Please sign with your Name and in "Organization", please type your Fandom Name.
As members of various artist fandoms worldwide, we recognize that our fan labor directly impacts the creative and financial production of our beloved artists. Our subcultural activities play a pivotal role in maintaining the influence of these artists. While the relationship between fans and artists is often commodified and transactional, it is also culturally reciprocal in myriad ways.
However, current world events call for major reflection on this reciprocal relationship between fan and artist priorities and politics, embedded within the power inequalities of the world.
The ongoing apartheid-led genocide in Occupied Palestine compels us to question our priorities and politics as fans. We find ourselves in a moral dilemma. Can we, in good conscience, continue to stream our artists' music/watch their films/consume any other cultural product when they remain either silent, silenced, or even on the wrong side of history? We are deeply disturbed by the unfolding humanitarian crisis in Palestine, and it has left us unable to "escape" into our fandom activities. We struggle with the knowledge that an entire population is being denied the joys that this world has to offer. We struggle that our artists may not be able to voice their opinions because of their own embeddedness in repressive ruling regimes. We struggle that some artists have really chosen the wrong side of history.
And what is the use of an art-fan relationship in a world where a whole population is being systematically decimated? What is the use of art in a world where a whole people, their dreams, their talent, their desires, are quashed? What of their art, that will never make it to our present? What about the future where we need Palestinian artists to survive and thrive and make our lives richer? So much is being lost as we write this.
Furthermore, we very well know that fandoms are often perceived as secondary to artists, and most of us are strangers to each other, lacking the fame and power that many individuals possess. Nevertheless, we represent the global majority, the working masses who refuse to stand idly by in the face of the ongoing apartheid enforced by Israel's ruling regime. Our struggles resonate with people whose hard-earned labor is devalued and utilized indirectly or directly in funding violent regimes. We abhor that we have been put in situations of complicity, not of our direct choosing.
As fans of our beloved artists, we urgently call for:
It is imperative that we, as a united force, utilize our collective influence to effect change and support justice for Palestine. The time for silence is over; our voices must be raised to end the suffering of an entire population.
As the signers of this letter are increasing as days pass by, we have received a request to add this to our list of demands: we are very aware that many artists work and associate themselves with Zionists, which makes them intentionally or unintentionally complicit in the ongoing genocide of Palestinian People. We call for an immediate disassociation from any product or person that aligns with Zionist agenda, if it is found that our artists are working with them or are associated with them.
We also want to note that we are also fans who consume content and cultural products via streaming channels like Disney+ and are avid consumers of McDonald's and Starbucks, companies that have often collaborated with our favorite artists. We are very aware of the complicity of these corporations in funding the violent regime in Israel. We vow to boycott these products until the reparative demands of the Palestinian people are met.