Chris Brown has been forced to cancel his tour of the UK and Ireland after being denied entry to the UK on the grounds of having been convicted of a serious criminal offence.

In a statement, the Home Office said:

“We reserve the right to refuse entry to the UK to anyone guilty of a serious criminal offence. Public safety is one of our primary concerns.”

“Each application to enter the UK is considered on its individual merits.”

I was pretty upset by Chris Brown’s actions when he violently assaulted his girlfriend at the time, Rihanna.  I didn’t want to play his music on my show, didn’t want his music to be on the station, and frankly would still feel the same way if I was still on the radio.  However, there are those who feel differently.  Who can forgive him his behaviour, and accept his claims that that night in February 2009 were “out of character”.  “I ain’t a monster”, he said.  And obviously people who bought tickets to his gigs believe that, or are able to separate the art from the artist and appreciate his music on such a level that they were willing to accept his behaviour.  And I don’t know if those people should really be deprived of that choice.  Maybe if they want to pay money to see someone who was resonsible for the actions in the following affadavit from an LA policeman, they should be allowed to:

“Brown shoved Rihanna’s head against the passenger window . . . punched her in the left eye . . . continued to punch her while driving causing Rihanna’s mouth to fill with blood . . . shouted at her, ‘I’m going to beat the shit out of you when we get home. I’m really going to kill you” . . . Brown then stopped the car and began choking Rihanna until the point where she began to lose consciousness”.

I wouldn’t do it.  If I had kids I wouldn’t let them do it.  And I would have some long debates with friends who chose to do it….but at the end of the day I think it should be up to them.  We’re not prevented from watching Polanski films after all.  What do you think?