Russian officials have found a new way to hate on U2’s Songs of Innocence record… they believe the whole album is actually pro-gay propaganda.
According to a report in The Guardian, right-wing Russian politician Alexander Starovoitov is threatening to sue Apple for moral damages over the Songs of Innocence debacle. Along with a lawyer, Evgeny Tonky, the politician is claiming that the company illegally distributed homosexual propaganda when they forcibly added it to 500 million Apple consumers worldwide.
For those who may not remember, Apple caused its users some frustration by automatically uploading a copy of U2’s Songs of Innocence album onto all Apple platforms, including iPhones, iPads, and even iTunes libraries.
The cover of the album (which was not initially shared but did appear later on, when physical copies of the album were released) depicts U2 founding member Larry Mullen Jr. with his arms wrapped around his son. Both men are shirtless, as pictured above. When asked about the seemingly-awkward cover, the band has said that the picture is a metaphor for “how holding onto your own innocence is a lot harder than holding on to someone else’s.”
Starovoitov, meanwhile, believes that the image is a metaphor for “unconventional sexual relationships,” and inflicted moral damages on his own son. Apparently there are Russian laws in place to prohibit questionable material from getting in the hands of minors, and Apple violated that with Songs of Innocence. They’re potentially seeking somewhere between 800,000 and one million rubles, or roughly $20,000.
The initial article in Russian newspaper Izvestia (Google Translated version) does acknowledge that it would be both hard to prove that the album is propaganda, and that it would be hard to provide compensation, since there is no group of people actively speaking out against the album, aside from Starovoitov and Tonky.
We’ll be sure to update on the outcome of this outrageous story.