Kirin J Callinan has reportedly been charged over his alleged flashing incident that occurred on the red carpet of the ARIAs in November of 2017.
As The Guardian reports, Callinan was charged by police today with wilful and obscene exposure in a public place. Callinan is set to appear before a Sydney court later this month, but if convicted, the charge can carry with it a fine of $1,100, or a six-month prison sentence.
The charges have since been filed following the release of footage of the incident over the weekend by singer Neil Finn, who shared the footage while defending Callinan’s actions, stating “Laneway Festival pulled Kirin J Callinan from the lineup for this??? Ridiculous.”
.@lanewayfest pulled @KirinJCallinan from the lineup for this??? Ridiculous pic.twitter.com/hBeGubP8Wm
— neil mullane finn (@NeilFinn) February 2, 2018
In January, organisers of Laneway Festival removed Callinan from this year’s lineup, with the musician having been added to the bill one day before the alleged incident. Neither the festival or Callinan addressed his silent removal, which reportedly came about after Brisbane rapper Miss Blanks raised concerns about his inclusion on the festival lineup.
“This kind of behaviour isn’t okay, it shouldn’t be tolerated, and you shouldn’t be rewarded with a festival if you’re going to act like this,” Miss Blanks told triple j’s Hack about Callinan’s removal.
“For me to be the first trans woman of colour in a festival that’s been running for ten years, to be touring it nationally in all cities, it’s important to me that there’s safety, it’s important to my community that it’s safe.”
Just last week, Kirin J Callinan broke his silence in regards to the removal, asking punters to be respectful towards Miss Blanks and her appeal to have him removed from the lineup.
“It does not sit well with me one puny pitiful bit that a fellow artist & clearly strong, trans woman of colour could now be shamed or take the blame, be defamed or suffer the same re my recent omission from a certain summertime festivus, regardless o the role she may have played,” Callinan wrote on Instagram.
“So I’m saying so, demanding it now, there will be no harassment, there will be no D’s out 4 Miss B in 20 A~teen. There will be tolerance & there will be respect.”
Despite his removal from the lineup, Kirin J Callinan did happen to make an appearance at yesterday’s Sydney leg of Laneway Festival, appearing onstage briefly with Mac DeMarco, whom Callinan is supporting on his Laneway sideshows.
Of course, this isn’t the first time this sort of thing has happened to famous performers. In fact, six years ago today, rapper M.I.A. was fined US$16.6m for saying the word “shit” during her Superbowl halftime performance and raising her middle finger towards the camera filming the event (although this was later settled as part of a confidential agreement).
Likewise, the 2004 Superbowl performance saw Janet Jackson’s breast exposed during a supposed “wardrobe malfunction”, for which the broadcasting network was fined US$550,000 (though this amount was later voided).
While these are arguably much higher-profile cases, it really does tend to raise some questions about the charges being put against these artists, and what exactly constitutes the obscenities that they were charged for.
Check out Kirin J Callinan’s ‘Big Enough’:
