Mayor of Marseille opposes Kanye West concert over 'unapologetic Nazism'

Copyright AP Photo - Canva

By David Mouriquand

Published on 05/03/2026 - EURONEWS

Benoît Payan said the rapper is “not welcome” to perform at his scheduled concert at the Velodrome stadium on 11 June.

The mayor of the southern city of Marseille, France's second-biggest city, does not want American rapper Kanye “Ye” West anywhere near his city.

Mayor Benoît Payan has opposed West's visit, after the controversial singer announced a concert at the Vélodrome stadium on 11 June - West's only scheduled French gig.

In a message posted on X, Payan said: “I refuse to let Marseille become a showcase for those who promote hatred and unapologetic Nazism. Kanye West is not welcome at the Vélodrome, our temple of living together and of all Marseillais.”

Payan is not alone in wanting West to stay away. The CRIF (Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France) believes that welcoming “someone who has professed his admiration for Hitler raises a real moral question”.

Previously, West had his Australian visa cancelled and was threatened with immediate arrest in Brazil.

In recent years, West has made numerous racist and anti-Semitic comments, going so far as he posting a picture of KKK robes, rescinding his previous apology to the Jewish community, declaring himself “a Nazi” and asserting that he has “dominion over his wife”. West also started selling swastika t-shirts, and released a song titled ‘Heil Hitler’, in which he praised the Nazi leader.

In January 2026, the singer apologised in a letter published by the Wall Street Journal, in which he stated that he “lost touch with reality” and that his behaviour was due to his bipolar disorder – a condition he previously dismissed.

From Jim Ratcliffe to the Ballot Box: How offshore billionaires still shape British politics

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead 

21 February, 2026 
Right-Wing Watch


There’s little surprise that Ratcliffe and Farage harbour respect for each other. As well as both loathing immigration, Reform's top donors use similar offshore arrangements, 75% of their funding comes from just three mega wealthy men with offshore ties.

When Sir Jim Ratcliffe, the Monaco-based billionaire and co-owner of Manchester United, pronounces that Britain is being “colonised by immigrants,” it’s worth asking not only what he means, but what influence men like him wield over the country they no longer fiscally support.

His remarks came just as parliament began considering one of the most significant reforms to Britain’s electoral system in years.

A long-overdue clean-up, but is it enough?

On February 12, MPs gave a first reading to the Representation of the People Bill, landmark legislation designed to reform how elections operate. While headlines focused on extending the vote to 16 and 17-year-olds, a provision that aims to tighten the rules around political donations gained less attention.

The bill would block companies from donating to political parties unless they have genuine British ownership or generate sufficient revenue in the UK. That change could prevent overseas billionaires from funnelling money into British politics through UK subsidiaries, a route that, until now, has remained open. It aims to stop foreign companies offering high-value gifts to MPs, who will not be able to accept them unless they are below £2,230. There will be no cap on donations by eligible individuals and corporations.

Given that in late 2024 Nigel Farage suggested that tech billionaire Elon Musk was giving “serious thought” to donating up to £100 million to Reform UK, a donation that could have been legal under existing rules, the new legislation can’t come soon enough.

Local government secretary Steve Reed, described the bill as ushering in “a new era for our democracy – one that protects against foreign interference and empowers young people.”

But does it go far enough?

The mega-donor problem

Anti-corruption campaigners argue it doesn’t. Transparency International UK has welcomed the closure of shell-company loopholes but warns that without caps on individual donations, the outsized influence of mega-donors will persist.

Its research found that 66 percent of private political donations in 2023 came from just 19 individuals. Meanwhile in the 2024 general election, parties collectively spent a record £92 million, highlighting the ever-increasing reliance of mega donors on election campaigns.

Duncan Hames of Transparency International UK argues this must change: “MPs now have a choice: settle for half-measures or use this bill to set a meaningful cap on individual donations, reduce campaign spending limits, and fully restore the independence of the Electoral Commission. If the government is serious about restoring trust, this is the moment to prove it.”

Without those changes, the super-rich can still legally purchase disproportionate access and influence. Prem Sikka, Labour member of the House of Lords makes such warnings. In a column for Left Foot Forward, he warns the new bill merely tweaks the current system and that it regularises bribes disguised as political donations.

“… political donations enable the super-rich to buy access to policymakers and shape public policies. Their interests are prioritised. The consequences for the rest are dire.

“Some of the reforms are welcome but they won’t end political corruption. The super-rich would continue to buy political influence.”

Tax exiles with political voice

The timing of the new bill is pertinent. Failsworth-born Jim Ratcliffe, whose fortune was built through his chemicals giant INEOS, moved his tax residence to Monaco in 2020. Residents in the tax haven city state don’t have to pay any income or property taxes. The decision is expected to make him £4 billion in tax savings. Once among Britain’s largest taxpayers, he no longer appears on tax contribution lists, though his wealth, estimated at around £17 billion, keeps him near the top of rich lists.

Compare Ratcliffe’s £0 in personal income tax in the UK to skilled worker migrants, who pay a median of around £9,100 a year in income tax, while health and care workers pay a median of roughly £3,500, according to government PAYE figures, These figures exclude national insurance, council tax, VAT and other levies, meaning total tax contributions are even higher.

“Immigrants are contributing much more to the economy than Jim Ratcliffe,” said Ala Sirriyeh, a senior lecturer in sociology at the University of Lancaster. “And so, I would just say: get your house in order before you start commenting on other people’s contributions.”

To rub salt in the wound, just weeks before his inflammatory immigration comments, during which is also falsely claimed the UK’s population had grown by 12 million since 2020, Ratcliffe secured £120 million in UK state support for INEOS operations.

His remarks were widely condemned. Outside Manchester United’s Old Trafford stadium, a billboard reads:

“Immigrants have done more for this city than billionaire tax dodgers ever will.”

Fans scarcely need reminding that without its foreign-born players, United’s starting eleven, and even its bench, would be threadbare. The global character of the game is obvious on the pitch every week. Why it appears not to be so to its billionaire co-owner is harder to understand or to reconcile with his anti-immigrant rant.

Predictably, Ratcliffe has also expressed admiration for Farage, describing him as “an intelligent man” with “good intentions.” Farage returned the regard, insisting that “Jim Ratcliffe is right” and repeating claims about immigration and public services to his 497,000 YouTube subscribers.

“And then you look at parts of London, for example, where the road names, the Underground signs, aren’t just in English, they’re in a foreign language as well. One million people in this country don’t speak any English at all, four million people living in this country barely speak passable English,” he said, adding:

“And that’s the point that he [Ratcliffe] was making – that big areas of our towns and cities have been changed into something completely different from what they were. And I don’t really care if Number 10 is in uproar or if much of mainstream media find his comments too difficult – I believe, firmly, that Jim Ratcliffe is right.”

This is how influence operates in modern politics.

The Populist Decoder offers a brilliant analysis of the danger of all this, arguing that “Ratcliffe’s colonised” framing isn’t accidental. It’s the great replacement narrative dressed in establishment respectability. When a £29bn fortune and a Manchester United owner says it, suddenly it’s not fringe conspiracy, it’s “legitimate concern” about demographic change.

“Farage’s defence completes the laundering: acknowledge the language was “clumsy,” then insist the substance was “fundamentally right.” This is textbook populist legitimisation—use an elite figure to test inflammatory rhetoric, then amplify it whilst maintaining plausible deniability through the “just raising concerns” shield.””

Offshore money and party funding

Then again, there’s little surprise that Ratcliffe and Farage harbour respect for each other. As well as both loathing immigration, Reform’s top donors use similar offshore arrangements, 75% of their funding comes from just three mega wealthy men with offshore ties.

A report from the Good Law Project shows, the largest portion of this comes from the British technology investor Christopher Harbourne, who lives in Thailand and has donated £13.7m to Reform.

A huge chunk of donations has also come from Jeremy Hosking, co-founder of Marathon Asset Management, who has given Reform £2.4m. The company has a subsidiary based in the Cayman Islands and is ultimately controlled by a firm based in Jersey.

And then there’s Richard Tice, a property tycoon and deputy leader of Reform UK, worth a reported £40 million. According to the Good Law Project, Tice as put millions of pounds worth of shares in his property empire into an offshore account. So much for his pledge to “take back control of our money.”

But this pattern is not new. A 2019 investigation by the Times found that the Conservative Party had received over £1 million before the 2017 general election from Britons based in tax havens or their UK-registered companies. Donors included Belize-based peer Michael Ashcroft, Monaco-resident property magnates David Reuben and Simon Reuben, and Michael Platt, Britain’s wealthiest hedge fund boss, who has lived in Switzerland and Jersey during this time.

Campaigning costs money. But surely a democracy cannot thrive if political competition depends on cultivating a handful of ultra-wealthy patrons, particularly those who have structured their affairs to minimise their own contribution to the public purse.

Half-measure or turning point?

The Representation of the People Bill is a step forward. Closing shell-company loopholes matters. Preventing foreign money from being laundered through UK subsidiaries matters.

Yet without caps on donations, tighter spending limits, and stronger oversight, Britain risks entrenching a system where politics is shaped not by citizens collectively, but by billionaires individually.

As Electoral Reform wrote in response to the Times’ report: “Now, no one denies that campaigning costs money. But politicians need to show some respect to their own profession by having an open and transparent funding regime: one which allows them to focus on their policy differences – not who has the largest number of rich friends based in tax havens.”

Which brings us back to Sir Jim Ratcliffe.

When those who have relocated their tax base abroad retain both a megaphone and the means to influence domestic politics, reform cannot stop at technical fixes. If the government is serious about restoring trust, it must ensure that political power in Britain flows from voters, not from offshore fortunes.


Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is author of Right-Wing Watch

Don't misinterpret Bono's criticism of Israel's policies

 Martini Judaism

Don't misinterpret Bono's criticism of Israel's policies

(RNS) — Bono speaks as a friend of Judaism and the Jewish people. Let's give him the respect he deserves.

Bono sings during U2's performance at Lucas Oil Stadium on Sept. 10, 2017, in Indianapolis. (Photo by Daniel Hazard/Wikimedia/Creative Commons)

Jeffrey Salkin

February 23, 2026

(RNS) — I am getting tired of the rock-and-roll intifada.

Here is what I am talking about.

In April 2025 at Coachella in California, the Irish hip-hop trio Kneecap projected statements such as “Fuck Israel. Free Palestine,” and led the crowd in chants of “Free Palestine.”

At Glastonbury in the UK, one of the world’s most storied music festivals, Bob Vylan took the stage and led the audience in chanting “Free, free Palestine” and “Death, death to the IDF.” Festival organizers reminded everyone that “there is no place at Glastonbury for antisemitism, hate speech or incitement to violence,” and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer criticized the “appalling hate speech.” 

According to a friend who attended the Newport Folk Festival, an emcee held up a Palestinian flag, and the crowd roared its approval. Again, according to friends who attended, this past summer, at Tanglewood, in the quiet Jewish Berkshires, Graham Nash stopped his music in the middle of his set to declare that what is happening in Gaza is a genocide — again, to widespread applause.

And now there is Bono.

Oh, no. U2?

No contemporary rock artist has Bono’s resume of activism. He has championed debt relief for African nations; co-founded campaigns like ONE and DATA to fight poverty and disease; and has spoken before political leaders.  

Musician Bono. (Video screen grab)

That is how we should interpret his recent criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in an interview published in U2’s fanzine, Propaganda, alongside the band’s new EP, “Days of Ash.”

Days of Ash is a martyrology. It features songs about the killing of Sarina Esmailzadeh by Iranian security forces in 2022, the fatal shooting of Renee Good by an ICE agent and a song that memorializes Palestinian activist Awdah Hathaleen, who was killed by an Israeli settler in the West Bank in July.

After Oct. 7, Bono described the massacre as “evil.” He paid tribute to the hundreds of “beautiful kids” murdered at the Nova music festival during a performance. But as it all unfolded, Bono came to believe Netanyahu’s response to Oct. 7 and the ensuing war in Gaza was one of “sweeping brutality.”

He has gone further than the typical condemnation of the Gaza war. He has looked at the right wing manifestations in Israel and, in the recent interview, laments that Judaism was “being slandered by far-right fundamentalists from within its own community.”

“While I’m someone who is a student of, and certainly reveres, the teachings in many of the great faiths, I come from the Judeo-Christian tradition and so I feel on safe ground when I suggest: There has never been a moment where we needed the moral force of Judaism more than right now, and yet, it has rarely in modern times been under such siege.”

This is not the first time Bono has turned his gaze toward the Middle East. At the 2025 Ivor Novello Awards, he said: “Hamas, release the hostages, stop the war. Israel, be released from Benjamin Netanyahu and the far-right fundamentalists that twist your sacred texts.”

You might resent such criticism coming from an Irish gentile rock star. You might resent the unrelenting chorus of hectoring that comes from the cultural left, from oh-so-enlightened celebrities who somehow forget to include Hamas in their moral laundry list.

But, Bono’s voice is not the voice of an enemy. It is the voice of someone who believes Judaism possesses moral power — and fears what is happening to that moral power. 

Because consider that there are many Jews who would join Bono in this chorus — Israelis and diaspora figures alike. There are many Orthodox rabbis who have blown the shofar on this outrage against Judaism. Leaders across the Jewish world have described the influence of figures like Smotrich and Ben-Gvir as a hillul ha-shem, a desecration of God’s name.

Notice, please, what Bono is not doing. He is not demonizing Israel or Zionism. He is not casting aspersions on the Jewish people. Quite the opposite. He speaks as someone who has great sympathy for Judaism and the Jewish state, but balanced with his passion for peace.

One of the songs on the album, “The Tears of Things,” contains a striking lyric referencing the Holocaust: “Six million voices silenced in just four years, the silent song of Christendom, so loud everybody hears.”

Finally, let us give Bono credit where it’s due. One track on his new EP features Nigerian singer Adeola Fayehun reciting the anti-war poem “Wildpeace,” by Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai. In today’s climate, that is an act of courage — not least because I love Amichai’s work.

Here is the poem “Wildpeace,” on which the song is based:

Not the peace of a cease-fire
not even the vision of the wolf and the lamb,
but rather
as in the heart when the excitement is over
and you can talk only about a great weariness…

The poem asks a simple yet profound question: What does real peace look like?

Amichai teaches us that peace is not merely a ceasefire, not an idyllic vision of enemies curled up together without conflict, nor a noisy parade of slogans and politics. He imagines a peace born of weariness, of bodies and hearts grown tired of war — a peace like relief, like something earned.

There is that line that moves me most — and I would adopt it into my prayers:

“And the howl of the orphans is passed from one generation to the next, as in a relay race: the baton never falls.”

Like memory itself — passed down through centuries and sorrows.

The U2 song that has always moved me most is “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For.” Like the band, I still haven’t found what I’m looking for — a world in which music festivals are once again places of shared humanity rather than tribal divides; a world in which political anguish does not become an invitation to erase the humanity of others; a world in which Jews and Palestinians — and all who long for dignity — can at last lay down their batons.

Until then, I will keep listening, keep arguing, keep loving Israel enough to criticize it and loving Judaism enough to demand better of it.

At Brazil's Carnival, the country's religions fight for respect on a global stage

(RNS) — Carnival, a spectacle celebrating African deities and Catholic saints alike, has become a battleground for religious groups in Brazil.

A performer from the Grande Rio samba school parades on a float during Carnival celebrations at the Sambadrome in Rio de Janeiro, Wednesday, Feb. 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Silvia Izquierdo)

Helen Teixeira
February 20, 2026
RNS


(RNS) — Rio de Janeiro’s lavish Carnival parades, which burst to life in the days before Lent begins, are famous for their colorful costumes, giant floats and the driving rhythm of samba that is a hallmark of Brazilian culture and a magnet for tourists from around the globe. Each parade is produced by one of Rio’s samba schools, which work year-round to prepare them, and each has its own “plot” — enredo in Brazilian Portuguese — that guides its aesthetic. Themes range from tributes to historical figures or artists to pop culture to social and political critique.

These parades all compete on craftsmanship, choreography, rhythmic precision, narrative coherence and the poetic quality of their original song lyrics. They are broadcast nationwide and make headlines around the world.

What is less known about the samba communities behind the parades is their Afro-Catholic religiosity — Afro-Brazilian spirituality that coexists with popular Catholicism: Each school has an orixá — an African deity and a catholic saint of devotion — and at the altars found in the rehearsal halls, the schools’ spiritual guides perform rituals and Masses.

“They are recreational organizations, but religion is present in their social life throughout the year,” said Lucas Bártolo, anthropologist and author of a study titled, “On the Altar of Samba: Religion in the World of Carnival.” “Both the worship of orixás and the devotion to Catholic saints organize the religious life of carnival groups and ground their symbolic dimension.”

In Brazil, as in other Latin American countries, the Catholicism of the Iberian Peninsula arrived with colonization. The church maintained strong links with the state, setting dates and festivals that structured the calendar. Carnival begins the Saturday before Ash Wednesday and ends on Shrove Tuesday, also known as Fat Tuesday, or Mardi Gras, before Lent’s 40 days of fasting start.

“It is a festive period, deeply religious, representing an opposition between Carnival and Lent, which is very strong in Iberian culture, and has also been appropriated by African-derived groups,” Bártolo said.

Performers from the Mocidade samba school parade on a float during Carnival celebrations at the Sambadrome in Rio de Janeiro, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Bruna Prado)

Afro-Brazilian religions have interacted with Catholicism and Christian festivals since the Portuguese arrived, reinterpreting the colonial religion through their own practices and worldviews, even observing aspects of Lent.

“The origins of Carnival in Brazil are linked to enslaved Africans who were brought here and came together to create samba using percussion instruments,” Aydano André Motta, journalist, screenwriter, writer and Carnival researcher, told Religion News Service. “Samba gave rise to samba schools as community spaces in the neighborhoods where these people settled after abolition — predominantly low-income communities, known as favelas.



“Every samba school has always included a priest or priestess from Candomblé or Umbanda,” Motta added, referring to two dominant Afro-Brazilian religions. “The social dynamics of samba schools are guided by (their) rituals.”

Before official parade competitions began in the 1930s, and before state authorities, the media, wealthy classes, corporate sponsors and tourists became involved, the samba schools were confined mostly to homes in the Afro-Brazilian community.

The rhythms of Carnival are derived from the drumming that is central to communication and spirit invocation in Africa. “The instruments used in ritual spaces are the same as those in the school’s percussion section,” said Carlos Monteiro, a journalist and sociologist from the Federal Fluminense University.

Samba brought together the descendants and the percussion of Africans with distinct languages and cultures. “What the diaspora separated, cultural diasporic practice united,” Monteiro said.

FILE – Performers from the Mangueira samba school parade with a depiction of a crucifixion during Carnival celebrations at the Sambadrome in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Monday, Feb. 24, 2020. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)

Of the two main branches of Afro-Brazilian traditions, Candomblé focuses on orixás, while Umbanda is more given to blending Catholic and Indigenous spirituality, religious mixing that emerged when, under slavery, African practices were forbidden. The orixás each have Catholic equivalents: “Oxum is syncretized with Our Lady of Conception, Oxóssi with Saint Sebastian, Xangô with Saint Peter, and more than any other, Ogum with Saint George. Ogum is the orixá of war and metals, and Saint George is the most popular saint in Rio, and therefore in the samba schools,” said Motta.

The Catholic Church’s relationship with Carnival and samba schools has historically involved periods of “absolute rejection and condemnation of public discourse, including attempts to prohibit and criminalize these practices,” according to Bártolo. In Rio, city laws were proposed to restrict or regulate Catholic symbols in parades, claiming they profaned sacred images, and schools have often had to modify images of Mary and other Catholic saints to avoid clashes with religious authorities.

In 1989, when a samba school called Beija-Flor planned to depict Christ as a beggar, the church prevailed, but the float entered the Sambadrome — the stadium built for viewing the parades — covered in black trash bags with a banner reading, “Even forbidden, look upon us.”

The opposition has a racial element, given that samba schools have always been predominantly Black institutions. At times, this opposition takes theological form, particularly in the demonization of Afro-Brazilian deities. Exú, a central figure in Candomblé and Umbanda, is a messenger between the human and divine worlds and has long been associated with the devil by Christian groups. But Afro-Brazilian religions, which don’t have a concept of absolute evil, see Exú as playful.

Although African-derived religiosity has been embedded in samba schools since their origins, it was only in the 1960s that they began to explicitly incorporate Black Brazilian culture into their plots. “From there, numerous parade themes highlighted Black history and figures who had previously been invisible in Brazil’s official history,” Motta said.

FILE – Priestess Laura D’Oya Yalorixa, center, takes part in an Umbanda religious ceremony at the Casa de Caridade Santa Barbara Iansa temple in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Saturday, Feb. 6, 2021. The faithful of the Umbanda religion, brought to the Americas by West African slaves, perform spiritual protection rituals as part of pre-Carnival traditions. (AP Photo/Bruna Prado)

Under Dom Orani Tempesta, archbishop of Rio de Janeiro since 2009, and with the election of Pope Francis, the Argentine bishop who championed the Amazon and its culture, the church came to support Catholic-themed parade narratives. “Today, it is common for Masses to be held at samba school headquarters, for Carnival groups to be received in sanctuaries and for their flags to be blessed in churches,” Bártolo said, though he added that the rapprochment still has its limits.


The growth of evangelical Christianity in Brazil since the 1980s has added a new dimension to the religious disputes over Carnival. Initially, evangelicals avoided the celebrations, organizing spiritual retreats during this period. Later, as they became more publicly active and aligned with conservative Catholics in criticizing Carnival, they drew political and social criticism from samba schools, while framing themselves as victims of religious persecution.

RELATED: Brazilian evangelical Christians disrupt pre-Lenten partying with ‘Gospel Carnival’

When Rio elected Marcelo Crivella, bishop of the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, mayor in 2017, “he tried, very hard, to destroy samba schools and Carnival,” Motta said.

The debate intensified recently when Pastor Gil, an evangelical Rio de Janeiro legislator, proposed a bill that would ban the use of sacred images or representations deemed disrespectful to Christian, Catholic or Evangelical faith in Carnival parades and events.

Still, Carnival has served as a space for coexistence of Brazil’s wildly divergent social, racial and cultural differences, allowing marginalized groups to gain legitimacy as they express their culture. In recent years, the parades have emphasized Afro-Brazilian religions, as if to say, Bártolo said, “This is religion, too, not just Afro culture or Brazilian culture.”

“The people of samba schools are experts in resistance,” said Motta. “They survived slavery, structural racism, state violence and state repression. The schools survived and will continue surviving.”

New Orleans celebrates Mardi Gras, the indulgent conclusion of Carnival season

NEW ORLEANS, La. (AP) — Mardi Gras, also known as Fat Tuesday, marks the climax and end of the weekslong Carnival season and a final chance for indulgence, feasting and revelry before the Christian Lent period of sacrifice and reflection.

A member of the Krewe of Zulu offers up coconuts on Mardi Gras Day, Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026 in New Orleans. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton)

Sara Cline
February 18, 2026

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — People leaned out of wrought iron balconies, hollering the iconic phrase “Throw me something, Mister” as a massive Mardi Gras parade rolled down New Orleans’ historic St. Charles Avenue on Tuesday.

Mardi Gras, also known as Fat Tuesday, marks the climax and end of the weekslong Carnival season and a final chance for indulgence, feasting and revelry before the Christian Lent period of sacrifice and reflection. The joyous goodbye to Carnival always falls the day before Ash Wednesday.

In Louisiana’s most populous city, which is world-famous for its Mardi Gras bash, people donned green, gold and purple outfits, with some opting for an abundance of sequins and others showing off homemade costumes.

The revelers began lining the streets as the sun rose. They set up chairs, coolers, grills and ladders — offering a higher vantage point.

As marching bands and floats filled with women wearing massive feathered headdresses passed by, the music echoing through the city streets, people danced and cheered. Others sipped drinks, with many opting for adult concoctions on the day of celebration rather than the usual morning coffee.

Each parade has its signature “throws” — trinkets that include plastic beads, candy, doubloons, stuffed animals, cups and toys. Hand-decorated coconuts are the coveted item from Zulu, a massive parade named after the largest ethnic group in South Africa.

As a man, dressed like a crawfish — including red fabric claws for hands — caught one of the coconuts, he waved it around, the gold glitter on the husk glistening in the sun.

Sue Mennino was dressed in a white Egyptian-inspired costume, complete with a gold headpiece and translucent cape. Her face was embellished with glitter and electric blue eyeshadow.

“The world will be here tomorrow, but today is a day off and a time to party,” Mennino said.

The party isn’t solely confined to the parade route. Throughout the French Quarter, people celebrated in the streets, on balconies and on the front porches of shotgun-style homes.

One impromptu parade was led by a man playing a washboard instrument and dressed as a blue alligator — his paper-mache tail dragging along the street, unintentionally sweeping up stray beads with it. A brass band played “The Saints” as people danced.

In Jackson Square, the costumed masses included a man painted from head to toe as a zebra, a group cosplaying as Hungry Hungry Hippos from the tabletop game and a diver wearing an antique brass and copper helmet.

“The people are the best part,” said Martha Archer, who was dressed as Madame Leota, the disembodied medium whose head appears within a crystal ball in the Haunted Mansion attraction at Disney amusement parks.

Archer’s face was painted blue and her outfit was a makeshift table that came up to her neck — giving the appearance that she was indeed a floating head.

“Everybody is just so happy,” she explained.

The good times will roll not just in New Orleans but across the state, from exclusive balls to the Cajun French tradition of the Courir de Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday Run — a rural event in Central Louisiana featuring costumed participants performing, begging for ingredients and chasing live chickens to be cooked in a communal gumbo.

Parades are also held in other Gulf Coast cities such as Mobile, Alabama, and Pensacola, Florida, and there are other world-renowned celebrations in Brazil and Europe.

One of the quirkiest is an international Pancake Day competition pitting the women of Liberal, Kansas, against the women of Olney, England. Pancakes are used because they were thought to be a good way for Christians to consume the fat they were supposed to give up during the 40 days before Easter.

Contestants must carry a pancake in a frying pan and flip the pancake at the beginning and end of the 415-yard (380-meter) race.

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.