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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 15, 2024

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Yet, after having crowd-funded an album set to be released in 2020, they scrapped the release of the album and started sharing various links to BLM- and CRT-related “resources” and encouraging their fans to direct their money and attention to those causes instead. Did they do so because they’ve been undercover progressives the whole time and felt morally obligated to speak up? Or did they do so because they were afraid of the optics and potential backlash of raising money for a goofy ska album when black people are literally being murdered and they need your money to save their lives? (Or is it some combination of both?)

I know nothing about these folks beyond what you wrote in this comment, but isn't there a 3rd, IMHO more parsimonious, option, that they are recent converts and display the fervor present only in such people? Certainly in the past 20 years, I've seen no shortage of people who have recently converted to this particular faith with the result being going from fairly neutral apolitical/milquetoast generic liberal to single-minded fanatics cheering on violence against dissenters and denigrating peers for not clapping loudly enough at the latest stunning and brave person/organization to stand up against the Oppressors. This kind of blowing up an existing project and replacing it with calls to funnel all the resources towards supporting the organizations that run this faith would fit right into that same pattern.