Róisín Murphy dropped as Istanbul festival headliner over recent transphobic post

Róisín Murphy no longer headlined a music festival in Turkey over a recent transphobic social media post.

The Irish singer was dropped from Back In Town Festival, — which took place Sunday, Oct. 26, in Istanbul — after she posted a graph on X suggesting the number of 18- to 22-year-olds who identify as transgender or non-binary has significantly dropped in the U.S. from 2021 to 2024.

“It was never real. Terribly sad though. Absolute havoc wreaked on children, families and society,” Murphy, 52, wrote alongside the post, which went up on Tuesday, Oct. 21.

Murphy, who first rose to fame as one half of the pop duo Moloko in the 1990s, later shared a lengthy statement to X clarifying her comments.

“Just for the record, I have zero hate toward trans people; I do not deny anyone’s existence. The post that has caused such frantic panic among the trans activist mob is a graph that shows a steep decline in trans and non-binary identity in young people over the past few years in the USA,” part of the statement read.

“My declaration ‘it was never real’ refers to the contagion that was undoubtedly aided by the submission of the media, captured medical institutions, and social media derangement,” Murphy wrote. “Recently, this willfully blind and irresponsible behavior has been curtailed to some degree, as more and more people affected by it stand up and demand a long-needed audit of trans ideology, which continues to stamp its boot across anyone who decries its negative consequences. Children, families, women, and gay people have all been adversely affected by the insane belief that one can change sex — the core hallucination of this destructive and insidious movement — while bad faith actors have lined their pockets.”

The singer ended the post with, “The arts as a whole are a shadow of their former free and inclusive selves. I’ve had the most free and fun time possible making the music I believe in over the past 30 years. If being a compassionate artist is to be my downfall now, then so be it. I know in my heart that one day, I will be remembered as a brave person, both morally and artistically uncompromising. In the long run, that will be my legacy.

Back In Town later announced the lineup change in an Instagram post on Thursday, Oct. 23.

“We are extremely excited about the Back In Town Festival, which will be held for the first time this year. From the idea phase, we started with the dream of a true music festival centered in Istanbul, which we missed — including everyone in all its diversity, where everyone can feel safe and belong,“ the post, translated from Turkish, read, per Stereogum.

“We added Róisín Murphy to our line-up as a headliner, believing that she represents the energy we missed and touched many of you in a sincere place. However, the statements she shared in recent days completely eliminated these feelings,” the festival continued. “Because we would never be comfortable including her in such a festival set-up, we would like to state that we cannot include her in our program, keeping the values we try to introduce to you above all things — and knowing that this stance cannot have any financial equivalent.”

After vowing to find to a new headliner, Back In Town replaced Murphy with Turkish singer-songwriter Kalben, GScene reported.

“We thank you for being with us, and we expect understanding from everyone whose hearts we have unintentionally broken,” the festival wrote in their statement.

This was not the first time Murphy has received backlash for transphobic remarks. The Irish singer first came under fire when she criticized the use of puberty blockers — medications that stop the body from producing oestrogen and testosterone often used for transgender and gender-diverse youth — on Facebook in 2023. She later backtracked on the comments, saying that she “cannot apologise enough for being the reason for this eruption of damaging and potentially dangerous social-media fire and brimstone,” according to NME.