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Mumford & Sons boycott Swedish festival over attacks on women

By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 6 July 2016

Mumford & Sons have said that they will boycott Swedish festival Bravalla until assurances can be made about the safety of attendees in future. This follows reports that five women were raped and twelve sexually assaulted at this year’s event last week.

“We’re appalled to hear what happened at the Bravalla Festival last weekend”, said the band in a Facebook update. “Festivals are a celebration of music and people, a place to let go and feel safe doing so. We’re gutted by these hideous reports”.

They continued: “We won’t play at this festival again until we’ve had assurances from the police and organisers that they’re doing something to combat what appears to be a disgustingly high rate of reported sexual violence”.

Meanwhile Swedish singer songwriter Zara Larsson has responded to reports that one of the attacks took place during her performance at the event, writing in Swedish: “Fuck you who shamelessly raped a girl in the audience. You deserve to burn in hell. Fuck you for making girls feel insecure when they go to a festival. I hate guys. Hate hate hate”.

“How am I supposed to take it seriously when you say ‘not all men’, ‘I’m a nice guy, I don’t rape’?” she continued. “Where do all the ‘nice guys’ go when girls are raped? Are you too busy telling women how nice you are? It’s not fucking hard to be generalised. It’s hard to feel insecure about a festival where you just wanna go to have fun and enjoy. BUT YOU CAN’T, BECAUSE OF MEN. UGH”.

As well as the reports of attacks at Bravalla, there were also reports of 35 sexual assaults at another Swedish festival, Putte I Parken, with one woman telling local media that a friend had been dismissed by bouncers when she tried to report an attack.