SUPPORT GROWS TO END DEF LEPPARD BOYCOTT
November 7, 1983
By Joe Olvera
El Paso Herald-Post
The Texas chapter of the League of United Latin American
Citizens has voted to continue a state boycott against Def Leppard until
Dec. 31st, but a movement is growing in El Paso to end the boycott sooner.
Def Leppard is the British rock group, whose lead
singer Joe Elliott referred to El Paso as “that place with all the greasy
Mexicans.”
Elliott has made several overtures to the Mexican-American
community in El Paso, but has met with a stonewall in LULAC District
4 Director Joe Loya.
Loya gained support for his stance this weekend
at the LULAC executive board meeting in Houston. The 17 district directors
in Texas voted to continue the boycott of all Def Leppard music, t-shirts
and related items.
“The message has gotten across that we will no longer
stand around and let people abuse us,” Loya said.
Loya said the district directors voted “unanimously”
to continue the boycott, at least until the end of the year. “At that point,
I will probably kill it,” Loya said.
Elliott has offered to fly to El Paso and make a
personal apology and said he would donate $10,000 to El Paso’s needy children.
Loya refused his offer saying LULAC would not be “bought off.”
But some El Paso youths don’t see the offer as a
payoff.
Leaders of a petition drive hope to gather 20,000
signatures through a petition drive in El Paso high schools. They are
asking Mayor Johnathan Rogers to lift a boycott that he helped start.
El Pasoan Yvette Mona, who described herself as
the “U.S. correspondent” for Def Leppard’s fan club, said she is spearheading
a petition drive at El Paso schools including Burges, Eastwood, Coronado,
Riverside, and Bel Air.
“We presently have over 1,000 names, and we still
have quite a ways to go, but we’re determined,” Miss Mona said.
Miss Mona said she knows Joe Elliott personally,
and that he is really “upset” about the whole incident.
“Elliott’s girlfriend, Denise Dakin, wrote me from
London to tell me how bad he feels that he offended people,” Miss Mona
said.
“I just don’t think Mayor Rogers should decide for
El Paso citizens which performing artists will or will not be welcomed
in the city,” she said.
Miss Mona said LULAC should not try to run the city
and that part of the problem could have started because Elliott “really
likes the comedy team of Cheech and Chong.”
“Cheech Marin, a Mexican-American and Tommy Chong,
a Chinese-American, are always poking fun at themselves and at others,”
said Miss Mona. “Joe Elliott thought he was being playful, but he now realizes
the big error he made.”
Loya said LULAC is not forcing anybody to boycott
Def Leppard, but that many students “don’t understand” what Elliott said.
“Youngsters don’t always have the same values as
us older people do,” Loya said.
“They don’t mind being insulted, but I’m really
proud of Mayor Rogers, because, he took a stand, which is more than I
can say for other Hispanic council members.
“This is a message, not only to Def Leppard, but
to other groups that wish to insult Hispanics,” Loya said.
“We will not be pressured into giving up the boycott,
because it’s much easier to accept an apology than to continue our stand,”
he said.
APOLOGY OFFERED
Boycott will keep Def Leppard away
November 18, 1983
By Clay Hutto
El Paso Herald-Post
Def Leppard’s Joe Elliott, who insulted Hispanics during
a rock concert won’t come to El Paso to apologize because LULAC refused
to drop the boycott of Def Leppard music and products.
A Def Leppard spokesman, George Knemeyer, said Elliott
received an invitation from California state representative Joseph B.
Montoya to publicly apologize in a news conference in Los Angeles November
22nd for his comment made in the Tucson concert. He said the group had
just played in El Paso, “that place with all the greasy Mexicans.”
Elliott accepted the invitation but also wanted to
come to El Paso before going to Los Angeles and “resolve the matter there.”
But with LULAC boycotting Def Leppard until December 31t, 1983, Elliott
and his management “saw no point coming when the organization that organized
the boycott wouldn’t drop it {the boycott},” Knemeyer said.
Joe G. Loya, a representative of LULAC, said he knew
Elliott wanted to come to El Paso. But Loya said that Elliott’s visit
would have made no difference in ending the boycott before December 31st,
1983.
“It’s our stand that the boycott will end December
31st,” he said, adding that “we did invite Elliott to attend a news conference
in mid-January, after the boycott, so he could apologize to the people of
El Paso. But we understand that Elliott’s schedule will probably prevent
this.”
Knemeyer admitted that “it doesn’t look likely” that
Elliott will be able to come to El Paso in January. But he did say that
Elliott and Def Leppard would be coming to El Paso on their next tour,
in early 1985.
Knemeyer also said Elliott, after Los Angeles, will
go to Mexico City, and along with some promotional work, will “explain
to the Mexican people” that his remarks at the Tucson concert were “unintentional.”
Loya said Elliott’s upcoming trip to Los Angeles
and Mexico City shows “just how big this thing has gotten. It’s gotten
out to California and Mexico,” Loya said. He added that Elliott “must
be feeling the pinch” of the protest and boycott.
Because it has been circulated in El Paso that Elliott
intended to arrive Monday for a public apology, and since he isn’t coming,
Knemeyer said Elliott wanted to release a statement to the people of
El Paso. The statement reads, in part, as follows:
“I humbly apologize to all Mexican-Americans and
the people of El Paso for my ignorant statement made while on stage in
Tucson in September. While it was unintentional, I understand it deeply
hurt the feelings of everyone in the community.
“I was wrong and can offer no excuses. Out of this
terribly negative experience, I am trying to come up with something positive.
I have learned a strong lesson. Racial or ethnic stereotypes are just plain
wrong. Each individual, or each group, makes their own unique contribution
to society.
“I hope that everyone can learn from my mistake and
treat all people with the dignity they deserve.
“The band hopes to return to El Paso in 1985 to extend
our hands in friendship to all fans and all the people of El Paso."
DEF LEPPARD GIVES $15,000 AND APOLOGY TO HISPANICS
November 23, 1983
El Paso Herald-Post
El Monte, Calif. {UPI}— The lead singer for the English
rock group Def Leppard Tuesday presented checks for $15,000 to five groups
serving Hispanics and apologized for calling El Paso “that place with
all the greasy Mexicans.”
Singer Joe Elliott, 24, outraged Hispanics with his
statement about El Paso during a September 7th concert in Tucson, Arizona.
He later apologized, saying that as an Englishman
he didn’t realize the nature of the statement.
“This is a lot harder to do than a gig,” Elliott
said at a news conference in the predominantly Hispanic Los Angeles suburb
of El Monte. “I would like to publicly apologize. The statement was entirely
unintentional and was said during a highly emotional part of the concert
when I was trying to increase audience participation. It was patently false.”
Elliott maintained that he does not remember making
the statement and was unaware of the subsequent controversy until he was
informed about it while on tour in Japan.
“My only excuse, although I am English and have spent
most of the last three years in this country, is that most of what I have
learned about Americans is through the media.
“The last thing Mexican-Americans need as they try
to rid themselves of the stereotype is for me or anyone else to make such
statements. It was stupid of me to make such false accusations.”
The predominantly Mexican-American audience packed
into a room in City Hall appeared to accept Elliott’s apology, breaking
into applause at the end of his statement.
Elliott then posed for photographers with his arm
around a young boy in a wheelchair from one of the organizations that will
benefit from the group’s donations.
Elliott had wanted to fly to El Paso to apologize,
but decided against it because LULAC has refused to drop its boycott
against the group until December 31st. The group invited Elliott to attend
a news conference in El Paso in mid-January, but a spokesman said the
singer’s schedule probably will prevent him from attending.
Elliott agreed to fly to Los Angeles from Paris Tuesday
after state Sen. Joseph Montoya’s office contacted the management of Def
Leppard to inform them they had received numerous calls from concerned constituents
regarding the statement.
“I believe that he was unaware of the sensitive nature
of his comment, and that he try regrets having made the statement,” Montoya
said.
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