TORONTO -- Musician Brian Wilson is calling on fans to stop supporting The Beach Boys, the band he co-founded back in the 1960s, because current members are performing at a convention for trophy hunters.
The band is set to perform at the Safari Club International Convention in Reno, Nev. on Wednesday. U.S. President Donald Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., a noted trophy hunter who has been photographed holding up a dead cheetah, is a keynote speaker at the event.
Wilson issued a call to fans to protest the event in a tweet, saying he and bandmate Al Jardine are “emphatically opposed” to trophy hunting.
“There’s nothing we can do personally to stop the show,” Wilson said in the post on Monday.
Wilson continues to perform The Beach Boys songs that he wrote with Jardine, but the pair is not touring with the current band, which is fronted by Mike Love. Love, who was part of the glory days of The Beach Boys with Wilson and Jardine, owns the touring rights and name to the band.
However, Wilson urged fans to sign a petition saying that they would not support the band in any way unless they cancel their show at the convention and “publicly state their opposition to this sick ‘sport’ of killing animals for ‘fun’.”
More than 93,000 people have signed the petition so far.
Convention attendees will be able to shop for guns and hunting equipment, and register for upcoming hunting trips in South Africa and Scotland, according to the event’s website.
