Manchester Terror Attack

I noticed that as well and I suspect it is for record, quite possibly to protect it from exploitation (in the commercial sense) by other entities, or that if they do she and her management can approve it and - I would hope - ensure funds raised go to the correct place. Could also have been for legal expediency.

I'm normally one of the first to be cynical, but there is no reason to be. This was more genuine than your average telethon with a young performer who has a strong team including Scooter Braun and her mother behind her to get the concert right.

The consensus among the masses is largely positive too, job done.

From time to time probably not enough as I should, it's of course a bit of both, I do it because there are those that are really suffering. I guess actually it doesn't make me feel better about myself as I'm also left thinking I could've done more.

First of all I welcome your understanding of the point of the forum and extra commentary on Ariana Grande, that gives a bit more information and background on her as a person.

I don't feel I've been 'incredibly cynical', I have voiced a cynical thought that passed through my mind and no doubt through the minds of others I've balanced that out with other thoughts about the whole thing though. I feel my posts on this have been balanced and reflect more than one thought that I have. There will be many who watched tonight that enjoyed the music but were also cynical about motives too, there will be those, like me, who were slightly cynical but overall thought it was quite a positive thing. One comment I've made has been picked up on and the other thoughts in my posts and that were in my mind have been ignored.

Well if the material is being exploited to raise money for charity then I don't think anyone would have a problem.

Not good enough. Do more and make sure you tell us so we can judge you and question whether your motives are genuine enough or not.

Sometimes you want to come back with a reasoned argument. Sometimes a post makes you so annoyed you just want to be lazy and respond with a two word response that'll get you banned.

There is clearly a difference to question a commercial industries motives when helping others than when individuals do it.

Also I'm always the one who defends the likes of Bono when they're pushing a charitable causes, whilst being a multi-millionaire, I always say "they might privately be donating to these causes but they can do more to help by using their position".

People are just reading too much into a thought that passed through my head I choose to post on a forum where we should be allowed to have that conversation.

The "questioning" is wildly inconsistent. Young female pop star Ariana's accused of exploiting tragedy to promote herself while "credible" male BritPop relics Oasis are simultaneously being criticised for not exploiting tragedy to stage a self indulgent reunion!. It really is just kneejerk cynicism. It's a mix of music snobbery and sexism crappily disguised as woke & deep criticism of commercialism.

My questioning isn't wildly inconsistent as I was just posting thoughts based on a snippet I'd seen whilst doing other things, going out to the shop and watching a bit of Catchphrase on ITV +1 to name two. It was the idea Grande picked up the phone and rang round the likes of Barlow that made me chuckle, it's that which led to the thoughts of insincerity and clearly organising something like this is a lot more formal and unlikely to be led by one artist.


My thoughts would've have been the same if it was Pharrel Williams and not Ariana Grande doing the 'phoning round', so not sexist, but you'd probably unfairly accuse me of racism had that been the case.

It's not in anyway music snobbery either, you're simply reading things into it which aren't there.

Yes the post was kneejerk but that's the nature on posting thoughts on a live event, it kinda has to be.

Freeform's former name was ABC Family.

Quite possibly a venue curfew being outside and a Sunday?

The outdoor stuff I've been involved in (including in Manchester), normally has a very strict 11pm noise curfew. You don't run over those, even by 10 minutes, so you normally schedule your event to be done by half ten to give you the leeway for any overruns without just cutting off midsong.

With this, 10pm is probably late enough anyway for it's target audience, especially on a school night.