Why do most people hate Bono so much?
I'm not a fan of U2 or anything like that, but everybody seems to absolutley hate that guy.. I've never paid enough attention to him to know why, but I wouldn't mind someone explaining this to me because it seems to be so unanimous.
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I don't know, but "Where the Streets Have No Name" came on shuffle this morning and I sang along hard
Possible reasons
- He wears tinted sunglasses all the time.
- He's a 50 year old man who calls himself 'Bono'
- He's in U2
- That one story about him flying his hat first class to a gig after he left it at home
- Tax evasion
- Does charity work in a way that strikes people as narcissistic and 'look at me, look how wonderful I am, saving all the children'.
- IT'S BONO - HE'S JUST A CUNT, OK?
Not necessarily my opinions, but the ones cited most often.
this ^ seems to sum it up pretty accurately
and I am not predjudiced against him, because i think that new years day is a beautiful song, and many of their songs were good.....i even brought their single 'fire' in the early early days
he's just a dick, look at him
slightly more substantial answer: i believe a lot of the good he does is questionable. for example that (red) thing he's head of, a very tiny percentage of those profits go back to fighting HIV, the rest goes to paying bono and his employees. also it barely even counts as a handout seeing as a lot of the (red) products are made by the very people being underpaid to make them in the first place.
his horrible, awful, patronising "well thank god tonight it's them, instead of you" jesus christ fuck off you cunt
the fact that he turns up for all these photo ops with world leaders wearing his shitty sunglasses
he's a massive tax evader
that clicking his fingers every second to indicate another child dying with a big shit eating grin on his face. again, fuck off.
he's worth an insane amount of money, and doesn't disclose if he donates any of it to charity. in other words, he chooses to keep that private. why would somebody as ridiculously ego-centric as bono not want people to be able to find out how generous he is? yeah.
i'm not going to deny that he hasn't contributed some good to the needy, but on the whole he's basically just a self-serving asshole. look at bill gates, that dude has really used his position and his money to make a directly positive contribution to the world. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_%26_Melinda_Gates_Foundation
and then look at bono. it's a lot of photo ops and bullshitting.
plus his band is terrible.
Watch the Bono episode of South Park
because haters gonna hate
yeah but everyone agrees that hitler was a massive bellend
whereas quite a lot of people think bono is a great guy, which makes his cuntitude much harder to swallow
if a band called themselves crispin alexander must die!
i can't begin to tell you how much that'd warm my heart
For me it's the fact that he fronts the most awful, bloated, grandiose, boring band in the history of the universe
I loved it when Bernard Sumner
referred to him as Bongo on Jukebox Jury back in 1991. Very funny.
I don't hate him - he's a massive, massive dickhead, and his tax evasion exposes him as an utter hypocrite, and his band are dull as fuck, but hate? Nah.
And if Bongo didn't exist, we wouldn't have this, and so the world would be a poorer place...
Alan Partridge visits Bono's House:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlXsCLWgFkw
does anybody want to go to law school with me
so we can become lawyers and start a U2 tribute act called Pro Bono?
Because of the way
He inveigles himself into any celebration of anyone talented or important, and somehow comes out of it looking like he's the fucking Pope giving his blessing to that person. Desmond Tutu, Steve Jobs, Joe Strummer, Pete Townshend, Charles Bukowski...somehow Bono's always there, giving them his stamp of approval in just such a way that makes it clear that this person is really important because BONO SAYS SO.
That, and he's an arrogant tax-dodging twat.
that's rock star guilt
and I understand why he's hated for that.
But still, he sang on that "Unforgettable Fire" LP, so he's a good egg in my books.
I think it boils down to accusations of hypocrisy
he's so explicitly set himself up as a 'good' person with his political crusading that his every inconsistency is pored over, and I do think a lot of people probably dislike him because they feel he has ideas above his station. I also think his unabashed cheesiness irritates the likes of us, though I suspect it plays well with the band's large Middle American fanbase.
I'm not really a tremendous fan of the fella, but I find it difficult to really dislike him - much as I wouldn't really like to be trapped in a pub with him, I just think it's total bollocks that his various charitable initiatives have achieved nothing over the years, and it genuinely irritates me when friends of mine who have never lifted a finger for charity start blathering on about the flaws of Red when at the very least it's probably well meaning.
And you know, I do think he gets a hard ride: if you look at a band like The Stones, they're virtually celebrated for turning themselves into tax exiles in the '70s and nobody seems to mind that Bill Wyman was, you know, basically a paedophile. And Morrissey fans just take him back like a beaten spouse after saying the most awful things. If Bono has never done any charity work and just set himself up to be an abrasive cunt, we'd probably all think he was a bit of a legend.
Spot on about Bill Wyman.
Can't work out how he got away with it while, say, Gary Glitter is public enemy no 1.
True, but Wyman was openly shagging a 13-yr old
whereas, and correct me if I'm wrong, Glitter has only ever been convicted of possessing child porn (apart from his somewhat dodgy conviction here in Vietnam)
it is very strange
I think they kept it under wraps for a while, but I can only think the British tabloid press's mania about paedophiles didn't really kick off until a few years later. I think it's inconceivable that he'd get away with it now.
reading a little more
her mum encouraged the relationship, so I guess nobody actually reported them to the police, though I'm pretty sure the police could have brought their own case to bear if they'd wanted to.
to be clear we're talking about the same relationship
Bill Wyman became sexualy involved with Mandy Smith when she was 13 and he was in his 40s... they broke up a good while ago, though. I'm not taking a dig at him as such - though what the fuck would any of us think if, I dunno, someone from Radiohead started stepping out witha minor - I just think it's odd how Bono attracts such hatred when people are quite prepared to forgive actual technical paedophilia.
Oh and the bit
Where he patronises BB Fucking King by telling him that Edge can play the chords.
U2 had their moments, mind, I'll not deny that.
I do hate Bono, because
during the civil war in Bosnia '92-'95 he publicly stood by the Bosnian Muslims side, saying that only they are suffering and that the Serbs are committing all these horrible crimes against them.
The truth of the matter is that civilians on all three sides, the Muslims, Serbs and Croats were all victims of terrible war crimes that were committed by the armies of all three sides, and that there was a civil war in Bosnia, not an aggression by Serbia, yet the cunt Bono bought into the western mainstream media bullshit propaganda and their lies!
I like him
I think he is cool. Arrogant, hypocritical, massively ego-tistical, ridiculous, stupid looking. That's what I want stadium rock frontmen to be like.
I once went to see them in Dublin
and during one song Bono put on a blindfold that was covered in symbols from all of the world's major religions and began staggering around the stage. Symbolism, see.
Amazing!
What a dick. Love him!
hmmmm
which is worse 'buying into' the 'western media bullshit propaganda' or, y'know, the Srebrenitsa Massacre?
But why does everyone talk about the Srebrenica massacre,
which is a war crime, but no one talks about the killings of Serbs in Sarajevo by the Muslim paramilitary, or the slaughter of 3000 Serbs in Srebrenica in 1993. by Naser Oric and his bandits, etc.? Because the western mainstream media, like CNN, BBC, Sky News and so on, only focused on Serb crimes, just like Bono did.
Didn't think I'd find anything interesting in a Bono thread ...
I'm largely agreed that there has been a very odd disparity in how the western world has reacted to conflict in the Balkans over the last thirty years. The Srebrenica massacre has (understandably and quite rightly) become part of popular consciousness among those who take an interest in international affairs, yet even the more interested and better informed have largely never heard of the Ustaše.
Personally, I think the likes of Germany, the UK and US have a great deal of middle class-esque guilt about contributing so heavily to tensions in that region themselves.
I'll admit to never having heard of the Ustaše.
And indeed, to being under-informed about the Balkans in general.
The Ustaše were basically Croatians who've collaborated with the Nazis and Fascists in WWII.
They had a Nazi puppet state during the occupation of Yugoslavia which was run by Ante Pavelic, and it is estimated that over 700,000 Serbs, Jews and Gypsies were murdered in their concentration camps between 1941. and 1945.
First off, there was no genocide anywhere in the Balkans during the '90's.
Second, my country (Serbia) stood up against the Nazis first in occupied Europe. The 10,000 people killed a day was in the Independent State of Croatia, a Nazi puppet state formed after the occupation of Yugoslavia, and they were the ones that followed the Nazis first to the Vatican, then to South America.
Bono should have definitely stayed out of it, since he didn't know the full truth about the civil war in Bosnia.
If he wants to raise awareness about AIDS so much
he should just fucking contract it
:D
brilliant
Is it better to be a famous musician and do fuck all but count your cash?
Or is it better to at least try and make a difference for the less fortunate in the world?
I understand that he has avoided paying tax but so did George Harrison and Willy Nelson and noone is pointing the finger at them. If i could avoid paying the taxman literally millions of pounds by shifting it offshore, i would in a heartbeat.
And on the sunglasses issue he needs to wear glasses and has admitted that prescription shades look cooler than prescription glasses if your fronting the worlds biggest rock band.
People just need someone to hate. If it's not Bono it's Chris Martin but for some fucking reason people turn a blind eye to Mika.
And the rest of U2 too
After work, I'm going to put a post on this thread to say why I don't get the hate.
Mika's hardly among the world's most constantly successful recording artists
Yeah i know, but thats no reason to hate an artist is it.
hey people hate mika too
bono hating is more prominent because bono is more prominent
moving U2s publishing arm
from ireland to holland to pay less tax
not cool, especially when ireland has pretty low tax rates.
"These guys are from England and who gives a shit?"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativland#The_U2_record_incident
<3 Negativland
Bono?!
the man is mentally ill
He composed half of The Joshua tree over there,
and the other half...over there
Here are all the facts -
http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Bono
Brilliant!!! :D
Thanks for the link! :)
Uncyclopedia is banned from my uni internet
so i tried bypassing that through Google Translate and this is what I got: http://i56.tinypic.com/1zbtjqg.png
My ex hates him because he called him a cunt one night
in a dream.
Actually true.
I hate him...
Because is a born-again-jesus freak, who smuggles christian messages into his music.
He is uninteresting, and vain.
I don't hate him
just find him quite tedious now
Great relevant artist tag on this thread.
Mr. Irish Bastard. haha
it's good to know that if you were disgusting wealthy like bono
you'd be a cunt about it like bono, too
Don't forget he has a wife and children that he needs to look after
I'm sure he's thinking about their long term financial stability as well as living comfortably himself.
Good on him. I don't care what anyone thinks about Bono, the inland revenue are bigger cunts than all of us.
god you're right
if bono had to pay taxes his wife and his children might not be able to get a gold speed boat, they'd probably have to settle for the normal speed boat. and instead of a holiday mansion in france, it'd be a villa in spain.
doesn't bear thinking about does it?
it's funny because this isn't even true
he could still have the gold speed boats he wants
Ha
^ that's the sound of Bono laughing at the impracticality of a gold speed boat
no?
you're talking like he's being asked to give up being super rich, it's not even that. if somebody making minimum wage has to pay taxes then so does fucking bono, and the amount of money that he would have to pay is large enough to actually make a significant difference to the government, but nowhere near large enough to impact his extravagant lifestyle.
the fact that he goes to the trouble of evading tax makes him arrogant, selfish and hypocritical seeing as he's spent quite a decent chunk of life trying to guilt trip non-rich people into handing over their money to save the africans.
oh and let's not even get into his completely patronising and simplistic view of the suffering of africa
Ok you win
Just because you clearly hate Bono more than i think he's a decent chap.
nothing that i said indicated that bono has more money than the government
i think i'm done arguing with you, you're just not very good at it.
Forgetting the virtues of paying taxes or not
You would assume that since you are fine with his tax evasion you would avoid paying yourself. I am guessing you will answer no, and that you should qualify this by saying it is impossible to achieve for someone on moderate wage (apologies if inaccurate). Herein lies the problem...
I don't know the first thing about offshore tax havens
But id assume there would be substantial fees to have these accounts and to have my measely wage (which is mainly CIH anyway) shifted OS would be silly, but if your talking tens of millions i'd do it in a heartbeat.
I think the real hypocrisy is with his calls for governments to forgive foreign debt
I mean nothing wrong with that per se, but FFS, you aren't in much of a position to make these demands when you're doing all you can to minimise your own tax position.
If it's good enough for Bono to maximise his income through remitting less to government(s), then surely those governments have every right to enforce loan repayments from poorer nations under the usorious terms the money was originally lent to protect their own revenues.
I don't know the first thing about offshore tax havens
But id assume there would be substantial fees to have these accounts and to have my measely wage (which is mainly CIH anyway) shifted OS would be silly, but if your talking tens of millions i'd do it in a heartbeat.
Sure, and that's your prerogative
But would you then have the gall to publicly call on the government to whom you have just avoided paying millions of taxes to forgive the debt of a poor African nation?
Yeaaaaah... Why not?
After all the less of his money goes to Inland Revenue, the more can go to charity surely?
Noone says he has to declare it to the world.
Why not? Because it's hypocritical
If he wants to avoid taxes to give more to charity all well and good, but don't then bang on about what the government should do with its money or other revenue streams. Sort of like the flip side of "No taxation without representation".
I don't want to impose any obligation on Bono to declare his charitable donations, but I don't want to hear him tell the government to waive other sources of income that are added to the pool of funds used for the general good of the community. And yeah, I know a fair bit of it is wasted and perhaps spent on stuff you don't believe in like weapons etc, but there is also a fair whack that goes to hospitals, schools, road maintenance etc.
it's not just that he's a tax evader though
it's also the fact he is a hypocrite by saying that everyone should use their money to help causes when it's pretty obvious he's just using the tax evasion as a means to make more money and nothing else.
you don't see the stones or nelson or whoever blabbing on about helping africans. they're pretty open about their reasons.
Was wrestling with this tax evasion issue and I think that probably sums it up quite well
bono says he doesn't reveal his donations
which is a very convenient way of saying "i don't donate to charity"
the couple of times where he has actually donated to charities, he's publicly announced it.
there is absolutely no way in hell somebody like bono wouldn't use regular donations to charity as a way to boost his rep as a rock star saint.
I don't have to because I pay my taxes
and I don't preach to others.
can't help but think that it's not that people hate Bono because
he avoids paying tax and doesn't publicly donate to charity and has made some political proclamations that, in retrospect, were a bit naive or simplistic, but rather that people find these acts on his part significant and objectionable because they hate Bono.
He's damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.
If a child dies every time he clicks his fingers
why doesn't he just stop clicking them? Eh? EH?
Why don't more people love Adam Clayton?
Seriously, the man seems terribly cool for someone who's had Bono as a co-worker for decades. If I have to have a teen-girl crush on one band member, it's Adam.
Clearly your all wrong, and therefor complete knobtash's by proxy.
As the Q awards PROVE.
Note, U2 voted the greatest act of the past 25 years. Couldn't have done it without you know who. sniff.
http://m.mirror.co.uk/article?a=m4:23511977
Innovation in Sound - Kaiser Chiefs?
Innovation being sounding a bit like Maximo Park?
There's nothing wrong with him
Sigh...
1) The Simpsons episode, "and tell yer when yer arse is show-ehhhg"
2) His 80's mullet and antics at Live Aid
3) His 00's sunglasses and antics at Live 8
4) He was one of the few celebs visit the Whitehouse to meet George W Bush during his reign.
5) Not being at Glasto... then being at Glasto, sucking...
6) That SMUG GRIN in The Sweetest Thing video
7) Une, Doz, Treze, Quatro, HELLO! HELLO!
8) His singing on Lemon/Numb, squeaky cunt.
9) VOX. He calls himself BONO VOX. WHAT A CUNT.
10) A picture of him in Smash Hits when I was young, he was in a restaurant kitchen making some chocolate pudding, whilst smoking a cigar. Looking smug.
11) One more - this is the man responsible for DISCOTHEQUE.
See, a list of legit reasons that don't mention tax, finger clicking or paedophilia. He was a bit responsible for Stay (Far Away And All That) which is a tune but not enough to redeem him from the above.
His singing on Lemon/Numb, squeaky cunt.
Have to agree
with the "uno, dos, trece, catorce".. 1, 2, 13, 14..? Really.
What's the paedophilia thing? I never heard about that.
LOL @ Bono becoming the people U2 parodied during the ZooTV era.
Or did he? Bono is an easy target.
Most of the naysayers probably wish they were him.
Hold on, some more
12) His charater witness statement during Peter Buck's air rage trial "he's like a brother to me, this is truly ridiculous" Iam Bono and I say let him go!
13) Not having the bottle to keep U2 going at a slightly interesting left of centre tangent by coming back with two grotesque formulaic rehashes of former glories
14) The devil make-up/alter ego thing, AmDram on a stadium level.
15) The proposed U2 Tower in Dublin, a massive Bonocock, erect over the city.
16) The fact that Elvis Costello seems to have ripped off Bono's schtick. I hated him to start with, now it's even worse.
17) The "fish needs a bicycle" line. Sigh.
18) The Apple/U2 love in, and Bono wants to patent the idea of releasing albums as apps, even after so many have done it.
I'm going to think of more, will update, there's so so much to hate!
I could use some clarification point 16
http://the-music-snob.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Elvis_Costello_Allen_Toussaint_River_in_reverse.jpg
Nope, can't really see a whole lot wrong with that
he has all the most hateable character traits
and is really successful
Stop...
moaning you bunch of twats. Want to see a front man bore the shit out of you? Buy a ticket to the 'Roses reunion. Also, when did everyone start working for the IRS?!
Yikes
why do people keep saying this
there's this thing called taxes right, and in a fair society everybody pays their share.
ian brown being boring doesnt make bono anyless boring
Is that you Bono?
If you were uncharitable then I guess you could call Ian Brown tiresome
but he's not boring.
A friend of mine sat next to him during some dinner thing a few years ago and had no idea who he was
They were chatting away for ages and eventually my mate asks him what he does for a living.
Bono says "I front a huge fucking rock band called U2, you might have heard of us" and then makes a big thing of turning away to talk to the person on his other side.
I mean it's possible he thought my mate was winding him up, but still, pretty cunty behaviour.
What kind of human being doesn't know who Bono is?
Sorry, just winding you up.
That is surprising that someone doesn't know who he is. Especially if they end up sitting next to him at dinner, the irish accent, the glasses he was no doubt wearing.
Actually the more i think about it i think your mate was winding him up. :)
He knew who Bono was, he just didn
't recognise him
This was back in the day when he was just a massively rich & famous pop star, before the whole Saviour of the Universe thing really took off.
Ahhh right.
Well you know we all have good and bad days.
I happened to be doing the tourist thing at Abbey Rd when they were there recording that charity single with Green Day. I was wearing a Floyd Tshirt and my mate was wearing a Sigur Ros one and Bono walked right up to us because he liked our tshirts. Was lovely, shook our hands, got a photo with him. Purely by chance this happened.
So that's my counter arguement. Maybe if we said "who the fuck are you?", he might not of been so gracious.
I sat near him in a restaurant last week.
He ate his meal, chatted to his friend and left after an hour & half. What a twat, we were stunned. True story.
Didn't pay then?
CLASSIC BONO.
He just sprinkled some blood diamonds and
ivory on the table, put on his baby seal skin jacket and POOF! - gone. A bit like Keyser Soze.
I'VE NEVER DONE ANYTHING FOR CHARITY
HE'S A SELF INDULGENT PRICK SO HE IS HE SHOULD PAY HIS TAXES I'M RAGING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OH FUCKKENN SO MAD
Bono & The Edge
It's a cloudy day, we're in a dimly lit room, and yer look like a big bollix
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_BcLjtG3eY
I never got off on that revolution stuff
was the line from bowie song I thought about when I saw U2, and Bono waving his white flag, back in the early 80s.
They've got some good (early) songs, and I really don't give a shit after that. All the tabloid stories, pros and cons, don't really sway me one way or another. Sometimes they're amusing, or interesting, or disgusting, or good-on-you!, but I have so little investment in U2 that it means fuck all at the end of the day.
I actually find him less annoying
when he's in pompous rock messiah mode (eg Unforgettable Fire/Joshua Tree period) than when he's trying to be all post-modern & funny (the Mephisto period was when his face was at its most punchable).
The correct answer:
Bono has a Jesus complex
*jesus has a bono complex
4 very good reasons
1. Tax Evasion
2. His stupid sunglasses.
3. Fiddles with kids.
4. Who the hell has a pet monkey for Christ Sake!!
I for one am glad he's dead.
hahahahaha
Fucking hell, I can't believe a thread debating whether or not Bono is a twatfarm has got over 100 replies
Who are the apologists going to stick up for next? Phil Collins? Sting?!
actually i'd probably stick up for phil collins
he has written some really good songs. i personally don't really understand the hate, he just seems like a really normal man to me.
also he said he has no intention of ever making music again because he has nothing else to contribute. think you gotta respect that.
i said really too much
I'd stick up for him
purely for his fantastic drumming on the Gabriel era Genesis albums
I think he's ok
although you could add him to the tax exile hate list too
Sting is one of the principle reasons I got into music...
Those that blindly slag him off need to either listen to his albums (pre-Brand New Day, possibly pre-Mercury Falling) or stop slagging him off entirely. Nevermind, just go listen to The Soul Cages and Ten Summoner's Tales.
Most people hate him because he looks like an arse...
and then build a (admittedly convincing) case justifying that hatred. The tax avoidance does concern me.
Why?
I actually like the guy ;)
http://www.flirtfachmann.de/freundin-finden.html
_
http://i.imgur.com/rYSdh.jpg