Ed Sheeran delivered a four-minute speech addressing the controversy around the removal of Macklemore from his tour — and cried while doing it — at Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field on Saturday night. The reaction inside the nearly full stadium was largely supportive. The reaction online was not.
At the top of the show, Sheeran doubled down on the position he took in an online statement earlier in the week, addressing the backlash that followed Macklemore’s removal from the tour after the rapper made pro-Palestinian remarks. “I’ve had to take and make difficult decisions, and I am making mistakes, and I’m so, so sorry,” Sheeran told the crowd. He described himself as “appalled by the conflict between Israel and Palestine,” calling the suffering caused by the war “a human tragedy,” but explained that he has generally sought to keep his concerts centred on “unity, joy, escapism, love” rather than his personal political positions.
Later in the show — this time without a teleprompter — Sheeran wept. “I really didn’t know if this tour would be carrying on,” he said. “I really didn’t know whether I’d even be getting on stage again, whether I even wanted to be an artist at all. In these situations, you really find out who your friends are.”
“It brought a tear to my eye — I think it was very heartfelt,” said Kim Shafer, a UX designer who drove four hours from Paris, Pennsylvania with two friends for the concert. “I think he made his position, where he stands, very clear.”
The Online Response Was Sharply Different
As Sheeran’s speech spread across social media, it attracted considerable criticism. Many noted his use of a teleprompter for the prepared remarks and objected to what they described as “neutral language” on a situation that, in their view, required clearer moral positioning. His emotional second speech drew particular ire — critics argued he had made a conversation about Palestinian suffering into a vehicle for his own feelings. One widely shared post on X read: “Everyone fails to consider the important thing about the genocide: Ed Sheeran’s feelings.”
Others drew a direct contrast with Macklemore’s public statement, in which the rapper explicitly rejected the framing of himself as a victim. “I am not a victim. Ed Sheeran is not a victim,” Macklemore wrote. “We have careers, money, opportunities, safety and audiences around the world. Whatever consequences any of us face for what we say, we get to go home to our families. The victims are the Palestinian people.”
Outside the Stadium: A Protest, Inside: Indifference
Approximately 100 pro-Palestinian protesters gathered at a corner near the venue ahead of the 8pm performance, organised by groups including Writers Against the War on Gaza, the Boycott Cooknsolo Coalition, and Shut Down Day & Zimmermann. The demonstration attracted more press than participants — reporters from CNN, ITV News, and Hollywood Reporter were among dozens camped outside the NRG train station. The protest did not appear to disrupt concertgoers. Only a handful of passing cars honked in support. “We heard about it, but it made no difference,” a security guard at Lincoln Financial Field said.
Inside the stadium, most fans seemed eager to move on. One woman, asked about Sheeran’s speech, simply said “Nope!” and pursed her lips. “I’m just here for the music,” her companion said. Younger fans expressed discomfort with being asked about the issue at all — one teenager said she didn’t feel “educated enough” to speak on it. A pair of sisters with grey hair and matching denim outfits said they had been “on the fence for a while” before deciding to attend.
A security guard at the venue rolled his eyes at what he called an “attempted cancellation” of the singer, stressing that it was promoters, not Sheeran himself, who removed Macklemore from the tour. “Shame on them!” he said of the protesters.
What the Tickets Actually Looked Like
Sheeran told the crowd that ticket sales had ticked up during the controversy, saying the numbers convinced him to continue the tour. “Everyone’s telling me to cancel and I’m feeling all of my friends and family and people I know abandon me — and I look at the end of the week, and I see 50,000 people who haven’t abandoned me.”
The stadium was nearly full, though two large sections sat visibly empty, with ticketholders apparently relocated to consolidate the crowd. Tickets had been available for as little as $66 on Saturday morning and dropped to $44 immediately before the show — a figure that tells a different story than sold-out demand, even as the overall crowd size gave Sheeran something to point to. A $90 ticket purchased Thursday was upgraded to a better seat by Saturday morning.
By the end of the two-and-a-half-hour concert, the “unity, joy, escapism and love” Sheeran described as his purpose were visible on the concourse. Outside the stadium, the conversation was considerably less settled.
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