| By Paul Motter
Last week's headlines said a well-known Rap Music artist, Foxy Brown, was thrown off a Royal Caribbean cruise ship. The stories read that she showed up for a manicure three hours late and subsequently "threw a tantrum" when she was told she could not be accommodated for the rest of the day.
According to news reports, she was onboard the Tom Joyner Morning Show group cruise hosted by the popular radio D.J. After the tantrum, Foxy was escorted back to her stateroom by ship security officers and confined there until the ship arrived at Grand Cayman the next day where she left the ship - halfway through the cruise itinerary.
Most in the cruise business accepted the story, because we know people are put off of ships for bad behavior all the time, but in this case Foxy Brown now claims she intended to disembark in Grand Cayman all along, and the stories of her being "thrown off the ship" are simply "lies."
Royal Caribbean confirmed that Foxy was scheduled to leave the ship in Grand Cayman, but was she confined to her stateroom by the ship's security officers? Initially, D.J. Joyner said definitely yes, but he has since backed away.
Either way, let's just say Foxy (real name Inga DeCarlo Fung Marchand) takes her personal grooming habits very seriously and apparently can go bananas at the sight of a roll-about hooded hair dryer.
In 2004 Foxy was arrested for assaulting two hotel workers who told her there was no clothes iron available. Foxy received a 30-days suspended sentence. In 2004 Foxy attacked two manicurists over a disputed $20 surcharge and received three years probation. In 2007 she pleaded not guilty to assaulting a beauty supply store employee. She eventually spent a year in prison for parole violation.
In reading Foxy's bio it seems she has a history of denial where her temper is concerned.
It Can Happen to You
Everyone should be aware of what Foxy now knows - cruise ships will not tolerate bad behavior - and they will put you off the ship. We have reported about many people disembarked in distant foreign ports for different reasons over the years. On the high seas, the ship's captain is the final authority with the right to put off any person at any time or place.
Last October, a well-to-do couple was asked to leave a Cunard Line ship after they reportedly made crude and profane remarks about other passengers. After some deliberation, the captain allowed them to finish the cruise, but confined to their stateroom.
Last August, ten passengers were not so lucky. After creating a brawling melee in the shipboard nightclub they were put off a Carnival cruise ship in Costa Maya, Mexico, the next day. Carnival says it made the travel arrangements for all ten people and their luggage to get home, but we assume the pugilists had to pay Carnival back - per the standard cruise contract.
An Australian couple claims they were kicked off of a Holland America cruise just for making a joke about jumping overboard. Ironically, the couple was trying to convince the purser's office to grant them a stateroom upgrade at the time. They had started the cruise in Vancouver and were put off the ship in Juneau, Alaska. They had to pay their own way home, after an evaluation at a local hospital to determine if the husband was indeed suicidal. The hospital said he wasn't, but they were still not allowed back on the cruise ship.
We have even received email from people who were denied boarding the cruise ship at all, solely because they admitted to having a slight cough a few days prior to the cruise departure. Cruise lines are very careful about not allowing people harboring viruses onboard their ships, but in this case the man didn't even get a chance to explain that he was never actually sick, nor was he checked by a doctor.
In other words - yes, you can be "kicked off" of a cruise ship - probably a lot more easily than you think. Similar to the airlines that do not tolerate jokes about bombs or guns, cruise lines take nothing for granted when it comes to shipboard security. Many people ask if you will be ejected for trying to "smuggle booze" onboard and the answer is "no." The main determining factor is whether the cruise line feels you will be disruptive or a safety risk to other passengers or crewmembers onboard.
You can comment on Foxy Brown's cruise adventure here: Foxy Brown kicked off Royal Caribbean cruise ship after nail salon tantrum
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