Ja Rule’s non-apology after the Fyre Fest meltdown is so self-centered and I love it

Ja Rule fucked up, he knows it, we know it.

He’s organised a festival that has descended into a Lord of the Flies game of survival. Tents are on fire, people are hiding, and they’re serving the saddest-ass cheese sandwich I’ve ever seen.

The natural thing to do in this case is to put up your hands, accept you fucked up, and say sorry.

But Ja Rule delivered the best non apology I’ve ever seen, and I love it.

Now I’m a personal fan of the “I’m sorry you feel that way”, but I have never seen a fake apology as sincere as “I truly apologise as this is NOT MY FAULT… but I’m taking responsibility.”

Notice the capitalisation of “NOT MY FAULT”, drawing the most attention to his own innocent in the matter. Poor Ja Rule, his passion project has been taken over by bandits. His incompetent staff made something that more closely resembles a refugee camp than an elite festival, and it was totally NOT HIS FAULT.

After abdicating all responsibility of the anarchic mess that Fyre Fest has descended into, Ja Rule, like all good spin men, tries to get some good publicity out of this. “But I’m taking responsibility,” he signals.

Sweet Ja Rule, so innocent. His festival has descended into chaos, but he’s doing the right thing. He’s grabbing the situation by the flaming balls and taking responsibility.

Despite the mastery of this fake apology…for some reason I don’t buy it.

There’s something about saying your festival was ‘NOT A SCAM’ that makes me think it probably was a scam.

If there’s an entire Twitter account set up to say your festival was a scam…and if they are pointing out that your private island is actually a Sandals resort in MARCH…it’s probably going to raise alarm bells.

And, I don’t want to nitpick here, but if you don’t even show up to your own festival, you probably know there’s something wrong.

@CharlieCapel