Do we like Amy Winehouse?
Our score: 7 out of 10. A well-loved queer favourite with one ugly 2008 video she apologised for, and no pattern of harm in her own words or acts.
The ugly bit first. In June 2008 the News of the World ran video of her singing a song full of slurs, filmed by her then husband. She apologised outside her London home, but pushed back on the label, saying “I'm the least racist person going.” It's one video, years old at the time, and an apology that was never followed by more of the same.
On the harm check, there's nothing else to put against her. We found no campaigning against any group, no conspiracy theories, and no stream of culture-war nonsense, and no run of work with people who push that stuff. That one video earns her an asterisk, not a fail.
As for the good-person test, she pleaded guilty in January 2010 to assaulting a theatre manager at a panto in Milton Keynes. She pulled his hair after he suggested she leave, and she got a two-year conditional discharge plus costs and compensation. That's a bad night rather than a pattern of bullying, and the court noted alcohol played a part.
The queer community took her to heart, and she gave it right back. She joked that she was a sex symbol “only to gays”, her look became a drag staple, and artists like Olly Alexander and Sam Smith have named her as an influence. After her death, her family set up the Amy Winehouse Foundation, which educates young people about mental health and substance misuse and runs music programmes for disadvantaged kids.
The recent news is a family feud, not a scandal about her. In April a judge dismissed her father's High Court claim against her former stylist and a friend over the 2021 sale of her clothes. In July Euronews reported he was ordered to pay nearly £1 million, with the judge finding he “knowingly and deliberately” made unfounded allegations.