JUNOS Protestor Hoped Avril Lavigne Would Be "Punk Rock" and Give Her the Mic

"Everybody just saw a topless protester, but they're looking now. It's not an issue that people want to think about — climate disaster that we are currently experiencing here and all around the world."

Photo via @JonnyWakefield on Twitter

BY Megan LaPierrePublished Mar 16, 2023

At least something interesting happened at the JUNOS this year, right? In the "get the fuck off, bitch" and titty slap heard nationwide, Avril Lavigne getting disrupted by a topless protestor certainly livened things up a bit — and while Vancouver-based climate activist Ever Hatherly doesn't think it could have gone any better, she had "low-key" hoped that the musician would back her cause.

In a new interview with CBC outside of the Edmonton courthouse where she was charged with mischief for disrupting the awards show, Hatherly gave her rationale for the act, which she started planning about a week ago as part of an activism group called On to Ottawa that is headed to the nation's capital next month to demand a citizens' assembly for climate change.

"We wanted to start off with a big bang, and I think we achieved that goal," she explained, having purchased a ticket to the JUNOS and taken a 10-hour bus ride from Vancouver to meet up with two others from the collective in the BC Interior before driving to Edmonton.

Hatherly purposely selected Lavigne's introduction to AP Dhillon's performance as the moment to crash the stage, wearing pink sweatpants and pasties and with slogans like "STOP OLD LOGGING GROWTH NOW," "SAVE THE GREEN BELT" and "LAND BACK" written on her body in black marker, "for the headline."

"I low-key, in my heart of hearts, hoped that she would be punk rock, girl power, give me the mic or something," she admitted, "but I don't think it could have gone any better." Hatherly noted, "We created an international buzz, and even if people aren't asking the right questions now, they will be."

"I think to get people's attention, you gotta do something dramatic," she went on. "And I know that I have an incredible amount of privilege, and it is my absolute privilege to stand up and fight for something I believe in. Everybody just saw a topless protester, but they're looking now. It's not an issue that people want to think about — climate disaster that we are currently experiencing here and all around the world."

Of the process of causing a public disruption on live TV during the biggest night in Canadian music, Hatherly said, "I just walked up there. It was so easy." After being very politely escorted from the stage by security all Canadian-like, the protestor said she explained her cause to several JUNOs staff members.

"Everyone was like, 'Why are you streaking?' and I'm like, 'I'm streaking for a really good reason.' So I got to have really good conversations with the people that work there, as well as ... most of the officers that arrested me at the two facilities I was held at," she said.

Hatherly has partaken in other acts of civil disobedience before, but this was the first on behalf of On to Ottawa.

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