a response to tamar iveri

A Twitter/Facebook storm has erupted over Georgian opera singer Tamar Iveri, currently rehearsing for her season with Opera Australia at the Sydney Opera House.

A lengthy Facebook post dated 18th May 2013, by either Tamar Iveri herself or - as she claims - her husband on her behalf and addressed to "Mr. President" [of Georgia] had referred to LGBT people as "fecal masses" and given voice to the opinion that "often, in certain cases, it is necessary to break the jaws in order to be appreciated as a nation," commenting on violent attacks that had been perpetrated against the participants of a small gay pride parade. 

As this came to light over the last 48 hours or so, calls for Opera Australia to terminate the singer's engagement grew louder. Today, 21st June 2014, Opera Australia issued a brief statement on its own Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/OperaAustralia), referring to an 'apology' by Tamar Iveri which was in turn posted to her Facebook page, also today (https://www.facebook.com/tamariverisoprano).

This is my response to that 'apology':

Tamar Iveri

This is not going to go away as easy as all that. If you are telling the truth - and who am I to say whether you are or not - then you still have a mountain of explaining to do:

1) You blame the hateful, vicious words that appeared on your Facebook page on your husband. Do you not talk to each other? If you are surrounded by gay friends whom you respect and care about, does he not know this? Has he not met them? Does he not realise you’re a public figure? What sane man would post on his famous spouse’s public platform something that was absolutely designed and worded to deeply hurt and insult not only her friends but also many of her colleagues and a significant segment of her audience? Your husband is either extremely stupid, incomprehensibly bigoted or both. This can’t have been news to you: why would you give such a man access to your Facebook page, no matter how much - for whatever reasons - you love him?

2) You say you apologised at the time to the Georgian LGBT community and they accepted your apology. As this post - whoever composed or sanctioned it in your name - is spreading contempt and incitement to violence around the world, that local apology is no longer enough. Your statement above contains no apology to your Australian employers, your international audience, your colleagues or anybody else in the world who either is or is not part of the LGBT community, but who cares for the dignity and rights of all human beings, regardless of gender, religion, race, creed, or sexuality.

3) I am not going to be anywhere near the Sydney Opera House over the coming few months, but I should not be surprised if even a full apology and plausible explanation may not, by this stage, be quite enough for those whom you expect to pay the tickets and the taxes that finance your career: I imagine that to rehabilitate your shattered reputation you will need to make a bold, grand gesture of the kind that leaves no doubt in anybody’s mind - not your husband’s, not your compatriots in Georgia, and certainly not your worldwide audience - that you are sincere and value the support that people from all backgrounds and denominations have been giving you to get where you are (and where, presumably, you’d like to stay) today.

It’s friendly advice, this: I would give you - as I would anyone - the benefit of the doubt. But the doubt, at this stage, is still abysmally deep.

(Incidentally: as far as I can tell, your Facebook post makes no mention at all of any commemoration event for Georgian soldiers that the parade in question may have clashed with. Your post is available in full here: http://identoba.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/letter-of-ms-iveri-to-president-of-georgia_english.pdf )

Sincerely

Sebastian Michael

Added 21st June 2014, 1pm BST:
Letter to Tamar Iveri by Irakli Vacharadze, Georgian LGBT Activist, in response to the same events.

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"policing by public consent"

we have in this country, says home secretary theresa may, a 'tradition of policing by public consent' which, she assures us, is to continue. so far so good.

there is a lot of debate to be had about the extent to which policing that entails the practice of 'kettling', of beating someone over the head with a truncheon to the point where they need brain surgery, or dragging someone from their wheelchair, or charging into a crowd on horses at the risk of trampling people who are going about their democratic right to demonstrate, can be said to be happening by 'public consent' and there is plenty of evidence that these are not just idle allegations of policing in london having gone way off anything that i, for example, would ever be happy to consent to.

but leaving these questions, burning though they really are, aside for the time being, another 'tool' for 'crowd control' has been seriously discussed over the last few days, and with it the spectre of a whole new type of violence. water cannon.

theresa may has now 'ruled out' the use of water cannon 'in policing student protests'. but only after doing the precise opposite as recently as sunday when she told sky news that the use of water cannon was up to the police as 'an operational mater'. meanwhile, head of scotland yard's public order branch, bob broadhurst, says it would be "foolish" not to consider their use.

if you want to know what a water cannon does to you if you get it in the face, have a look at this picture of a 66 year old man who took a direct hit in stuttgart, germany, earlier this year, courtesy of his local police force. (word of warning: it's not for the squeamish...)

Friedrich Wagner, after being hit by a water cannon.
Picture: Marijan Murat / dpa

love & peace

sebastian

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