RCA Records have already put a halt to their work with R. Kelly, but some advocacy groups believe they should drop the legendary singer altogether.
Earlier today (Jan. 16), dozens of protest groups gathered outside of RCA’s parent company Sony Music Entertainment’s headquarters in New York City. The cluster of activists demand that the label drops R. Kelly and suspends all business with him.
Members of groups like #MuteRKelly, Black Women’s Blueprint, Care2, Color of Change, CREDO, Girls for Gender Equity, NOW-NYC and UltraViolet’s “Rally to Protect Black Girls” aims to protest the embroiled singer, deliver a petition with 217,000 plus signatures insisting the major label remove the singer from the label’s roster and present them with the “Record Label of Shame” award.
“Lifetime’s Surviving R. Kelly is an unignorable investigation into R. Kelly’s decades of alleged sexual abuse of young Black women and girls, and those in the music industry that have not only enabled him, but profited from him,” the group said according to Billboard. “R. Kelly has been able to continue to prey on vulnerable Black girls for so long because companies like RCA — his record label — provide him a revenue stream to maintain his sex trafficking operation and a veneer of public credibility. With the seriousness of these numerous allegations and their overwhelming credibility, it’s past time for RCA and their parent company, Sony, to take a stand and drop R. Kelly from their record label. No company should be profiting from a man who physically, mentally, and sexually abuses Black girls.”
Here’s some of the protest footage.
“YOU did nothing to cause this violence.” –@BlackWomensBP’s Sharaya Tindal to survivors #MuteRKelly #DropRKelly pic.twitter.com/4UoFisTiti
— UltraViolet (Text JOIN to 98688) (@UltraViolet) January 16, 2019
WATCH NOW: Black women and allies deliver more than a hundred thousand petition signatures to @RCARecords headquarters to demand they #DropRKelly. https://t.co/lon5SV0fSO pic.twitter.com/CKuKekC0wP
— ColorOfChange (@ColorOfChange) January 16, 2019
