scripture Prince is referring to but he is just plain wrong.

And it saddens me that this man, who gave so much hope and entertained people and enriched lives, would now be spouting inane but hurtful bigotry.