“She is not supposed to be a nice person, or even a wholesome person.”
The Pogues lead singer Shane MacGowan has defended the use of a homophobic slur in Fairytale of New York.
The Christmas anthem is often regarded as one of the best Christmas songs of all time, but has been recently condemned by the LGBTQ community for the following lyric: “You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot.”
In response, MacGown said: “The word was used by the character because it fitted with the way she would speak and with her character.
“She is not supposed to be a nice person, or even a wholesome person. She is a woman of a certain generation at a certain time in history and she is down on her luck and desperate.”
He continued: “Her dialogue is as accurate as I could make it but she is not intended to offend!
“She is just supposed to be an authentic character and not all characters in songs and stories are angels or even decent and respectable.
“Sometimes characters in songs and stories have to be evil or nasty in order to tell the story effectively.”
MacGowan did add that he has no problem with the song being censored.
“If people don’t understand that I was trying to accurately portray the character as authentically as possible then I am absolutely fine with them bleeping the word but I don’t want to get into an argument,” he explained.
In the UK, Fairytale of New York is the most played Christmas song of the 21st century.
It has sold over 1.2 million copies in the country.
Listen below.
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