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German Promoters Boycott Hamburg Clubs Over Coronavirus Posts
Jonas Walzberg/picture alliance via Getty Images – Several posters about the Corona pandemic are hanging on the outside wall of the building of the club Große Freiheit 36.
Germany’s most important concert promoters have announced the boycott of two of city’s clubs in an open letter.
Eleven promoters and Hamburg’s interest group representing the city’s music business announced their boycott of two Hamburg clubs, Große Freiheit 36 and Docks, who’ve been criticizing the German government’s handling of the crisis as well as the validity of claims made about the danger of Coronavirus.
A few weeks into the pandemic, Docks started hanging up posters on its public notice board to “animate a discussion” around what the club’s operators described as a one-sided coverage in mainstream media.
They wrote that scientific voices critical of the restrictive measures and the actual threat of Covid-19 weren’t given a platform in the traditional media outlets consumed by the vast majority of people.
A few artists canceled their scheduled performances, claiming that the operators of both venues were “corona deniers” and “conspiracy theorists.”
A couple of weeks ago, some of Germany’s most well-known promoters followed suit, accusing the operators of Große Freiheit 36 and Docks of offering “dangerous and anti-democratic ideas” a public forum.
Jonas Walzberg/picture alliance via Getty Images – The entrance area of Docks.
The sign above the entrance demands the lifting of all restrictions to people’s fundamental rights, including the right to exercise a profession.
“By spreading false information, you are instrumentalizing not only us and your own venues, but above all the artists who have made a significant contribution to your formerly good name,” they write in a joint statement signed by FKP Scorpio, Karsten Jahnke Konzerte, STP Hamburg Konzerte, Semmel Concerts, Reeperbahn Festival, Neuland Concerts GmbH, a.s.s. concerts & Promotion, Buback Tonträger und Konzerte, River Concerts, Kingstar Music, OHA! Music and the Interessengemeinschaft Hamburger Musikwirtschaft e.V.
“At a time when our industry should stand together, and in which countless people long for the unifying power of live culture, you are apparently looking to join forces with conspiracy theorists and conspirators,” the statement continues, and concludes “events under your roof are out of the question for us under these conditions – we will accept the resulting damage for all guests and the cultural location of the cosmopolitan city of Hamburg.”