Recently, there has been a new figure popping up in Kasey's life; a thin, beautiful, egocentric and deceptive figure. The only reason I've been made aware of it, is because I loosely know the girl in question. We live in the same state and our paths crossed briefly about 18 months ago. Both of us being singers, we latched onto each other's social media accounts; an Instagram follow was exchanged, followed by a Facebook friend request. Likes were traded on Facebook photos for a brief while before we both dropped off each others list of recent connections and I became just another button to click when sending out event invites.
I know what you're thinking - was I into this girl? Hell yes I was, but in the way most rolling stones are interested in the ground they cover. It was a fun prospect to consider, but she passed out of my life as quickly as she came into it.
So what does this all have to do with Kasey Chambers you ask? Well, about ten months ago, I was trailing through Instagram like I normally do while I wait for sleep to hit me. Low and behold, who should comment on one of this girl's posts, but Kasey Chambers; a message of praise about how awesome she was and a question about why they didn't know each other better. The comment had been acknowledged and Kasey was welcomed into an exchange of comments that culminated in them agreeing to meet the next time Kasey was in our state.
As promised, the two met up, appeared to hit it off and proceeded to have what looked like a very boozy night in Kings Park. What followed next was a trail of postings from this girl, name dropping whenever she could. At first I was supportive - I watched from behind my screen like the rest of the world. I was excited to see a singer from my state making some kind of connection to someone who had had such a strong and sustained career in the industry. I enjoyed watching the friendship between them develop. The girl in question is the lead singer of a band; not a groundbreaking band, but your average pop band you'd find around the usual unsigned, independent, (not to be cruel) over the hill mums-on-a-weekend kind of traps. But then things took a turn for the weird.
Lets be balanced here; using your friendship with a minor celebrity to promote something you want to push, is in all honesty, what we'd all do. I will be the first person to stand up and say that if the most popular guitarist in Perth from 20 years ago knocked on my door and said I was an awesome dude, I'd be telling strangers on the bus for years to come. What I have a problem with, is using somebody (and along with them, an entire subsection of our community) like an emotional chew toy to further your singing career.
So what's weird about this? Well, as I mentioned earlier, I loosely know this girl. And as I mentioned earlier, I had a crush on her that went unfulfilled - because she has a husband and three children. Pretending to be in a relationship with somebody is weird. Pretending to be somebody's girlfriend while your husband and children are at home, is weird. It goes beyond weird - it borders on the immoral.
Over the weekend, Kasey Chambers announced she was gay. The below screenshots were taken from Kasey's Instagram account the morning I woke up on her 40th birthday.
Normally, somebody's sexual orientation only interests me if I'd like them for myself. I'm proud to say I live in a society where it's no longer a big deal to be gay. I'm not minimizing any incidences of hate crime that do occur; this is not acceptable and needs immediate attention - I'm just saying that it isn't a big controversy to be gay.
What is a big controversy, is pretending to be gay for reasons of self promotion.
.....or for the promotion of others. I want to put my stake in the ground now and say this - Kasey, if you pretended to be in a lesbian relationship with this girl to lift her singing career from the gutters of Perth to the level of yours, then we're done. I will not buy your music anymore. I will not come to your concerts. I will not follow your social media profiles or spend my afternoons drifting through the tracks of your albums. We're done.
But! If you were caught up in this girl's desperate attempt to have one last shot at the big time while the remainder of her 30's drain away and her children leave home, then my heart breaks for you. It breaks for you and for your fans.
I was instantly struck by the messages of love and support both women received. There were over a thousand comments on Kasey's Facebook post and the post was liked by 4.5k people by the time I saw it. In all those thousands of interactions, I found not one single homophobic comment. To be fair, I didn't read all of the comments, only a handful, but they were so accepting and supportive, they touched my heart.Kasey's reaction? She deleted them. Every. Last. One. All those messages of support. All those moments of "me too!" and "welcome to the sisterhood" - all gone. All those women who went through years of existence wondering why something wasn't clicking, who had another pair of beautiful faces to add to the explanation, all shot down in a second.
And Kasey's girlfriend? Exactly the same. The few people who took the time to track her down and post messages of support for her new found "love" on her Instagram, were all scrubbed out like stains.
In an attempt to honor the love was shared that weekend, I've posted a few screenshots of the now-non-existent support messages Kasey and her girlfriend received.
Perhaps Kasey would like to remember that music is a platform for inspiring people - not an excuse to mock a sexuality that was often subject to persecution, in some morose attempt to get a few more dead eyed followers on a fading Prima Donna's social media account.
