Lady Gaga Fans Raise Money To Help ‘Perfect Illusion’ Hit No. 1
You can say what you want about Lady Gaga. However, nobody can deny that she has the most dedicated fans in the world. In fact, some of them have set up a new fundraiser for their idol at GoFundMe. Mind you, it’s not to raise money for gay rights, which Gaga has been a constant activist for. It’s not even for raising money for the homeless. Instead, $80 has been raised (with the goal of $10,000) to help her new single “Perfect Illusion” become a No. 1 song. The mission statement almost sounds like a parody.
“Lady Gaga is to gay rights what Martin Luther King Jr. is to black rights. If it wasn’t for Lady Gaga, we wouldn’t have gay marriage or gays wouldn’t be able to participate in the military. We are hear [sic] to repay Mother Monster and give her another number one hit.”
The statement adds that the people who put the fundraiser together know how to manipulate iTunes and Amazon accounts in order to buy several thousand copies of “Perfect Illusion” with just a couple accounts. They say that Billboard will count all sales — something that may actually be possible as record companies have reportedly been using several shortcuts to purchase their artists’ own records without setting up several accounts. So far, the fundraiser — which was posted less than one day ago — has raised $80 from 11 donors. Some of the responses from donors may embarrass Lady Gaga and a huge portion of her fans who enjoy her music, but are embarrassed by the actions of her more crazy fans.
“I would donate my hole [sic] paycheck for this if I had time. But for now kindly accept my donation,” says Little Monster Miguel, who donated $5.
Perhaps the saddest response (or funniest — depending on how you look at it) is from Little Monster Jade, who donated $15.
“I don’t make much and am practically starving, but Lady Gaga is so important to me”
The popular gay blog Boyculture brought attention to this fundraiser on Thursday morning, and the commenters after the post think the fundraiser is pathetic, but funny as well.
“Oy, some folks take fandom beyond obsession,” claims SpireaX.
“I CAN’T STOP LAUGHING!! I’M LITERALLY CRYING I’M LAUGHING SO HARD RIGHT NOW!! This made my day so much gayer!!” shouts FRosario.
However, at least one Lady Gaga fan thinks all her fans should not be judged by the actions of a few.
However, Mikey brings up what most would consider a good point: There is a sector of artist fan bases that, in the internet age, are rabid and overreaching. In fact, it’s come to the point where different fan bases of mostly female singers have tweeted death threats or even racist comments to fans of artists they don’t like. In fact, E! News reported a couple years back that Lady Gaga tried to reign in her fans who were sending death threats to Perez Hilton and others who did not like her new single “Applause.” Perhaps Lady Gaga and other artists need to remind the Internet that pop music is supposed to be fun, not a death match.
Update: Through emails, some Lady Gaga fans have completely denounced this fundraiser and have even suggested it had been started by other fan bases in order to make Gaga look bad. After contacting GoFundMe, it was revealed that the campaign was deleted since it went against their rules. It raised $80 before its deletion and could have easily been a scam that some people obviously bought into.
[Photo by Larry Busacca/Getty Images]
