I was lying in bed the first time I saw someone bonk Bebe Rexha in the face with an iPhone. I reflexively laughed, because that’s what I do in moments of shock. But then I rewound the video again and again and fully processed that someone legitimately threw an iPhone and hit Bebe Rexha in the face. Then I saw the photo Rexha shared on Instagram, displaying three stitches next to her bruised eye. That did not elicit a laugh.
That incident seemed bizarre and random until, about a week later, a fan stormed the stage during an Ava Max performance and slapped her across the face. Then, this past week, a fan threw a bag of his late mother’s ashes on stage while pop singer and aerial silks enthusiast Pink was performing at Hyde Park. Later, a fan gave Pink a large wheel of brie from the front row. And then on Wednesday night, someone threw a bracelet at country star Kelsea Ballerini and hit her in the eye.
So I’m going to ask this frankly: What the fuck are we doing, y’all?
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We’ve entered a new era of chaos this summer, and I have a hypothesis as to why some concertgoers have seemingly lost their minds: Following the pandemic, I reckon that some people have lost the plot on how to behave in public situations. To go one step further, maybe a kind of “social media brain” is to blame. The internet rewards extremism and absurdity, so perhaps these people think that the absurdism is justified for the attention and virality that comes from it.
But most concerning, I think that the people who act out in these ways believe they’re entitled to it. They’ve paid the money to get in, and these entertainers owe us something.
Reader: They owe you exactly what you paid for, which is a concert. That’s it.
I’ve attended a fair number of shows over the years, so I went through my musical memory bank to try and recall the craziest thing I’d ever seen. In 2008, my friend Julia and I went to a Michael Bublé concert and a group of overzealous women got into a fight over a sweat towel he threw into the audience. I saw the guy dressed up as Taylor Swift’s CATS character at the Eras Tour this year. I even saw someone cry so hard at a Brandi Carlile concert that he threw up red wine everywhere (wait, that was me). But the important detail here is that none of the chaos crossed the stage because, ultimately, everyone knows there’s an unspoken respect that keeps us (and our belongings) behind the Line of Performance.
That said, I wanted to know more about the history of being a total moron at a concert before I cast any judgment. In the ’70s, fans threw their underwear at Elvis Presley. At the height of Beatlemania, diehards pelted the Beatles with Jelly Beans after George Harrison revealed they were his favorite candy. The infamous Ozzy Osbourne moment that resulted in him biting the head off a live bat happened after a fan threw it onto the stage. The tradition has continued into the present, too. In the past year, Rosalía was hit hard with a bouquet of flowers, while Harry Styles was pinged in the eye with a Skittle. I’m certainly not one to condone anything that causes any kind of discomfort to the performer, but for the sake of the conversation and good will, let’s go ahead and say that all of this happened out of admiration and/or the heat of the moment.
And with all due respect to Elvis and his burden of dodging underwear, things have gotten increasingly worse. There’s a stark difference between losing your marbles in the height of excitement and looking down at your $1,000 iPhone and saying, “This is going to be funny. I’m going to risk it all to hurt Bebe Rexha.” And that’s exactly the case here: The guy who threw the phone told police he did it because he thought it would be funny. Now he’s facing assault charges. (Also, I assume he has to get a new phone, which is arguably as complicated as being charged for assault.)
Out in Los Angeles, the Ava Max slap caused a scratch on her eye, according to the singer’s post on Twitter. Ballerini, who has her own trauma having survived a school shooting, had to leave the stage after the shock of being hit in the face with that bracelet. And while the incident at Pink’s concert isn’t as physically troubling, don’t get me started on the level of psychosis required to throw your mother’s ashes on stage at a person you don’t even know.
As I considered these recent events and the history of people throwing things at performers, I was initially confused because… is there any difference? As gray as the area seems, the answer is ultimately an unimpeachable “yes.” We’ve crossed the line from idolatry (which is a whole other conversation) and waded into this territory where we don’t respect these performers’ emotional or physical well-being, possibly because we’ve developed unhealthy parasocial relationships with them. There’s a calculation that goes into launching a bracelet at Ballerini at eye level. There’s a certain insanity in throwing your iPhone, and if you’re longing for a clear case of assault, there’s the open-hand smack.
Even the creepiest of past encounters—people grabbing at Taylor Swift or Beyoncé or Adam Levine—seem to be rooted in admiration. Does that make it justifiable? Not so much, but there’s a perceived innocence there. The same doesn’t apply here. If you’re going to a concert with a bag of your mother’s ashes in hand, intent on throwing them to the stage, then there’s clearly more at play here than thinking “Pink is mother.”
Performers shouldn’t have to go through the rigamarole of fearing for their safety; fans shouldn’t have to have their night interrupted because someone got all weird with a phone or a wheel of brie; and security shouldn’t have to be on the lookout for flying objects. (Unless, of course, those security guards are protecting President George W. Bush from flying shoes at a press conference. That was hilarious.)
In short, we, as concertgoers, have a duty: Get your shit together or stay home.
