Ted Nugent raging at show cancellation over ‘serious transphobic comments’
US musician Ted Nugent has lashed out on Twitter after the cancellation of an Alabama concert. (Gary Miller/Getty Images)
American rocker Ted Nugent’s Alabama show has been cancelled over “serious transphobic comments”, and the controversial musician is not happy, lashing out at “liars and haters drunk on stupid” on social media.
As part of his farewell tour, former National Rifle Association board member Nugent, who has a history of making inflammatory comments, was scheduled to appear at Avondale Brewing Company in Birmingham, Alabama on 18 July.
However, the concert met with opposition on social media and from Al’s on 7th, an LGBTQ+ bar in Birmingham.
Al’s announced on social meida that the venue would be withdrawing its support for the brewery for hosting Nugent: “Al’s will no longer purchase any beer from Avondale Brewing Company nor Good People Brewing Company.
“Avondale will be hosting a Ted Nugent concert in July. Nugent has recently made serious transphobic comments.”
A day before tickets were scheduled to go on sale, Avondale Brewing confirmed that the show had been cancelled.
A post on the brewing company’s Instagram Stories read: “We have heard the concerns of the Avondale community, which is so important to us, and in conjunction with our partners, have taken the necessary steps to cancel the Ted Nugent concert scheduled for July 18.”
Al’s bar celebrated the decision from Avondale Brewing with a Facebook post on Friday (5 May) that read: “It’s a great day! We’re glad the people at Avondale are doing what’s right.
“They said loud and clear that hate doesn’t have a home there and I’m proud of them!”
Over the past month, the “Cat Scratch Fever” singer has posted a number of anti-trans statements on social media and added his voice to the transphobic backlash against beer brand Bud Light partnering with influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
Nugent claimed that Bud Light giving Mulvaney a free, personalised can of beer to celebrate her “100 days of womanhood” was “disrespectful” to the brand’s “core consumer demographic”. He told Newsmax that while he’d “ never spent one red cent on alcohol”, he’s ““made sure that my entire crew and my family will never allow any Anheuser-Busch products anywhere near my world”.
Nugent was clearly enraged by Bud Light’s partnership with a trans social media star, asking how the brand can “p**s in the face of the people who pay their salaries”.
Taking to Twitter in April, Nugent wrote: “There is no such thing as transgender. You cannot change your gender.
“Comfortably numb is actually uncomfortably dumb. Debate me but bring your bib.”
This isn’t the first time that the musician and supporter of indicted former president Donald Trump has made anti-LGBTQ+ comments.
In a 2011 interview with Piers Morgan, Nugent said he was “repulsed at the concept of man-on-man sex” and called it “against nature”, but denied being homophobic. He followed up by saying: “I’m not going to judge another’s morals … I have friends that are gay.”
Speaking at Trump rally in Waco, Texas, Nugent warmed up the crowd by shouting: “I want my money back, I didn’t authorise any money to Ukraine, to some homosexual weirdo.”
Trump used the March rally to attack trans rights, vowing to crackdown on “transgender insanity”.
Responding to the cancellation of his Alabama show on Friday, Nugent tweeted: “Liars & haters drunk on stupid incapable to [sic] debate me.”
In 2022, Nugent was accused of hate speech and inciting violence after telling Trump supporters to go “beserk on the skulls” of political opponents at a rally in Texas – mere hours after a white supremacist opened fire on a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, killing 10 Black people.
Calling Democrats “enemies of America” and perpetuating false claims about the theft of the 2020 election, the former Amboy Dukes guitarist said: “I love you people madly … but I’d love you more if you went forward and just went berserk on the skulls of the Democrats and the Marxists and the Communists.”
In a YouTube livestream, Nugent later denied inciting violence and claimed that he was encouraging Trump supporters to vote.
How did this story make you feel?
