Chris Brown Apologizes for GMA Outburst, But Still Plays Defense

Mar 24, 2011

Yesterday Good Morning America confirmed a "very angry" Chris Brown stormed out of their studios, leaving a broken dressing room window behind. Shortly after Brown made an appearance on BET’s "106 & Park" apologizing to ABC’s staff.

"First of all, I want to apologize to anybody who was startled in the office, or anybody who was offended or really looked, and [was] disappointed at my actions," Brown told the hosts of "106 & Park."

"I’m disappointed in the way I acted."

But then he proceeded to defend his actions by saying he "just let off steam" and that he "didn’t physically hurt anyone." Brown also defends himself by arguing he was there to discuss his new album "F.A.M.E." and not his past.

"I didn’t physically hurt anyone, I didn’t try to hurt anyone, I just wanted to release the anger that I had inside me because I felt that I worked so hard for this music and I felt like people kept just trying to take it away from me."

But even if Brown didn’t hurt anyone the larger issue is he couldn’t maintain his composure — according to ABC a cooler was thrown on the floor and a window was broken by the time Brown left their studios. Colorlines.com’s Gender Matters blogger Akiba Solomon says Brown needs more therapy and less F.A.M.E.

Brown, unlike many men in his community, can afford quality, effective, consistent mental health care without crazy-making bureaucratic nonsense. He’s also in a unique position to circumvent the cultural stigma. He may have heard some variety of "black men don’t go to therapy, they go to the barbershop," but his healing (in theory, at least) is literally court-ordered. His friends, family, community, fans, stans and future romantic partners already know about his anger management and mental health needs.

Brown is saying his representatives agreed to discuss the album and became upset when Robin Roberts’ began asking questions that he felt weren’t promoting the album. "I felt like they told us this just so they could get us on the show so they can exploit me," Brown said. "So I took it very, very hard and I really kinda kept my composure throughout the whole interview, although you can see me upset, I kept my composure, I did my performance."

On Good Morning America yesterday, Roberts said that she was shocked at Brown’s reaction after the interview. She explained to viewers that Brown had agreed to questions before the interview started. "Anytime we have a guest here on the program we let them know ahead of time, the topics, the subject matter that we are going to discuss and I was shocked like everybody else."