It’s sure looks like the music industry is having its long-overdue #MeToo moment. But why now?
[This was my weekly column for GlobalNews.ca. – AC]
Another week, another series of sexual assault-related bombshells from the world of music. First, Diddy.
The firehose of stories about Sean (Diddy) Combs and his “freak off parties” involve everything from alleged sexual assault and sex trafficking to kidnapping, weapons charges, drug use and arson. The memes involving the more than 1,000 bottles of lube and baby oil (allegedly laced with the party drug GHB) are everywhere, as are those featuring Los Angeles police standing next to a seized barrel filled with 750 d!ld*s.
Every day brings more reporting on the A-listers some speculate may have been involved, what some have alleged to have done, the payoffs and cover-ups, the conspiracy theories, and the allegations brought forth by more than 100 complainants.
Diddy’s alleged behaviours are said to be decades old. He sits in a Brooklyn detention centre awaiting trial (probably in April or May), isolated from other inmates for his own safety. Meanwhile, there’s Jeffrey Epstein-level worry about who and what Diddy knows.
Then there’s the case of Sum 41’s Deryck Whibley who, in his new memoir, Walking Disaster: My Life Through Heaven and Hell, alleges that the band’s former manager and producer, Greig Nori, pressured him into non-consensual sexual acts starting when Whibley was just 16. (Nori says these stories are false and has reportedly retained a defamation lawyer.) It’ll be interesting to see how that all plays out.
