Appearing on the show on Friday to discuss the upcoming Young Talent Time 50th anniversary special, Arena’s mood changed when host Angela Bishop asked her how she’d been coping living in her native Melbourne, which is due to have had the most days under lockdown of any city in the world on October 4.“I’ve really struggled, and I’m comfortable in saying that. I’ve had a very difficult time, like many people. I’m profoundly against being locked up – the injustice is too much,” Arena began.“I also hate the differentiation between sport and arts in Australia. As the artistic community, we will draw the line in the sand now and say, ‘No more of your double standards now,’” she continued.“Sport is a great thing, but life is not just about sport, life is about art and culture … I would encourage the artistic community to come forward, and I’d encourage anybody else to start thinking straight now.”Bishop noted that various large scale music events had been cancelled at short notice during this pandemic, “but never the footy match”.“That’s a categoric disrespect,” Arena said.“I’m sorry, that’s rude, disrespectful, and shouldn’t be at all allowed to play out. Never, ever silence an artist – we play an important role in the social fibre of any country. It’s freedom of expression, and I’ll fight for it until the day I die.”Bishop noted one of Arena’s few stage appearances in recent years – outside of her May national tour, which finished just before this latest round of lockdowns – came during the February 2020 Firefight charity concert for victims of the Australian bushfires. “It seems people have forgotten about the arts community when they’re in need,” she suggested, to which Arena agreed.“If anything goes wrong, the artistic community has always lifted their sleeves up. We’ve gone in there and done what we needed to do. We’re very happy to play that role to help people – it’s what we do,” said Arena.“Now we’re in trouble, is someone helping us? No. It’s amazing how people just fly away and disappear, however they’re very quick to ask us to work for free, to relinquish any kind of renumeration from sales of record.“You know what? DONE. We’re done, and now we’re saying it. Just stop this ridiculous, preposterous behaviour. It’s got to stop.”Arena ended the interview on a hopeful note, telling Bishop that her plans for the near future were “to work”.“Don’t be cancelling any of those tours, ladies and gentlemen – keep your tickets! We need to work, the audiences need some respite, so the immediate future for us is that we’ll see you back at work ASAP.”Arena’s passion struck a chord with viewers.“I’m ready for Tina Arena to be PM,” tweeted one fan.“That’s what I love about Tina Arena, not afraid to speak her mind and tell it how it is. Who cares about sport. I’d rather the music thank you,” said another.“Tina articulating how we all feel. We are an incredibly resilient community but we are beyond exhausted,” wrote another.
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