The Story of Sinéad O’Connor & How Her Protest Still Resonates

by Nick Eustis | October 3, 2024

Written for Today in Music History

On October 3, 1992, Sinéad O’Connor tore up a photo of Pope John Paul II on Saturday Night Live to denounce child abuse in the Catholic Church. Though her career never fully recovered, her protest opened doors for future female musicians to become activists in ways few had dared before.

“Ladies and gentlemen, Sinéad O’Connor.”

Applause fills the air. Stage lights flood a bare platform, adorned only by a table of candles, flickering like votives in a church bye-altar, and a microphone draped with a scarf carrying the Rastafari colors. Into the spotlight steps a woman, her shaved head so unmistakable it requires no introduction.

It’s October 3, 1992, and the Irish singer takes the Saturday Night Live stage as the night’s musical guest.

Her first performance, “Success Has Made a Failure of Our Home,” went off without a hitch. Now, she returns for her second act: an a-cappella rendition of Bob Marley’s “War.”

Her cavernous voice echoes through the studio, delivering Marley’s righteous ideals with searing intensity: “Until the color of a man's skin / Is of no more significance than the color of his eyes / I say war.” But as she reaches the final line—“we have confidence in the victory of good over evil”—O’Connor raises a photograph of Pope John Paul II to the camera, tears it to pieces, tosses them to the floor, and implores viewers to “fight the real enemy.”

The studio is stunned into silence. Executive producer Lorne Michaels orders the applause sign to remain off, and NBC cuts to commercial as deafening quiet follows O’Connor’s radical declaration. Thirty-two years later, it remains one of the most infamous acts of protest in both music and television.

For O’Connor, this act of defiance was deeply personal.

A year after the SNL incident, she revealed that she had been abused by her parents, especially her mother. The photograph she tore was once her mother’s, hanging in her bedroom until her passing when O’Connor was 18. For nearly a decade, O’Connor had held onto the photo, waiting for the perfect moment to destroy it. When she finally found that moment, she used it to condemn the systemic abuse within the Catholic Church—a scandal that was only beginning to unfold. The Magdalene Laundries graves wouldn’t be discovered until the following year, and widespread media coverage of child abuse by priests wouldn’t begin until later that decade.

This wasn’t just a personal cry for justice; it was a reflection of Ireland’s collective spirit.

Irish journalist Una Mullally noted that O’Connor “equated the entire social psyche of Ireland to that of an abused child” and was attempting to address those wounds. Her act was a statement not only against the Church but also an attempt to bring attention to the deep wounds in Irish society, still reeling from The Troubles. O’Connor never apologized for her protest. In her 2021 memoir Rememberings, she expressed relief, calling the SNL incident a return to her true purpose: “I feel that having a No. 1 record [‘Nothing Compares 2 U’] derailed my career, and my tearing the photo put me back on the right track.”

Three decades later, history has vindicated her. The abuses she protested against have been widely exposed, and her actions now seem like a prescient warning.

Yet, in the early ‘90s, the American media reacted with fury. The New York Daily News branded her a “holy terror,” NBC banned her for life, and groups like the Anti-Defamation League and the Archdiocese of Boston lambasted her as hateful and intolerant.

Hosting SNL the following week, Joe Pesci remarked that if he had been hosting that night, he would have “grabbed [O’Connor] by the eyebrows” and given her a “smack,” underscoring the misogyny that greeted her defiant stand. A week later, O’Connor was booed off the stage at Bob Dylan’s 30th Anniversary Concert before she could even begin her song. Kris Kristofferson, who passed away this past Saturday, comforted her as she cried, telling her, “Don’t let the bastards get you down.” The irony of booing a protest song at a Dylan tribute concert was completely lost on the audience.

Even Madonna, an artist who built her career on controversy, mocked O’Connor by tearing up a picture of sex offender Joey Buttafuoco in a parody on SNL later that season. Madonna’s hypocrisy was particularly bare-faced given her own activism for LGBTQ+ rights, women’s rights, racial equality, and social justice.

Despite every attempt to bring her down, O’Connor remained steadfast.

Though her American career never really recovered, she continued to thrive in Europe, selling out venues and staying true to her convictions. In doing so, she laid the groundwork for redefining the role of female artists as protest figures.

Fast forward to 2003. America is leaping gung-ho into the invasion of Iraq, and Natalie Maines of The Dixie Chicks (now The Chicks), while performing in London, publicly denounces the war, saying she was “ashamed” President George W. Bush was from her home state of Texas. In the dramatically patriotic landscape of America immediately post-9/11, the backlash was swift and harsh—similar to O’Connor, The Chicks were ostracized, their songs dropped from radio and concerts boycotted. But, like O’Connor, they turned the fallout into art, doubling down on their position in the 2006 hit “Not Ready to Make Nice.”

Years later, Beyoncé would face a similar storm.

During the 2016 Super Bowl halftime show, she debuted “Formation,” a celebration of Black identity and culture. Dancers dressed as Black Panthers formed an X on stage, paying homage to Malcolm X. 

New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani erupted, accusing Beyoncé of “attacking police officers.” Police unions attempted to withdraw officers from providing security at her concerts. The FCC received numerous complaints, accusing her of harboring anti-white views, and the hashtag #BoycottBeyonce began to trend.

Sally Kohn, a political commentator, noted that too many people "continue to show themselves to be far more interested in reactionary defensiveness and preserving the abusive status quo" than making change—echoing the public’s denial when O’Connor raised awareness about the Catholic Church’s abuse.

Beyoncé, much like O’Connor, remained unapologetic, saying, “If celebrating my roots and culture during Black History Month made anyone uncomfortable, those feelings were there long before a video and long before me.” Her subsequent works, Black Is King, Renaissance, and Cowboy Carter, have continued to center unapologetic Blackness.

We now live in a world where artists are expected to take a stand on social and political issues.

Taylor Swift exemplifies this shift. Emerging in the country music scene when the specter of The Chicks’ cancellation still loomed large, Swift initially maintained an apolitical stance. Her silence was often interpreted as tacit approval, to the extent that the neo-fascist publication The Daily Stormer labeled her their “Aryan Goddess.”

However, during the 2018 U.S. midterm elections, Swift finally broke her silence, boldly expressing her support for LGBTQ rights and her disdain for systemic racism.

Since then, she has evolved into a prominent political voice. Her transition from neutrality to outspoken activism has galvanized her fan base, driving over 400,000 visitors to a U.S. voter-information site. If O’Connor were still with us, she would be proud.

O’Connor passed away on July 26, 2023. Yet, even in death, her legacy lives on.

She showed us what it means to speak truth to power, no matter the cost. Her courage remains a beacon for the countless artists who have followed in her footsteps, using their platforms to push for a more just, empathetic, and free world.

Rest in peace, Sinéad. Your voice still echoes.