Last weekend, Saudi Arabia hosted the region’s biggest electronic pop-music concert in Riyadh that concluded on Saturday. The music festival had the line-up including South Korean band K-pop, David Guetta, and Steve Aoki. The guest list included supermodels, Joan Smalls and Alessandro Ambrosio.
The social media influencers were slammed for performing at a star-studded music festival, raving for the kingdom yet overlooking the gross human rights violations in the country.
Scathing comments such as accepting the ‘blood money’ of the innocents to perform in Saudi Arabia hit the social media influencers, whose social media platform on Instagram and Snapchat were thronged with images and videos from the music festival. The captions of these social media posts were lyrical of ‘progressive’, revolutionary and ‘remarkable first’ initiative in Saudi Arabia.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6XhJHHBNAt/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6T0rJ_l6B8/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6WDeiuH0tG/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
The followers noted that all these posts were void of documenting the ruthless human rights violations by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in Yemen that resulted in an extreme humanitarian crisis, the suppression of dissent in the country, the undue arrests of women rights activists and others.
The critics argued that these social media influencers signed off a paid partnership to promote the progressive image of ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia. They commented that these influencers have been paid up to the six-figure amount for the contract.
Read more: Saudi Arabia turns to foreign social media influencers to improve its image
Other, disgruntled human rights activists like Rana Ahmed- a Saudi women rights activist, Karen Attiah- Washington Post columnist slammed the celebrities and influencers to support the counterfeit image of Saudi Arabia.
#Thread: Saudi Arabia recently invited many celebrities around the world, to improve the reputation of Saudi Arabia, to hide the truth about Saudi Arabia. To make everyone in social media thinks Saudi has really changed! In this thread I'll just talk about Saudi women rights. pic.twitter.com/wXKPykE9bH
— Rana Ahmad 🛰 (@lovhum) December 21, 2019
If foreign women dancing it’s legal, but when it comes to a Saudi woman dancing it's illegal!
they have arrested this woman (even that she was wearing abaya and niqab) but she shouldn’t have fun, because she’s Saudi, they won’t let them have fun or living a normal life! pic.twitter.com/GqSeJZbnIG— Rana Ahmad 🛰 (@lovhum) December 21, 2019
Stop lying! Women here are treated as slaves! unfortunately, celebrities all over the world are helping them improve their reputation, so everyone can believe that Saudi Arabia has really changed! pic.twitter.com/vNOYJrwFmP
— Rana Ahmad 🛰 (@lovhum) December 21, 2019
They asserted that while western actresses and social media influencers are allowed to follow non-traditional and western dress codes in the kingdom, Saudi girls are forced to wear abayas and niqab in the country, transgressing the strict code often gets them into trouble and results in negative sanctions for them.
The MDL Beast Music festival was organized by the Saudi Entertainment Authority to put the Saudi’s local Electronic Dance Music stars at the global music platforms, stated in the press release issued by the government of Saudi Arabia.
Speaking of the Saudi regime trying to buy the appearance of progress—
Here are names of western celebs and influencers that the regime paid this weekend to post feel-good IG photos of concerts in Riyadh. @MDLBeast
All of this is blood money. #JamalKhashoggi pic.twitter.com/fHVtknue0X
— Karen Attiah (@KarenAttiah) December 23, 2019
https://twitter.com/supermodeldaiIy/status/1208827319487488004?s=20
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6YNVSQJpfT/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
The statement further added that the music festival is part of the grand Vision 2030 that aims to transform the Saudi society. The music festival is anticipated to be attended by 200,000 people that will relish the new avenues of entertainment in the kingdom.
The music festival provides the chance to locals to rejoice their homegrown music talent which ‘helps normalize their deep love of electronic and dance music’.
Saudi authorities marked the music festival the new era of music and entertainment in the industry and combined with other provisions like the relaxation on the dress code for the local, the promotion of tourism in the country, sporting events, permission for live concerts, the influx of foreign tourists heralds an age of transformation towards a moderate and progressive state from a radically Islamic state.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6TNYVwJy0V/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
A couple of social media influencers such as model Theodora Quin Quinlivan, Emily Ratajkowski who possess more than 24 million followers on Instagram censured the fellow celebrities for promoting Saudi Arabia. They said they turned down paid offers to attend the concert for Saudi Arabia’s dismal human rights conduct.
Read more: Saudi Music Festival Visas easier to get than Umrah & Hajj Visas
Hollywood actor, Ryan Phillip, Bollywood actress Sonam Kapoor, American actor Armie Hammer posted a series of photos on their Instagram accounts. But vehemently defended their decision to attend the music festival in Saudi Arabia.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6Wb9ONnOmV/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
“What I just witnessed was truly special,” he wrote. “It felt like a cultural shift. A change. Like Woodstock in the 1960’s” wrote Armie Hammer.
” . . . Let’s appreciate that the whole world is” problematic right now and “any step forward is something that I want to celebrate,” she wrote in an Instagram post. “I was treated with immense respect and love as a Hindu brown female actor,” shot back Sonam Kapoor to the criticism from the Diet Prada account.
“Find me a country without issues, I’ll wait,” Phillippe wrote. ” . . . Things are changing and progressing rapidly in KSA and the people are lovely. Pay attention and quit virtue signaling, princess,” said the actor while defending his decision.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6YT7MhBT27/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
https://twitter.com/Sammy_Khamis/status/1209063006556045314?s=20
Saudi Arabia had been in the crosshairs following the brutal murder of Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi embassy in Turkey. The incident happened amid the formative period of ‘Vision 2030‘ hence, to mitigate the disgrace following the incident and reinvigorate its image, Saudi entertainment authority initiated an expansive public relations campaign.