Is Lady Gaga’s song “Bad Romance” really about how we are screwing up the environment? Mmm…, it is not clear. The pop star’s songs often have important underlying messages. Under the makeup, costumes and super-high heels, there’s a cool girl who wants to change the world.
And boy, with 100 million fans of more, does she carry a wallop!
The pop superstar turns heads and grabs attention. In her latest change of look, Lady Gaga has gone green.
Joining Artists Against Fracking
The 26-year-old pop singer flew in to Japan recently with green hair and a green dress, suitably dolled out to meet Yoko Ono and put her voice to the Artists Against Fracking campaign.
Lady Gaga is pissed. The singer has a deep love for her native New York but the state looks set to be fracked if enough people do not rise up in opposition.
Fracking is deadly serious.
Hydraulic fracturing or mining involves pumping millions of gallons of water laced with dangerous chemicals at high pressure deep underground to force gas out of rock. Communities and the environment across the United States are being wrecked as the water gets poisoned, people suffer from health problems and farm animals get ill and die.
Tweeting an important message
Lady Gaga recently sent out a message to her tens of millions of fans on Facebook and Twitter calling on them to sign the petition against fracking in New York State.
She called for support for Artists Against Fracking and to sign a petition asking New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to ban fracking.
“Hey!!! I’m gonna see Yoko tomorrow and this organisation is really important to her and interesting www.artistsagainstfracking.com,” she said in her message. “If you read up on ‘fracking’ this might be of interest. For those of you concerned in environmental affairs …”
Close to 100 million fans got that message – in essence, don’t frack New York.
How many acted and signed the petition is unclear.
Critics say ‘Lady Gaga sucks’
It is not easy being a superstar. Lady Gaga has probably come in for more criticism than most – often from people who “just don’t get” her outrageous costumes and performances, and maybe just don’t like the music. Think of the worst expletive and it has been used to describe this pop phenomenon.
Wearing a dress made of raw meat or splattering herself in blood may not help. Nor do the furs that critics claim are real, not fake. Animal activist group PETA was quick to take offense over the meat episode, though it was hard to pin down exactly what was their gripe.
Lady Gaga, a talented artist
What the critics don’t realize is that Lady Gaga is clever and talented. Check her out five or six years ago and you wouldn’t believe this is the same girl. It is hard to dismiss the fact that Gaga has cache, Gaga rocks, and if she sends a message, millions listen.
Today, she outshines the Material Girl, Madonna, and other female pop stars. And her fans seem to love her open and hidden messages.
Lady Gaga, the messenger
“Lady Gaga is one of the biggest living artists of our time,” Yoko said. “She is not only an artist, she is also an activist, using her art to bring better communication to the world. She is being acknowledged for her activism, and how her album, ‘Born This Way,’ has widely changed the mental map of the world. And how it has made us deal with the future world, which happens to be here already.”
It is easy to dismiss pop and movie stars as facades and the objects of false hero worship. You might think Lady Gaga sucks! But it is hard to dismiss the clout she wields.
And if she goes green, great! The environmental movement needs all the help it can get.
Check out Artists Against Fracking.
