Eric Clapton recently made headlines for blaming “the propaganda” for what he described as his “disastrous health experience” after getting the COVID-19 vaccine, for supporting Van Morrison‘s anti-lockdown stance, and then for subsequently declaring that he won’t perform at any concert that requires the audience to be vaccinated. Well, count fellow British guitar hero Brian May as someone who thinks Clapton’s wrong.
Speaking to the U.K. paper The Independent, the Queen guitarist was asked to comment on musicians like Clapton and their vaccination comments. “I love Eric Clapton, he’s my hero, but he has very different views from me in many ways,” May responds. “He’s a person who thinks it’s O.K. to shoot animals for fun, so we have our disagreements, but I would never stop respecting the man.”
As for people against the vaccine, May declares, “Anti-vax people, I’m sorry, I think they’re fruitcakes. There’s plenty of evidence to show that vaccination helps. On the whole they’ve been very safe. There’s always going to be some side effect in any drug you take, but to go around saying vaccines are a plot to kill you, I’m sorry, that goes in the fruitcake jar for me.”
May, who has a PhD in astrophysics, was also asked whether he’d like to buy a ticket to join billionaires like Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk on one of their space missions. May responds, “When it comes to one very rich guy putting himself into space — actually not into space, only about 60 miles high — I ask myself, ‘What is it really for?’”
He adds, “I saw this cartoon where somebody said, ‘We’ve got two billionaires competing to see who can get into space first. Wouldn’t it be nice if they competed on how quickly they could solve world hunger instead?’”
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