Anti-Gaga protests fail. Spectacularly!!

Lady Gaga has arrived in South Africa for 2 sold out shows and I find myself having so many feelings about this.  So to help me deal with all these feelings I'm calling in some emoticats to help me!

Firstly, while I would have absolutely LOVED to see her live in concert I couldn't get tickets.  They were sold out so fast and even if I got a ticket I would have no ride to the concert.  This made me one very sad panda.

Then I found out that the South African Council of Churches were planning massive demonstrations to get the government to ban her from entering the country.  They were worried that her performances here "could lead to an exponential growth of Satanism".  This left me feeling very puzzled.

See, I'm a pretty big Lady Gaga fan and I'm also NOT a Satanist.  At no point did I ever feel tempted to become a Satanist while listening to her music or watching her videos.  In fact, I can't seem to recall her even trying to convert me to Satanism at any point in time.  So where was this all coming from?  I mean if they were upset about her support for gay rights, it would at least make some sense but Satanism?  Based on WHAT pray tell?!  I even took a moment to skim the Facebook group South Africa: No to Lady Gaga and satanists and I couldn't find anything resembling proof there either.  Hey guys, the 80's called, they want their Satanic Panic back!  Srsly, this is some stupid-ass fearmongering bullshit...

It was pretty worrying though.  Back during the Apartheid days, the churches were the first and final word on what people were allowed to see.  If the church branded an artist as being immoral or a bad influence on the youth, that was it.  They could forget about getting any airtime.  Was this going to happen again?  I know we now have one of the most progressive constitutions in the world but the population is still very conservative and religious.  I had a lot of feelings about this and none of them were good...

But then the protest happened and I got better!  The thousands of righteously indignant Christians that were supposed to hand over a memorandum to the government didn't show up.  According to the Afrikaans newspaper Beeld only about 14 people showed up and most of them were late.

Source

This meant that the 30 people who showed up for the Cape Town protest seemed far less pathetic in comparison!

Source: Paula Chowles

 This was just EPIC failure!  Contrast these protests to the numbers there to welcome Gaga to the country:



This made me happy.  Very very very happy!

So even though I won't get to see her live in concert (this time) this is a great day!  The fearmongers lost so everyone wins.  Here's hoping the SA Council of Churches decides to spend its time focusing on actual problems instead of imaginary ones.  Heaven knows we have enough real issues in this country that can use some attention.  Also, I'm no longer a sad panda!