During his tearful speech in Philadelphia, Ed Sheeran said: “In these situations, you really find out who your friends are.”
Very true.
Macklemore was removed from the tour. The other support acts and his backing band then walked out in solidarity. Sheeran replaced them all and carried on.
Some friendships can’t be bought. Others, apparently, just require a new contract and a cheque.
But perhaps the bigger lesson from this whole episode is about Sheeran himself.
When principle, loyalty and the commercial machine around him collided, the commercial machine won.
The people around him were prepared to sacrifice work and money for what they believed in. Sheeran’s response was to replace them and keep the tour moving.
And all of this followed his insistence that he doesn’t want to “do politics”, despite having spoken publicly and unequivocally about Ukraine.
He didn’t need to become an activist. He needed to acknowledge the contradiction, drop the “I don’t do politics” defence, and show Palestinians the same basic humanity and clarity he was perfectly capable of showing Ukrainians.
And maybe that is the real lesson in finding out who your friends are: good friends don’t accept you for your convictions, invite you into their world, and then ditch you the moment those convictions become inconvenient.
Good friends stand by you when it actually costs them something. And that is priceless.
Take a look at some behind-the-scenes of Paul putting together our Materials Science and Renewable Energy boxes. Getting them ready to be delivered to the first school.
Special thanks to @iom3 and Armours and Brassiers’ Company for funding this initiative.
#CollabIsKey