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Canadian singer Bryan Adams has apologized for an Instagram post about COVID-19 that was widely condemned Monday as racist and inflammatory.
Canadian singer-songwriter Bryan Adams has apologized for an Instagram post widely condemned Monday as crass, racist and inflammatory.
Adams posted the apology Tuesday “to any and all that took offence to” his post.
“No excuse, I just wanted to have a rant about the horrible animal cruelty in these wet-markets being the possible source of the virus, and promote veganism. I have love for all people and my thoughts are with everyone dealing with this pandemic around the world,” he wrote.
The original post on Monday blamed the global COVID-19 pandemic on “some f–king bat eating, wet market animal selling, virus making greedy bastards.”
“My message to them other than ‘thanks a f–king lot’ is go vegan,” the caption read.
The World Health Organization said in April that evidence suggests the novel coronavirus originated in animals in China late last year and was not manipulated or produced in a laboratory.
Scientists who have studied the virus genome have found it is likely the product of natural evolution and made the leap from wild animals to humans just as both SARS and MERS coronaviruses did, probably as the result of close animal-human contact.
Early studies suggested the virus could have come from bats. The WHO is still researching the origin of the virus.
“Bryan Adams” was trending across social media after the singer posted his rant on Instagram and Twitter. The tweet has since been deleted.
He was accused of contributing to anti-Chinese rhetoric proliferating during the pandemic. Others accused the singer of forgetting the true victims of an outbreak that has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives worldwide.
Amy Go, president of the Chinese Canadian National Council for Social Justice, called the post racist and said it could stoke hatred of Chinese Canadians.
“People look up to public figures. He is seen as an idol by many,” Go said. “It justifies this racist hatred against Chinese … This is so irresponsible and just so, so, so, so racist.”
